Chp.20: The calm before the storm

The Kotenka River wasn't much different from ordinary rivers. It was very wide, sure, but compared to the Skai River, not that much. The big difference was that it was full of curves and often cut through cracks in the rock, making navigation difficult. In contrast, the Skai River was much straighter and unobstructed. Even the landscape surrounding the river was somewhat threatening: the terrain was in fact impervious and quite rocky. The richest vegetation environment that could be found in those areas were the steppes. Occasionally one could glimpse some solitary tree which had miraculously managed to take root and had grown into an odd shape due to its unfavorable position. Due to the harsh conditions, only the animals lived near the Kotenka River; for this reason it was considered the boundary line between east and west, given that it was a real natural ditch.

However, that inaccessible territory didn't only entail disadvantages. Along the river the rock often split into large caves and inlets, and within these the normally strong current of the river slowed enough to allow a ship to remain practically stationary even without dropping anchor. Which was great if someone planned to hide out for days, as the caves would not only provide protection, but the people on the ship would avoid getting sick from the constant tossing caused by the strong waves crashing against the hull.

That was exactly how Darbi had hidden his ships. Well hidden inside the caves, no one would have ever noticed their presence, and they could have waited even for months without anyone feeling ill. Obviously they planned to stay there much less, so the problem didn't even arise. Darbi, Brenno and Gord had already explored that area in the previous four months and had identified three perfect caves: the first was a huge cave dug by water and completely hidden since it was located in the middle of several curves dotted with rocks that obstructed the view ; this cave was just three hours' walk from the lizardmen's labor camp. Darbi would lead the group that would save them. The second cave was located a few tens of kilometers further south, and was actually a large complex of interconnected caves; it was about an hour from the tiger labor camp, and the fleet that had been hiding there was led by Gord. Finally, the third hiding place wasn't really a cave, but a mass of rocks stacked on top of each other forming a sort of shell, located much further south and two hours' walk from the lionmen's labor camp; the fleet located there was led by Brenno. The three small fleets had been positioned at the designated points for a couple of days now, keeping in touch thanks to two avatars that Darbi had left on friends' ships, and were just waiting for Haku to give them the approval to go to the labor camps and free all prisoners.

Haku had foreseen that Carrion would spend most of his strength to face him; he had deliberately chosen the terrain of the battle in such a way that it was extremely disadvantageous for the adversary, thus forcing him to field a large number of forces. As a result, only a few guards would remain in the labor camps, the bare essentials to ensure order. Of course that would only work in the short term; after a few days that the prisoners had seen that the soldiers did not return, they would certainly have taken the opportunity to rebel. That would in fact have been the simplest method for Carrion to provoke a revolt, but it was clear why he hadn't used it: such a rebellion, even if crushed immediately, would have allowed many prisoners to escape in the most disparate directions, thus leaving many witnesses. Carrion planned to leave no one around to tell of his misdeeds, so he couldn't risk anyone escaping out of his control. Some prisoners like Zamor were easy to track, and he could keep them from reaching the king or some other important person… but hundreds of prisoners fleeing in all directions weren't the same thing. Therefore, he had preferred to avoid leaving the labor camps for too long. This time, however, he would have to… but after all, Carrion only planned to lead his troops away for a few hours, so he would have no problem with that. However, this would have left a security gap which, while not exploitable by the ignorant and frightened prisoners, could easily be used by a well-prepared outside force.

Underestimating the enemy was the biggest mistake one could make in the struggle for survival; In fact, Haku had never dared so much. When he fought, he did it only if he was sure of winning… or if he had no choice due to force majeure, as had happened in the case of the hydra. But in any case, he would never have started a fight without knowing every single possible information about his opponent and without having calculated every possible scenario and contingency. Fortunately, almost no newcomers reasoned like them: most of them were content to know only a small part of the whole, and did not try to see the whole picture. Generals, strategists, and officers were a little different, but even they were terribly limited. To understand this, one only had to look at how easy it was to deceive a newcomer simply by exploiting the fact that they were convinced that dragons were solitary. This was their great flaw: they assumed that their knowledge was sufficient. Therefore, since Carrion knew where Haku's army was, that he didn't know that they possessed ships, and above all that he didn't know their actual number, he assumed that a rear attack was impossible. After all, bypassing the mainland labor camps was a failing enterprise. But exploiting the rivers and moving along the border… that was another story.

Therefore, Carrion would drive his army away, leaving behind only a small handful of troops that Darbi and his men could easily handle. If we then added the fact that everyone before the attack would have drunk a bottle of dragon's essence and that Darbi, Gord and Brenno had studied the territory for months and knew exactly how to take their opponents by surprise, then victory was practically certain and they could have wiped out everyone without losing a single man. At that point they would just have to unchain the prisoners and flee with them.

For now, they just had to wait. So that was exactly what they were doing: waiting. On ships, soldiers spent their time playing cards and practicing with their weapons, waiting for the signal that the time had come to attack. It was what the newcomers usually called 'the calm before the storm'. Darbi spent most of his time sleeping on deck, and almost seemed to have decided to embrace the classic lifestyle that dragons were normally depicted in stories… which was extremely lazy and sleepyheaded. Although, to complete this transformation, a mountain of gold and a defenseless princess held against her will were still needed.

