Layla’s fingers danced across the strings of her lute, drawing a quick, airy melody from the instrument. Beside her, Hasni rapped her palms across her drum, adding a steady, syncopated rhythm to the song. Up on the table, Aisha turned and swayed her body in time with the music, the rings and bracelets on her body jingling merrily, adding their own sweet sound to the song.

Around the three performers the crowd of tavern goers: sailors off their ships, longshoremen from the docks, cheered and clapped, especially when Aisha spun; the hem of her brightly colored dress lifting up, revealing a considerable amount of her long, shapely legs. The neckline of her dress was cut low and tight to emphasize the young woman’s firm, round breasts. Had the tavern’s half-orc bouncer not been standing nearby, holding his stout oak cudgel, the men might have tried to grab the pretty dancer and tear her clothes off. As it was, she had to move quickly to dodge a few reaching hands now and then.

Aisha was a young human girl of striking beauty. She had a dancer’s long, graceful body, along with considerable women’s charms. Her dark brown skin and features marked her as a native of Sekairne, a land on the inner coast of the great southern continent. Her straight, black hair was worn in a long braid, woven with brightly polished brass rings that hung all the way down her back to her shapely bottom. It swayed and spun with her movements. The two musicians beside her were a close match for the dancer in looks. No surprise, given the three were sisters.

The song came to an end. As the last strumming notes of Layla’s lute faded away, Aisha froze in a final pose, arms outstretched in a bow to the crowd. The men cheered and clapped their hands. Aisha thanked them for their applause. Others threw copper and silver coins onto the tabletop. She thanked them even more enthusiastically. One man, perhaps lucky at dice tonight and hoping to be lucky in another way, dropped a small gold guilder onto the table. Aisha flashed him a smile that was purely show, thanking him, without encouraging his hopes too much.

“Alright, you sorry sons of whore, closing time! Get your last drinks and get out before Durga throws you out!” Harga, the owner of the tavern, called out, coming into the room. With some grumbling, the crowd began to disperse, some heading for the door, others to buy a final mug of wine from the slave girl behind the bar. This late in the evening, it would be the worst vintage in the house, some foul goat’s piss little better than vinegar. The sailors were too drunk at this point to tell the difference.

“So, how’s the take?” Harga asked, walking towards the table. Aisha had dismounted and was counting up the coins the sailors had thrown at her. “Not bad.” The man said, eying the pile of coinage. He quickly scooped up the gold guilder. “This will cover your room and board this week and this…” He swept the rest of the coins into his money pouch. “…will go to paying your debt to me…”

Aisha watched the money disappear with a quiet sigh. “How soon will we be squared, sir?” She asked in as polite a tone she could manage.

“Not yet, my dear. Not yet. I spent quite a bit for healers, for medicine…room and board for you three. It was quite a sum.” He replied, condescendingly. “A few more nights like this.” He jingled the money bag. “And I’m sure your debt will be paid off in no time. Just be patient. Unless you’d rather spurn my hospitality and try some other way of raising the money you and your sisters owe me.”

Aisha glanced over her shoulder at Layla and Hasni, who were packing up their instruments for the night. She shook her head. “We’ll be patient.”

“That’s a smart girl.” Harga said, grinning. “Until tomorrow.” He turned and crossed back towards the bar. “Dinah! Tollah! Talley up the inventory. See how much wine we’ll need to bring up from the cellar for tomorrow.” He ordered the inn’s two slaves.

“Yes master.” The two girls said, bowing.

“Durag!” Harga called to the bouncer. “When they’re done, see they give this sty a good cleaning before you feed them and cage them up for the night. Then make sure you lock the doors and windows tight.” The bouncer nodded, giving a low grunt of acknowledgement.

“Dr’zab...” Aisha muttered under her breath after the man had left. In the tongue of her homeland, it loosely translated to “one who had known the charms of a goat.” She turned and walked over to her sisters.

