On the morning of May 15th Rage joins the rest of you in the common room for breakfast. It seems that she was up in her room all this time.
The slavery discussion picks up where it had left off two days previous...almost as if Rage had never walked out on you in the first place.
"You act as you must, and I will do as I will," the mage says, evenly. "I am not asking for anyone's help."
"You have no need to ask, in my case," says Malvis, "for you know I will gladly lend my aid to you. We have the means to do something, that is for sure."
Rage turns to Malvis, and smiles, a soft motherly smile. "Good young Malvis, this is not your fight, and I appreciate your offer to help. While Sian speaks true that we do better out of jail, I cannot and will not ask any of you to follow along the path that I will take. This is my fight, and mine alone. Only then can I exorcise the demons of my past."
"That's your problem, Rage, we are a family, nothing needs to be just your fight anymore, you choose to make it that way, it doesn't have to be. We all have ghosts in our past and we can lean on each other to get by," Logan replies.
"I'm always up for a good fight," Dor states.
"Save your strength, Dor D'och. On the road you travel, you will need it." the mage says. "Follow Kalian, follow Sian, and stop the evil that threatens all. That is where your sword and shield are needed."
Rage scoffs at Logan. "No, that is where you are wrong, I fight alone. In the end, I always have and always will. I do not choose to lean on or burden you with my choices, although you have suffered from them before. This time, I will go it alone."
"So be it, Rage, may you find Peace on your journey!" he says with a sigh.
"I will not interfere, if you insist, Rage, but I freely desire to assist. While I have not personally suffered under slavery, I find the practice abhorrent. And I see no need for anyone to go through anything alone. It leads to depression, and worse. Friends can always be of aid. If stopping slavery is your goal, then, by all means, you should accept the offers of help you are receiving. Personal demons are not the concern of those being held in slavery. They only wish to be free." Malvis stops suddenly, fearing that Rage might feel he has gone too far in his attempted gentle rebuke of her refusal of aid.
"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one." the mage replies, "My personal goals cannot and should no interfere with the goals that this group has. I do not wish that you all put off the important work you do, but here and now, I must do something. And I do not wish to put any of you at risk. Your mission, your goal to stop the evil that crawls is too great for that."
"That's enough of the self pity, Rage!" Logan says in an even tone. "Me, me, me.. you act like you are a martyr, well get off the cross, I could use the wood!
"You do what you want and how you want, well, if you were alone, that's all well and good, but you are not, you are part of a group whose actions, as you say, affect and are affected by you, so knock off the "woe is me" shit and as a group, we can accomplish more than you running off and acting like a child!" he continues, obviously very angry.
Rage looks at Logan, and stops. She opens her mouth, to say something, then stops.
Surprised, she sits down.
He approaches her and kneels so he is face to face. He takes her hands in his and asks, "Rage, what can I do to help? I want to help, we can all help, there is no reason to do on your own anymore, you have friends that will walk to the end of the world for and with you!"
"That is correct, Rage. But, before we free the people down by the docks, we have to figure out what to do with them after we have them all freed."
"I see that you have it all figured out." the mage says, angrily. "Easy peazy. You all think that you know what is best and how to do it. Is that it? The only person I can really trust is me." she says, shaking her head, "It the way it has always been, the only...only way...to be alone...to not get hurt. Be alone, be safe. Don't have to get hurt by others..." the woman says, anger seeping out, as fear and an overwhelming sense of loneliness takes its place.
"Actually, I do not have anything figured out. That is what I need you for. We are willing to help, but we just cannot go into the slave pens and kill the slavers while releasing the slaves. We have to come up with a plan that will work."
"Let it out, Rage, a good cry can make anyone feel better," Logan says as he slowly hugs her.
Rage balls her fists up and begin to pound as hard as she can onto Logans chest, tears rolling down her face.
He grits his teeth from her strength, but holds her close, placing a hand on the back of her head, to rest her head on his shoulder and/or chest.
"Logan, when you have had enough, I will be happy to take over."
"I am fine," he says, holding her protectively.
After a time her tears stop and Logan releases her.
Kailar steps up and whispers to her and Kadlian.
The three of them retreat to a private corner for a discussion.
Carburator looks around impatiently.
After a moment Kadlian, Rage and Kailar rejoin the rest of you. Rage seems mollified.
"I guess that means no fight, huh?" Dor asks. "Well, I still think we should try to find a slave or someone who comes from where we are going. Just to find out what the situation is. My sergeant called that tactics."
He smiles.
"No, no fight. Kailar did some checking and found that there are two types of slaves here. Slavery is typically used as a form of punishment instead of incarceration for criminal acts. For minor crimes a person may be imprisoned for a few weeks or months. For more major crimes a person has their rights as a human stripped from them and they are sold as slaves. However, after a period of years, provided they are good and obedient slaves, they may be freed. The length of the slavery is proportional to the severity of the crime.
"People who commit truly heinous acts, like multiple murders, are executed.
"The other type of slaves are prisoners of war or more commonly foreign pirates. These people are sold into slavery for the rest of their lives.
"In either case, the offspring of slaves are freed at puberty.
"The men that we saw were pirates.
"So, I say we check out the situation in Tybol and see if we can take down a lich. Any objections?"
"So, there is going to be a fight," smiles Dor.
"I imagine there will be a number of fights. But, if you go looking for them, all you will find is a quick death."
Dor laughs. "A death that comes from battling evil is not to be feared."
Rage shakes her head sadly. "Death should be feared by all who value life."
In the absence of any further comments, Rage retreats back to her room, and Wizbang takes Carburator off to train him.