Misune had never understood the reason for these strange stories. When she heard them as a child she was sure that dragons really were like that, but now that she knew some of them she couldn't even connect them to the monsters she knew. Maybe dragons only became obsessed with gold and princesses when they were adults, or maybe Haku and his siblings were the exception that proved the rule. Or, more simply, she had to learn to distinguish reality from fantasy and accept that sometimes the vicissitudes of those stories were a bit fictional... even if it was strange that all of them always had the same points in common.

Misune spent her days leaning on the edge of the ship, quite bored like everyone else. Maybe that was why she'd found herself reflecting on how different real dragons were from the ones in the stories… or maybe she was just trying to distract herself. She couldn't get what Darbi had said out of her head, and it disturbed her quite a bit.

Even though she still smiled and was actually grateful for what Haku had done for her, the memory of that horrible night continued to haunt her. She had discovered that Haku had had an influence over her even greater than she imagined: when they were in the arena and she could sleep next to him in fact she had had few nightmares, perhaps because she felt protected. But as soon as Haku provided her with a house to live in (well, house… more a cabin. After all, it wasn't built to be a permanent home), things got worse. The first few nights had been a true hell: she found herself in the throes of terrible nightmares, nightmares from which she was unable to wake up no matter how hard she tried. She tried and tried again, but remained trapped in the dream. She continually relived that fateful night and her tormentor's face, still horribly disfigured by the stab wounds she herself had inflicted on him. That situation had lasted for about a week, then finally the nightmares had begun to calm down, or at least to allow her to wake up when they became too horrendous. From then on, she spent her nights jolted awake every few hours, covered in sweat and her eyes filled with pure terror. She knew she wasn't the only one: in the village, the screams of ex-slaves waking up in nightmares were often heard. She didn't know if Haku knew; probably yes, since dragons had extraordinary hearing, but still he had never mentioned the matter. Probably because even he had no idea what to do; Misune suspected that was why he had gone to such great lengths to allow she and the other ex-slaves to learn to fend for themselves. Even though her abilities and strength had increased, however, Misune's nightmares hadn't gone away. And the nightmares were only part of the problem: the half-elf still felt extremely uncomfortable when approaching men, to the point where she almost had tachycardia. The only males who didn't have any effect on her were the dragons, both out of a sense of gratitude and the fact that they couldn't have done anything to her even if they wanted to. But as far as everyone else was concerned, no matter what race they were, she couldn't get within three meters of them without starting to get shivers down her back. And it certainly didn't help that all the soldiers saw her as trash and had often made it clear that they would have a good time with her if she didn't have Haku and the other dragons protecting her (of course they didn't tell her to her face, but they did made clear through certain phrases and with body language).

Misune had hoped that by joining Darbi's expedition he might solve something. She remembered well the feeling she had felt in killing: even if she was still convinced that it was not a good thing, she almost lacked that sense of power and fulfillment that gave taking a life. Maybe if she killed people to the point where she was convinced she could defend herself against anyone, that would be enough to drive away her nightmares. She certainly wouldn't have been stupid enough to join the battles of Haku or Rhaegal, since there the risk of dying was very high, but a simple mission like the one entrusted to Darbi seemed within her reach. Killing a guard while his back was turned shouldn't have been that difficult, and she could then prove herself and feel that wonderful contentment again. And then she was going to kill evil people, people who deserved it, so there was no point in feeling remorseful. It seemed like a good idea. But after Darbi's words she had begun to reconsider that.

Perhaps, her was really just an attempt to distract herself. Perhaps what she would get would really be only a momentary fulfillment. Maybe it wouldn't make the nightmares go away. She instinctively brought her hand to her lower abdomen. Just thinking about that awful night made her feel hurt at that point. She continued to feel violated, used, treated like an object. She wanted that horrible feeling to vanish, she wanted to convince herself that now this belonged to the past and that it would never happen again. But maybe she was doing it all wrong… maybe throwing herself headlong into a battle wasn't a good idea.

She glanced at Darbi, who was sleeping as usual in the middle of the deck. Misune was grateful for his concern for her. Darbi had always seemed to her the friendliest dragon and the most able at understanding others one. And even if he didn't know how to provide solutions, like Haku did, he still knew how to point out the problem and give good advice. Misune used to think of him as jovial and amusing… but recently something had made her doubt even that.

It was when she'd told him she didn't consider him an idiot. When she had forbidden him to consider himself such, Darbi had seemed almost… grateful? Though she was used to seeing the dragon happy, she couldn't remember ever seeing such a smile on his scaly face. Why? Why so much gratitude for such a simple sentence? Misune didn't understand that. But if there was one thing he had long ago ascertained, it was that in Haku's family no one didn't have at least two or three traumas behind them, so she had simply imagined that Darbi too had a very problematic part of him.

What that was, she didn't know. And she wasn't sure she didn't want to know. At the moment she had to concentrate on herself. She had to figure out what she meant to do and why he wanted to do it. She still had some time, so she could think about it calmly.