“That gold would have covered our room and board for a year, not a week!” Layla complained. “That Dr’zab is cheating us! Surely we could find somewhere else to stay.”

“How?” Hasnia asked her, motioning for the other girl to be quiet. Durag was still in the room, watching the slaves clean up and he reported everything he heard to his master. “Harga owns every tavern, inn and flophouse along the docks, in truth, if not in name. Anywhere we go, we’d still be under this thumb.” She whispered. They had no money to find any better lodgings elsewhere in the city and would never have it, with their host taking every coin they earned.  

They collected their things and made their way up the stairs to the living space over the tavern that Harga extracted such an outrageous rent from them. There was a single bed, with a straw mattress that took up half the space. The other half was taken up by a rickety wooden table and four wobbly stools. A small clay oil lamp sat in the center, shedding some dim light in the dark room.

“Still probably better than the slave pens downstairs.” Aisha thought. Harga had a small iron cage down in the tavern’s cellar, alongside the wine barrels and the rest of the establishment’s inventory. According to the two girls who spent their night’s trapped inside it was cramped and cold and when a sea squall blew through the port the basement often flooded. But if the sisters weren’t careful, though, they might end up in that pitch-black dark cage with the other slaves.  

Three years ago, the sisters had signed on with a troupe of traveling performers, left Sekairne and crossed the Inner Sea to the Northern continent. They’d traveled across the civilized lands, performing in the cities of Humans, Elves and Dwarves. For a while, everything went well. At each city and town crowds greeted them with applause. Silver flowed into the troupe’s coffers. They’d felt that, after a few years the sisters might return home richer then they’d dare dream.

Then, about a year into their contract, the performers ran into trouble while cross through the mountains. Storms brewed up and rockslides closed the pass for several weeks. The leader of the troupe took ill and died. The local porters they had hired ran off with all of the horses and most of the money they had made. The troupe had broken up, everyone heading their own way. Aisha and her sisters were left stranded alone and penniless in a strange land.

The next two years had been hard for the three. They’d managed, somehow to get to a small town where they could perform and raise enough money to stay alive and eventually arrange passage with a merchant caravan to a larger city. Slowly, the sisters had worked their way southward, pausing in each town and village long enough to raise money to get them to the next, hoping to reach a port and find passage on a ship bound for home. Sometimes, they would get lucky and it would only be a few days before they had enough money to move on. Other times, they could be there for weeks or months, watching every copper piece and looking to the day when they would finally come home.

“Home…” Aisha whispered quietly. They’d come so close. Trialle lay on the southern coast. Ships regularly crossed over to the southern lands. With plenty of bored sailors fresh from the sea with silver in their pockets looking for entertainment, the sisters figured a week or two at the most would be needed to raise enough money for passage on one of the merchant galleons.

Instead, the three had misjudged, arriving in winter when storms savaged the inner sea. Kraken sightings off the coast meant no ships were willing to put out to sea till they had moved on. The few sailors in town had already been ashore for weeks and most of their money had already gone to the wine sellers and dockside brothel slaves. What money the sisters had saved or managed to collect was quickly spent on food and lodgings. Little came in to replace it. But spring, better weather and the promise of new ships with crews of sailors long at sea eager to spend their pay, lay just ahead.

Then, just when they were so close, disaster had struck. The last gasps of winter had blown through the city, freezing everything. Layla and Hasni had both fallen gravely ill. They couldn’t perform, couldn’t raise money and they barely had enough to keep a roof over their heads and keep from being kicked out into the frozen streets, let alone pay an herbalist for medicine or a wizard for a healing spell. Aisha didn’t know what to do.

Then, a seeming stroke of good fortune. Just as Aisha was at her most desperate, she was approached by a man named Harga. He told her he owned a dockside tavern. He offered to lodge the sisters there, and pay for medicine and a healer and in return, the three would perform at the tavern when summer came and the trade fleets and their crews of sailors arrived, and they could repay the debt.

