Chapter 9
It was another gilded cage, that was for sure.
He wasn't placed in a cage as much as it was a room, but an odd one. The room wasn't just not a cage, it had no door at all, just an opening into the hallway beyond. Out in that hall there were men stationed, two men to each end of the little dormitory, standing silent guard. The room itself was almost like an inn. It had a bed for him and a stool beside it, with a small nightstand, a table near the stool–for what he had no idea, most Arcans couldn't write–a cushioned chair against the other wall, and a chest at the foot of the bed for his belongings. It had a mirror, a full length mirror on one wall, beside an opening that held a small closet-like room that held something he'd only heard of, never seen… an indoor plumbing toilet. They were said to have them in Avannar, on the north side of the river in the new part of the city, and they were said to be very common in the northeastern regions of Noraam, where the cold made going to an outhouse a very unfriendly proposition. Of course, from what he'd heard the ones in the northeast had to be filled with water manually, where this one and the ones in the new part of Avannar were part of a water system. The one in north Avannar used huge crystal-driven pumps to generate water pressure to move the water, but he wasn't sure how the one in here in Alamar worked. It was entirely possible, he supposed, that the city didn't have forced water, that it was a luxury built just into the compound, a luxury for Arcans.
Kyven sat down on the bed, testing it as his tail swished on the sturdy linen sheets. It wasn't as luxurious as that boat had been, but the sheets were clean, the bed looked and smelled free of little bugs or beasties, and it looked to have a firm mattress. The pillow smelled to be filled with goose down, which meant that it would be soft and nice to sleep with.
He got up and paced the rather large room. It was lit by an alchemical lamp high on the ceiling, some twelve rods from the floor, whose control was nowhere to be seen. How he was supposed to turn the lamp on and off was beyond him.
Now what? The little man had brought him in here, told him to settle in, then left. Well, there wasn't much he could do to settle in, just drop his pack on the chest and he was done. There was nothing to do in the room, no books, and Toby had the cards he'd been using to play solitaire, it was his deck. Was he allowed to leave his room? Well, he didn't see why not, since it literally had no door. He came up to the opening and peeked out, saw the two sets of guards on each end of the passageway, which had six openings to each side. He stepped out into the hallway and saw the men not react to him, so he figured he was permitted to leave his room. He looked across and into the room opposite his own, but saw that it was empty. He advanced down the hallway and to the next set of rooms, and found those empty as well. He went down one more set and looked, and found that one of those was occupied. It was a female mink with truly lustrous fur, naked, and huddled in the corner with the blanket of her bed wadded into the corner with her to form a sleeping place. She was very thin, curled into a little ball, and had long, shaggy, wild and unkempt brown hair with little round ears poking out of it.
It seemed that not every Arcan in the blue ring was as well treated.
"Herro?" he called. "Herro mmink?"
She looked at him with empty eyes. This mink was wild, he saw. She wasn't intelligent like tamed Arcans. She looked up at him fearfully, but when he dropped down onto all fours, she didn't seem quite so afraid. He padded into the room, sliding around the doorframe, then slowly coming up to her, carefully. She bared her little fangs and hissed at him threateningly, then growling at him, which made him skitter back a step or two and sit down on his haunches, which wasn't an entirely pleasant thing to do while wearing pants. He was curious about her, he'd never seen a wild Arcan like this before; the first one he'd ever really seen was the one that killed Aven, the one that was Touched. She didn't look all that intimidating or dangerous… at least when she wasn't growling at him. She stayed in her corner, watching him with wary brown eyes, and he realized that she really was just like an animal.
No wonder Arcans often had such a hard time of it with human perception. Not only did they look like animals, there were Arcans like this mink, who were really little more than animals. He wondered what made her different from other Arcans, why she was like a wild animal. Was it breeding or upbringing? Were there some Arcans who were just naturally wild? Or could a wild Arcan be educated, be taught to speak and act properly? Wild Arcans could be tamed–Kyven shuddered just at the thought of that word–but he'd not really heard of a wild Arcan being taught to speak more than a few words. And some breeds weren't known to be very smart anyway. Minks were notoriously dull-witted, even the ones born in captivity weren't all that smart. The mink that worked in the Three Boars couldn't say much more than "drink," and she was supposedly bred tame.
So what was the difference between a tame Arcan and a wild Arcan? Was it genetics or upbringing? Or maybe both?
He was no scientist. He had no idea.