He then produced a sheaf of parchment, written in text Aisha couldn’t read, but which, he told her, spelled out the agreement they had made. A formality only, he said, and persuaded her to make her mark at the bottom, beside his. To Aisha’s surprise and delight, he had been true to his word, spending lavishly on expensive medicines and hiring the finest healers in the city and soon Layla and Hasni were well once more.

What she hadn’t known then, and what Harga likely thought they still didn’t know, was the law of Traille regarding contracts and debts. If the debt was not paid by the specified time, the holder of a debt or a broken contract could present it to the city fathers and claim anything the debtor had as repayment, even his wife of children as slaves, even himself, if there was no other way of paying it back. The sisters had been all but penniless when Harga approached them, the last of their money spent. All they had were their instruments and the threadbare clothes on their backs. The stage jewelry they wore was just that; stage jewelry, polished brass and cut glass that looked rich but was worth only pennies. The only thing that could pay their debt was their bodies.

That was Harga’s plan, they knew now. He would let them work through the summer, and when they couldn’t pay him back what they owed, which they never would at the exorbitant rate he charged them room and board and the amount he’d spent, or claimed to have spent on medicine, he would take them to court and put them in chains to perform for his tavern forever.

As they found out, Harga was far from the humble proprietor of one simple tavern. He was the boss of the whole waterfront, who had a stake, if not outright ownership in every tavern, dice house, fighting pit and brothel along the docks, staffed by hundreds of slave girls. Not all of them had been bought at the Three Crowns slave fair. Many of them had been freewomen who had fallen to one of his contracts. One of them had warned the sisters, giving them a chance, albeit a slight one, of escaping the same fate.

“How much do we have?” Layla asked. From a hiding spot under a loose floorboard, the sisters withdrew a small purse. They spread the coins from within out onto the table. Copper, with one or two silver coins mixed in. The sisters added the handful of coins they’d been able to sneak from tonight’s performance without Harga or Durag noticing, to the pile. It made for a meagre sum, all told. Hardly more than they’d had when they first arrived in Trialle, many long months ago.      

“Will this be enough?” Hasni asked.

“It will be rough passage aboard a small boat, but that might be enough for passage home.” Layla replied, adding particular emphasis to the last word. After so long, home seemed some forgotten dream to the sisters, it hardly seemed possible they would ever make it.

“Even if it isn’t, it might be enough to get us somewhere…anywhere that isn’t here. When we’re away from Harga, we’ll have more luck raising the money we need for the last journey.” Aisha replied. They bagged the coins and waited until everything was silent below. The slaves had finished the day’s toil and were now getting what meagre sleep they could in the slave pens downstairs before the next day’s work was upon them. Durag slept down in the main room, always keeping one ear open should a thief try and break in to steal something from his master.

Quietly, the sisters eased open the room’s shutters. A cool night’s breeze blew into the room with a faint hint of summer’s warmth and a strong smell of the sea. Hasni and Layla got out a coil of rope they had managed to steal from the inn’s storeroom a few nights ago. Aisha, meanwhile, threw a plain brown traveler’s cloak around her shoulders. She pulled the hood up over her head. Her features marked her easily enough as a foreigner and the sister’s couldn’t afford word getting back to Harga they were trying to leave the city. If he knew they planned to flee, he’d clap them in chains at once. Fortunately, the night was still cool enough a woman wearing a hood and cloak would not look too out of place walking down the streets.

Tucking the pouch of coins into the folds of her cloak, Aisha took the rope. Her sisters held it steady as the dancer nimbly climbed down to the street below. When her feet touched the cobblestone street, still warm from early in the day, she let go of the rope and waved up at her sisters, their faces peering from the window above. Silently, they waved back, pulling the rope back into the room and closed the shutters.

Aisha turned and started down the narrow, winding streets. A few nightly excursions previously had given the young woman an idea of the layout of the city, or at least the docks. Fortunately, in a port town as bustling as Trialle, the city never entirely closed down. Many of the inns and lodging houses remained late into the night, to accommodate late arrivals off ships or coming down to the coast.

And despite the ordinances of the city leaders, the establishments careering to the sailor’s vices remained open until the early morning light, doing a thriving business. Some buildings with closed doors and shutters drawn shut never the less had a steady stream of men coming and going. Others were more brazen, light blazing from their windows, cheerful music and the sounds of revelry spilling out into the street to entice others in as well. The dockside watchmen ignored them the same as their quieter brethren, bribed by the owners to look the other way or unwilling to risk the brawl that would erupt should the watchmen try and turn out a whole tavern’s worth of rowdy, drunken sailors.

Aisha wondered into the crowd of sailors and mingled, keeping an ear open for word of anyone who might know of a ship sailing soon. She said little and kept her head down. Besides the risk of Harga, the young woman didn’t want to be taken for a dockside whore. Like any port town, Trialle had plenty of them. At the brothels, bare breasted women leaned out of the windows, enticing sailors in. Others wandered the streets, leading lusty sailors to a nearby alley, maybe to pleasure him or perhaps so a hidden accomplice could club the unlucky man over the head and relieve him of his coins. Most were slaves, who had no choice; they no longer owned their own bodies. Aisha averted her gaze, praying that would not be the fate of her and her sisters…

After a while, Aisha picked one of the nicer looking places along the dockside and went inside. It had a richer décor and the clientele were a cut above the masses of common sailors; captains and officers off the merchant ships, as well as local traders with money come to do business with the seamen. A couple of musicians played a local tune in one corner, but they were ignored by most of the clientele who huddled around the tables talking with one another, discussing business and arranging deals.

“What will it be, my Lady?” A young woman asked from the serving bar as Aisha walked in. She was a pretty young maid, from the far north with her pale skin and fair blonde hair tied back in a long ponytail. She was dressed in a skimpy white tunic and around her neck was locked a slender silver collar stamped with the sigil of the tavern that owned her.

“A glass of wine.” Aisha asked, reluctantly counting out the copper coins to pay for her drink. It was a necessary expense, she knew, the people who ran this place would look amiss if she tried to come in without paying for something and this was her best lead on finding a ship her sisters and her could book passage on, but the cost still hurt. Already, almost half of the money they had scrounged today was gone on a small ceramic mug of middling-quality wine. As Aisha waited for her drink, she overheard a conversation between two men further down the bar.

“I told you already, I don’t know.” The first man said, anxiously. He was a short, grey haired figured wearing clothes of middling prosperity. The owner of the tavern, Aisha guessed. He was talking to a burly man who towered over the short tavern-keeper. He wore the livery of the City Watch, but his clothes were of a finer cut and cloth then the average guard and on his belt and neck and wrist was the glint of gold and silver ornamentation. A captain or someone of importance rather than the common patrolman.  

“I already know Parrel’s missing daughter and some of her friends were slumming it down by the docks the night they went missing.” The Watchman told him. “I have a wine trader from Parth who swore upon half a dozen gods that he saw them at this place. Tell me what you know? Did they meet with anyone? What time did they leave?”

“I don’t know anything.” The tavern owner told him. “I didn’t see anything amiss that night. Ask any of my staff…” He waved a hand towards the slave who was serving Aisha her drink.  

“Oh, I will.” The watchman said. He turned towards Aisha. “You, maid! Were you here three nights ago?”

“Wh-what? Um…no…this is the first time I’ve come here.” Aisha replied, shrinking back from the man’s intense look. She hoped the man wouldn’t note her face and remember her. Harga had a small army of the city patrolmen in his pay, bribing them to ignore his businesses while harassing and shutting down those few places that weren’t under his thumb. This man could easily be one of his paid men.

“Alright. Take care as you head home, girl. We’ve had half a dozen go missing in the last month. And that’s just local girls; merchant and craftsmen’s daughters, even a nobleman’s girl. Who knows how many outsiders have gone missing with no one noticing. Could be the work of smugglers, snatching girls for Three Crowns. Hopefully the missing girls are still in the city and we find them before they’re shipped out. In the meantime, be cautious, stay on the main streets and report anything suspicious you see to the first watchman you run into.”