He moved to turn to leave the room, but the mink shifted. He turned to look back at her, and saw her eyes… curious. She slinked tentatively out of her little bed, and Kyven thought that if she saw him sit or lean low, being higher than her might intimidate her. So he backed up a step and then laid completely down on the wooden floor, putting his clawed hands under his chin and looking at her. She inched closer to him, sniffing at him curiously, until she was literally nose to nose with him. She ghosted her short muzzle over the bridge of his own, sniffing at his fur, felt her breath against his eyes, then heard her snuffling as she stuck her nose in his ear, making it twitch in protest as her sniffing thundered through his eardrum. For an irrational moment he felt like he was back on the plantation, that this was one of the daughters inspecting, but he pushed that out of his mind forcefully as his body seemed to tense up in preparation for being punished. The mink seemed to sense his sudden wariness, backing away from him, but he just let out a sigh and closed his eyes. He wasn't there, he wasn't there, and the man who'd tormented him was dead. He was in Alamar, not on the plantation, he'd been sent here to be sold.
The mink edged back to him, her head over him, sniffing him like she was some kind of dog. Then, much to his surprise, she clamped her small jaws on the back of his neck. It wasn't an attack, it wasn't painful, but she had a firm grip on him, and she tried to pull him up and forward. He allowed her to pull him up, but he resisted when she tried to pull him forward, until she lost purchase with her teeth and let go. When Kyven rose up over her she shrank back, but then he lowered his head to her level and inched it forward. She shied away, but then, curiosity overcoming her again, she nudged forward a little, coming nose to nose with him. He moved past her nose, nudging at her muzzle with his own, then licked her on the cheek. Her fur tasted much the same as his own, and when he licked her again, she tilted her head to accept his attention. He licked her face several times, then rose up over her, coming to a sitting position, which did not make her shy away. She sniffed at his neck and chest, everything above the shirt, and he licked at her ear.
He had no idea what he was doing. He really didn't. But whatever he was doing, it seemed to be working. The mink became much less nervous, much less wary, let him lick at the part of her ear not under her wild brown hair, then allowed him to lift up his hand and put it on her shoulder. Her fur was like his, exquisitely soft, and thick, and gorgeous with its light silver color. Trinity, how did she not end up getting slaughtered for this gorgeous fur? Seeing her reminded him of that mink he saw in Cheston, held down and killed brutally, then thrown into a wagon, for no other reason but for the fact that she had lovely fur. His fur was much like hers, except his was longer and had a shaggier exterior… and somehow, his fur let him meld into the shadows. The mink pushed more and more up against his chest, pushing him up into a kneeling position, then she pushed up against him, grabbing him by the ribs. What was she doing? He had no experience with this. She nuzzled her face against the soft fur of his neck, rubbing her nose against a collarbone just under his shirt. He put his hands around her, digging them into the fur on her back but not hurting her with his claws, and she nestled against him with a little sigh.
Of course. Touching. Even this wild Arcan craved to touch and be touched, to comfort and be comforted, she shared the need for contact that was so prevalent in her kind. Once Kyven had proved he was no threat to her, she responded by wanting to huddle with him, to share contact. He gave her what she wanted, holding her lightly and letting her root her muzzle against his neck, even gave him a couple of playful, gentle bites before giving another little sigh and letting him hold her against him, giving her the attention she craved.
He responded the same way, he realized. Exactly the same way. When that little girl, Liza, climbed on his back, at first he was annoyed by her, but then he came to accept her attentions, even enjoyed it a little bit. He liked being touched, he liked how she nuzzled at his fur and called him pretty, how she petted him and paid attention to him. That was no different from what the mink was doing. She had given him attention, now she wanted some in return. He complied, running his fingers through the fur on her back, feeling how soft and thick it was. By the Father's grace, what fur she had! Again, he was amazed she'd lived to adulthood. Then again, the fact that she was wild was probably the only reason she did.
"Ayah," a voice called from the opening, which startled the mink and sent her scrambling back into her corner… just like he had done. Did he look quite so pathetic, quivering in the corner with fear in his eyes? Kyven looked back over his shoulder to see the small man that had brought him in standing in the opening, looking just a little worried. "Ah'd be careful o' that one, she's a bit wild," he warned.
"Not whren you know how to apprroach," Kyven said simply, backing away from her slowly, then rising up onto his legs and turning around.
"Beautiful, ain't she?" he said, giving her an appreciative look. "Caught wild, and lawd don't it show. She's on the schedule for tomorrah. She'll be a breedah fo' sho'. It'd be a sin tah harvest fur like that."
"If it's a sin to kill her, whry is it not a sin to kirr–kill her babies? Or mrine?"
"Cause one is a treasure, but many is a commodity," he answered with brutal calm. "Ah got a bit o' bad news fo' you though. Ah can't get ya on the schedule tomorrah. So Ah hate tah say it, but yo' be our guest heah until Friday. But don't' you worry none, we'll take good care o' ya and yo' have plenty o' things tah do. Ya won't be bo'd for them four days, Ah promise ya. Toby say ya like cards, well, Ah'll get ya a deck o' yo' own."