“Th-thank you…I will.” Aisha said in a quiet voice. “Another reason for us to leave this city as soon as we can…” She thought to herself, silently.

“Are you through disturbing my customers?” The tavern owner asked the Watchman in a disgruntled tone.

“Just trying to keep more innocent girls from going missing.” He shot back. As the two argued, Aisha quietly slipped away, crossing the main room. She looked around for a place to sit, all the while keeping her ears open for any word of a ship sailing for Sekairn soon. Over by the bar, the watch captain talked briefly with the serving staff. Clearly unsatisfied by their terse answers, he turned and stomped out of the tavern.
 
“I hear you are looking to hire passage on a ship.” A man asked, coming up and sitting down at the table.

The young woman looked around the room, trying not to show her startlement to the man. “What? Err…I might be.” She replied after a second’s thought. Silently, the young woman debated whether or not she could trust this man. “Actually, yes, I am looking for a ship. One going to Sekairn. One that leaves soon, hopefully.” She added, studying the man. He looked like a sailor; an officer, if not a captain.

“In a hurry to get home? Or maybe you’re hoping to leave before a contract comes due? Aisha is it?” The man said, grinning at the obvious shock on the younger girl’s face.

“How…” Aisha began, but stopped herself. “How much would passage cost? For three?” She studied the man’s face intently. Yes, she thought she recognized him as one of the sailors who had come to watch her sisters and her perform. His name was…Imrall, she thought. How he’d heard of their predicament, she didn’t know.

The man named a figure. It was higher then what they had, but not by as much as Aisha feared. “I wish I could ask for less, but I cannot. Helping three beauties escape from a man like Harga, while a noble task, could be trouble. If he were to hold a grudge, I wouldn’t be able to dock here ever again. Great risks require appropriate reward.” He told her.

“Fine. It’s a deal.” Aisha told him. Quietly, she hoped they could raise the rest of the money quickly.

The man grinned. “Good. Come down to the docks at dawn, two days from this morning hence. Look for the ship Sirene. And don’t be late. We sail with the morning tide whether you’re aboard or not.”

They shook hands, then the man stood from the table. Aisha tried to watch him leave, but he passed by a crowd coming in from the street and she lost sight of him. Aisha waited a few minutes, then she rose from the table and made her own way back to the tavern, cautious as before, but her pace was quicker, her step lighter. Two more days…then the three of them would be on their way home…

***  

“This is most disappointing.” Harga said, looking at the pile of coins on the table. Compared to the take two days ago it was noticeably smaller. The day before the earnings had not been any better. “I’d come to expect a lot more of you three.”

“I’m terribly sorry, sir.” Aisha said, her head bowed. She struggled to keep her tone quiet and subservient. Knowing she would be free of him after the next morning, Aisha found it difficult to hide her disgust of the foul man. “Just a little longer…” She thought.

“I spent lavishly when your sisters were sick…spared no expense…saved their lives!” Harga said, raising his voice. “Are you perhaps holding back on me? After all I’ve done for you?”

“Please sir!” Aisha said, trying to hide the fear in her voice. She prayed he wouldn’t order Durag the bouncer to search the three sisters. All of them had a couple dozen coins concealed in their clothes. The last two days, they had palmed a much greater portion of the day’s take, to try and raise the extra money they’d need to pay for passage board the Sirene. “Per-perhaps the sailors have seen us perform too many times before and are growing bored. I’m sure when a new ship comes in and some new sailors arrive, we’ll do better.”

“Yes…” Harga said, placated by her words or her submissive tone. “That’s probably it. And in the meantime, we should do something to get the others to pay attention again. If you were to dance without those clothes perhaps…” He reached out a hand towards Aisha.

“Sir!” Aisha said indignantly, moving backwards. The jingling of her stage jewelry masked the clinking of the coins concealed in her dress. “I would never!”