"I'm surprised yrou talk to mme like I'm a real person," Kyven grated as he walked past the man then dropped back down onto all fours.
"Yo' an Arcan, friend," he said simply. "One o' the smart ones from the sound o' it, but still an Arcan, an' it's yo' place to serve man."
"Excruse me if I don't agree with you."
"Ah reckon that be yo' right," he said simply. "But it ain't gonna change nothin'."
"At lreast you give me one right," he said as he stalked back to his own room.
It was a very strange outlook, he thought as he sat on his bed. How could these Alamari treat him like a person, but then talk about butchering his offspring for their fur? It was a paradox. Didn't they think he might care about his children?
Maybe if it required a real investment in time for them, they wouldn't do it. Arcans had a very unusual life cycle. They were born semi-ambulatory, able to move, not entirely helpless, and then they grew at an almost shocking rate. The average Arcan was weaned off mother's milk after three months, and would grow to the first stage of maturity in about three years, to about the size of a human teenager, and become sexually mature. They mimicked humans in that they continued to grow slowly after reaching that plateau, reaching full size and maturity after about six years, then they lived, on the average, about forty years. That female Arcan the farmer had, the one that was nearly fifty, that was positively elderly for an Arcan. So, a breeder only really had to put three years of planning and effort into his Arcan stock to get an Arcan that was more than large enough to provide a pelt that could make a coat. Odds were, some of them were slaughtered much younger, if only to not have to wait that long. A six month old Arcan was nearly the same size as a six year old human, and that was quite a bit of fur.
It turned Kyven's stomach just thinking about it. And they called the Arcans animals. At least Arcans didn't butcher children to harvest their skins.
And that was the fate awaiting his children, if indeed he could have any in this transformed state. He knew he was capable of sex, but since he wasn't really an Arcan, he doubted he was capable of breeding with them.
Trinity, would whoever bought him be furious when they found that out. And it was just another good reason why he had to escape. When they found out he was sterile, he'd be slaughtered for his fur.
It was a frightening thing when your own pelt was more valuable to others than it was to yourself.
From his window, Kyven watched an auction in the blue ring.
He was only on the second floor, so he could see under the tent and see what was going on. It took place just after noon, and the Arcans were brought out, one by one, from a holding room just behind the stage. All the Arcans were naked, and were wearing collars and leashes. The escort would walk the Arcan twice around the edge of the platform, then bring the Arcan to the raised barker's podium at the center and sit while men and women in rich attire raised little fans to meet the called bid. All the Arcans were either exotic or unusual, as befitting Arcans sold in the blue ring, and the little wild mink whom he had met the day before was the first one to be sold.
He wondered what would happen to her. He was rather fond of her, as she'd slinked into his room last night, when all the lamps were turned off, and had spent the whole night with him, nuzzled with him on the bed. She wasn't amorous, she was just needful of another presence to be with her, and Kyven gave her what she wanted. She slept nestled against him and found great comfort in the arm draped over her protectively… until they came for her. They put a leather snare around her neck and dragged her out, and the look of fear she gave him as she was pulled out of his room was almost heartbreaking.
That made him want to see what happened, so he sat on his haunches on his table and looked out his window and watched, watched as the handler walked her across the ring twice as she struggled against him, then was forced down by the barker's podium. He watched as they bid on her, for long moments, until she was sold. Sold for three thousand, six hundred chits. She was then dragged off the platform, towards the side, where a man and woman came up and looked at her, then walked towards a small building with the mink being dragged behind them, obviously to settle the bill.
And that was that. She was sold, she was gone, it was like she never existed. He got one last look at her as she was dragged into the building, and she looked up and back and seemed to see him… and even from there, her eyes were pleading.
But he could not help her.
If anything, that steeled him. Fuck waiting until he was sold. When he was sold they'd put a collar on him. His best chance to escape was right here, where he was kept uncollared within the blue ring compound, as they relied on the guards and whatever it was they used to prevent Arcans from crossing the boundaries of the compound. They were so certain that he couldn't escape that he was left without a collar, was put in a room with no door, no bars on the window, where he literally had free reign of the compound. The guards at the ends would not hinder him, he'd found out yesterday. One would escort him if he wanted to go out, so he wouldn't get lost, but he was allowed to go about anywhere he wanted to go. They would take him to the kitchens for food if he was hungry between meal times, or to the only real place an Arcan could really do anything for fun that didn't involve other Arcans… the playground. It was a large field behind all the buildings, near a white fence that ringed the back side of the area, where Arcans could come out of their rooms and exercise, meet each other, and do more than wait around. There were a few Arcans out there, running freely back and forth, two canines looking to be racing each other. There was little else to do, so coming out to sit in the sun without a collar and almost feel like one was free was a very pleasant thing to do, so much so that Kyven sat out there for nearly two hours, sitting on his haunches and then laying on his back on the ground, looking up at the hot summer sky.