“Fine.” Harga replied with a shrug. “As you wish. It’s your choice.” He did not say, but Aisha knew, from his leering look what the older man was thinking; when she was his slave, she would no longer have a choice. He could do whatever he wanted with her and her sisters.

Harga turned and went to talk over the day’s business with Durag and the house slaves. After collecting their earnings, he left, closing and locking the door behind them.

Aisha joined her sisters. The three went up to their room. While Hasni gathered up their meagre belongings, making ready to depart. Layla and Aisha added the money they had palmed and added it up with their savings. Counting up the total, Aisha nodded. “It’s enough, barely, but it’s enough to get us home.”        

The three talked for a bit longer, their conversation always turning back to home, though by now memories of the city they had left many years ago now seemed more dream then reality.

“Do you think Osmi still sells those sugared dates in the western market?” Hasni asked.

“Why not, it’s only been three years?” Aisha told her.

“Well, in that case, the first thing I’ll do when we get home is buy a whole bag of them.”

“Do you think Abi is still in the city?” Layla said, wistfully. Abi was a young soldier on the city guard who had been sweet on the young musician and given her gifts. Though the three had had plenty of admirers before they came north, in this case, his affections had not been entirely one sided.

“Yes, and I’m sure he’s now captain of the Sontar’s Palace Guard and he’s married to a princess.” Hasni teased her sister. “But don’t worry, I’m sure he can find room for you in his harem somewhere…”

The girls laughed and teased each other until it grew late. Then, they settled into the room’s single bed and tried to get some sleep. Sleep did not want to come for Aisha, though. She was too worked up, excitement over the coming journey, worry if something went wrong and they found themselves stranded in the city for much longer. Maybe that was why she was awake, staring up into the darkness of the room, when she heard the faint scraping of metal from the door. Curious. It sounded almost like the sound of a key turning in the lock…

With a jolt of terror, Aisha sprang from the bed. In two bounding steps, she was across the room. She seized the door latch and pulled. As she feared, the door refused to budge. “Wake up!” Aisha whispered to her sisters. “Someone’s locked us in.”

“Harga?” Layla asked nervously, rising from the bed.

“Maybe, or maybe Durag…either means the same for us.” Aisha replied.

“He’s going to the magister to press his contract?” Hasni asked, her voice trembling.

‘For sure…Still, we probably have some time. Dawn is still a way off. I doubt a magister would get out of bed early for a man like Harga. He must suspect we’re planning something. He doesn’t want us running off early.”

“What about the window?” Layla suggested. “We’ve still got the rope.” Aisha walked over and rattled the shutters a moment.

“No good.” She said, shaking her head. “It’s barred, from the outside. He must have done it while we were performing.”

“What are we going to do?” Hasni asked. “We’ve got to escape somehow. I don’t want to end up a slave! Certainly not to a man like Harga!”

“And whatever we do, we need to do it quickly.” Aisha added, pacing around the room. “We have to be down at the docks before dawn or the Sirene will sail without us.”

For the next hour, the young woman paced the room, like a caged animal, trying to think of a way to get out of the room. They could try breaking down the door using the bed for a battering ram…but they’d still have to make it down the stairs to the front door past Harga and Durag, both of whom would have been warned by the noise. Harga was old and fat, but he could still overpower one of them and the sisters would have no chance of forcing their way past the half-orc bouncer.

If they could get into one of the other rooms adjacent to them, the windows would be unbarred and they could get down with the rope…provided the rooms were unoccupied. But, though the interior walls were of thin wood, the sisters had no tools to open a hole, and trying to break them down would only bring everyone running no less than forcing the door.

Layla, meanwhile, had busied herself trying to jimmy, lever, force or even magic the shutters open, trying anything she could think of, all in vain. “It’s no use!” She said, miserably. “For all I know, Harga had them nailed shut! We’re trapped!”

By now, a thin sliver of grey light was beginning to slip between the gaps in the shutters. Dawn was nearly upon them, and with it their last chance of ever leaving this city. Aisha sank to the bed, dejectedly. Hasni lay sprawled on it, staring up numbly.

“How are we going to get out of this, sis?” Hasni asked, in almost a pleading tone. “You’ve always gotten us out of trouble before. What do we do now?”

“I…don’t know…” Aisha replied softly. “I guess…”

There was a sudden frantic tapping from the tapping from the door. A girl’s voice whispered through the keyhole. “Hello! Are you three still in there?”

Aisha looked back at her sister. “I guess we see who’s at the door.” She sprang to her feet and raced to the door.

“Yes! We’re locked in here!” She replied.

“Harga has gone to get the magister. When they get back, he’ll declare your contract unfulfilled and demand the three of you as slaves in payment.” The other girl told her. “Listen! I’ve stolen the key from Durga. He’s downstairs, eating his breakfast right now, so we have to be quick: do you three have a plan for escaping the city?”

“Y…yes we do!” Aisha exclaimed, hope rising in her breast. “There’s a ship. It leaves at dawn! Please, let us out!”

“The ship? Can it take two more? Tollah and I want to get away from Harga, from this city, but we have no way to get out of Trialle. Will your friends take us on this ship?”

Aisha glanced at her sisters. “We’ve only got enough money for three berths…” She told her sisters, keeping her voice low.

“Let’s worry about that when we’re out of this room!” Layla whispered back. “We’ll make a deal with the captain, offer to perform for the crew during the voyage, peel potatoes, swab the decks, whatever it takes to get out of here before Harga gets back and we’re all finished!”

Aisha turned back to the door. “Alright. We’ll take you with us. Now please! Let us out!”

The three heard the sound of a key turning and the lock sprang open with a joyous sound to the three sisters. The door swung open. On the other side was Dinah, one of the tavern’s bar slaves. From somewhere, the human girl had scrounged a short brown tunic, tied at the waist with a short length of rope. It afforded the slave some modesty, though did nothing to cover the conspicuous slave collar around her throat.

“Come on!” She said, motioning for the three sisters to follow after her. Hurriedly gathering up their things, the young women followed her to the stairs. In the common room, they were joined by Tollah. She had thrown a cloak around her shoulders, and handed a second to Dinah. “Hurry! Durag isn’t one to linger long over his food.” The five glanced around, expecting any moment to hear the heavy tread of the half-orc coming into the room. Fearfully, they fled out into the street, just barely touched by the first rays of early morning light. The streets were deserted, save a few drunk and debauched sailors, sleeping off the previous night’s revelry and some early rising shopkeepers setting up their stalls for the day’s buying and selling.  

The fugitives reached the docks without being stopped. The shadow hulk of the Sirene loomed in the gloom. The dim figures of sailors could be seen moving about on deck and in the rigging, loading the last provisions and getting ready to set sail.

“I was afraid you wouldn’t make it.” One of the figures said, moving away from the docks and towards the women. “Thought you might have run into trouble.” As he came close, Aisha recognized him as the man she’d spoken to several nights before, Imrall. He eyes the two slave girls with some trepidation.

Noticing his look, Aisha spoke up. “We had some trouble getting away from the inn…these two helped us. They…they would like to come with us. We don’t have the money, but maybe we could work something out during the trip…”

“I think…” Imral started, looking over at the two. The slave girls had thrown back their hoods and were looking up, hopefully, at the ship.

Just then, they heard a commotion from further in the city. A large group of people were coming down the street towards the dock. They could hear the heavy tread of boots and the rattling of weapons and armor. “…I think we should discuss this onboard.” He turned, shouting frantically to his men. The sailors redoubled their efforts, those on the dock clambering up the gangplank onto the ship, carrying whatever last bits of provisions they could grab. The women hurried up the ramp as well. As they jumped down onto the deck a pair of sailors grabbed it and hauled the wooden gangplank up. Others ran down the length of the ship, hurriedly casting off mooring lines.

A shouted command was given at the bow of the ship. Down below, in the water, a dozen burly men waited in two longboats, tethered with tow ropes to the Sirene. They groaned, pulling hard on the oars, slowly towing the larger ship away from the dock and out into open water.

They were about half a dozen yards from the dock when a large crowd of men poured from one of the streets leading to the waterfront. Aisha saw they wore chain mail coats covered in tabards of the heraldry of the City Guard. About half had spears in hand. The others were armed with crossbows. Cries to halt rose from the mob as they came up short on the edge of the water.

One of them, the Watch Captain Aisha had seen the night before, ran to the front, a drawn sword in his hand. He raised it up, shouting an order to his men. The young woman’s eyes went wide as the crossbow armed troops lined up, preparing a volley. She shouted a word of warning, echoed by some of the sailors, then threw herself onto the deck of the ship. A second later, the soldiers loosed a volley of bolts at the fleeing ship. Some hammered into the side of the wooden hull. Others whizzed by overhead, hissing like angry vipers as they passed.

Anxiously, Aisha looked around for her sisters. To her relief, they had also taken cover behind the railing of the ship and were unharmed. Others were not so lucky. A cursing sailor, blood streaming from the bolt sticking from his arm, was carried below by two of his companions. Another sailor, up in the rigging was wounded and plunged into the harbor with a wailing cry.

“Stay down!” Aisha told her sisters. She risked a peek over the side of the ship. On shore, the soldiers were reloading their crossbows. They loosed another volley and then another, with lessening effect each time as their target pulled further and further away from shore. The sailors up in the rigging dropped the sails, which caught the early morning breeze, billowing out. A final ragged volley of bolts splashed into the water, harmlessly as the ship pulled out to sea.

Cautiously, Aisha and her sisters rose up from the deck. Around them, the sailors were busy, getting the ship ready for the voyage; repairing the damage the crossbow bolts had done to the ship and rigging, and carrying the handful of wounded sailors down below. Behind them, Traille was quickly pulling back, shrinking into the distance. Ahead of the ship lay open ocean and beyond that…

“Home…” Aisha said, quietly. She shared a smile with her sisters, a wave of euphoria washing over them as the realization of their escape sank in. She turned. Tollah and Dinah were standing further up the deck, holding one another as they talked to one of the ship’s officers. Imrall came over and approached the sisters.

“That was…more exciting than I had hoped for…” He said, grinning. “Good to see that all of you are unharmed. I suppose I should show you to your quarters for the voyage.” He turned and walked towards the bow of the ship. Aisha and her sisters followed until he came to a halt standing over one of the hatches below deck. He motioned to two burly sailors. Grabbing the hatch, they lifted it up out of the way. “But first, I’ll introduce you to our other passengers…”

“Mmmppphhh!”

From down below came a chorus of muffled, female cries of distress. Aisha peered over the edge of the hatch, an expression of horror crossing her face. Huddled in the bottom of the cargo hold were almost two dozen young women and girls. They had been stripped naked and bound hand and foot with strong rope. Bands of cloth covered the captive’s mouths, muffling their frantic cries of terror as they looked up at Aisha and her sisters with looks of terror.

Before Aisha could react, she was seized. The young woman cried out as strong hands grabbed her and yanked her back from the open hatch. She struggled against the sailors holding her as she was forced to her knees. Behind her, she could hear Layla and Hasni fighting as they were also seized. Across the deck, Dinah and Tollah were also grabbed by the slavers.

Aisha protested feebly, stunned by the sudden attack as her hands were roughly pulled behind her back. Rope encircled her wrists in tightening bands. She shouted at the sailors, demanding to be let go, though there was little she could do in her situation. When the sailors tired of her protests, a rag was tied between her lips, gagging her.

When they had Aisha completely bound and gagged, the sailor’s picked her up. She turned her head as she was lifted up. Nearby, Layla and Hasni were also raised up by the sailors, stripped and bound. They whimpered. The sisters exchanged looks of shock and fear as they were carried off…