The guard would escort him around, but his room was his own, and it was on the second floor, with no bars. It opened outward, letting him bring fresh air into his room, and it was more than large enough for him to fit through. He would have guessed that they would have put him up on a higher floor, but Kyven's claws would let him climb down no matter how high they put him, so it was probably a moot point. But then again, they were so confident in their alchemical barrier they didn't restrict him at all. If he asked to be taken to the border, they'd probably take him and allow him to stand there and try to escape. There was little to do in his room, since he was now the only Arcan on his floor, there were no books, and there was little for him to do but play cards with the deck that the little man had brought him. He was just waiting, basically, waiting for dark, when he could go look around without someone following him around. When one of the many workers in the place brought him a plate of cheese and some water, he startled the young man by asking about the compound.
"Oh, well, this buildin' is the guest barracks fo', ah, gentle Arcans," he said. "The buildin' on the other side is fo' competitively bred Arcans. Ah, Arcans bred fo' racin', o' fo' aggression and fightin' ability. They'll be sold tomorrah. The buildin' behind these two is the headquarters fo' the business."
"Oh. Whrere are the ki–ki–kitchens?"
"In the headquarters buildin'," he answered.
"Thranks," he said.
He wasn't alone on his floor for long. A male rabbit was brought onto the floor and placed in the room beside his later that afternoon, as Kyven waited for sunset anxiously. The rabbit was quite urbane, could speak very well when he came to Kyven's room and looked in, then stepped in and introduced himself simply as Buster. "You know how to play cards?" he asked in surprise as he looked down at the table. "Who taught you?"
"A hruman," he answered. "Whrat brings you here?"
"Same as you, I'd guess," he answered. "Being sold on the blue ring. I can see why you're here," he said, looking at his fur. "A fox with black fur? You have to be unique."
"That's whrat they say," he said. "I've been bored all day, wrant to rr–rl–learn?"
"Still learning to talk?" he asked, then he retrieved a chair from another room and put it at the table.
"It's not easy."
"You long-snouts always have problems with some human sounds," he said with a nod. "So, what's your story?"
"Not mmuch of one. You?"
"Pretty much the same. I grew up in a mansion, my parents were servants in Phionn. But when the master died, his son sold me. The man who bought me sent me here, because I have very good fur. I guess they agree if they agreed to sell me in the blue ring," he said with a sigh. "Guess it could be worse than being a breeder."
"Doesn't it make you angrrry?"
"Sure it does, but what can I do?" he asked with a simple shrug. "We're Arcans, friend. Fate is not ours to decide, we can only roll the dice and hope to get lucky. I guess I've rolled the house, all my life. Born in a rich house, serving rich people, then sold to the blue ring to move on to being a breeder. What about you?"
He had to be careful. If he revealed too much, the rabbit might think he's either a Shaman or insane. "Not much," he said. "Owned by a crystalcutter in Atan. I escaped and lived free, but was caught and ended up here."
"Wow, you were free? What was it like?"
"Better than this," he said simply. "A herl--hell of a lot better than this. I rr–learned to hunt, I was doing good for mryself."
"Did you," he said, then he looked around and then leaned close and whispered, "did you ever work for the Masked?"
He shook his head.
"Well, at least you got to live it once," the rabbit said with a sigh, patting him on the arm.
"I'lr lrive it again," he declared.
"They say it's impossible to escape from the blue ring, because of the border," the rabbit said.
"We're gonna find out."
The rabbit laughed. "Well, I'm not about to try it, but if you want to, have at it," he said. "I think I'll take the lucky roll I was given and see how it goes, and only escape if I don't like my buyer. I've heard it's much easier to escape from breeding pens than here anyway."
Kyven spent the rest of the day getting to know Buster and teaching him how to play gin. He was an amiable fellow, nice enough, and possessed of the Arcan need to touch in the form of wanting to hold hands with him. The fact that they were both males didn't seem to matter to Buster, but Kyven saw that it had to do with comfort, just as it did with the mink. It was about finding comfort in proximity, like when he'd huddled with the Arcans in the cage in Cheston. Kyven got used to the idea of holding hands with a male, understanding it for what it was, and they played gin for the rest of the day.
After dark, after Buster went back to his room to sleep and after his lamp was put out from wherever it was they did it, Kyven got down to business. First he opened the window, then opened his eyes to the spirits and drew back into the shadows in the middle of his room, between the bed and window, and looked to see where everyone was. He saw roaming guards out on the compound, but not many since they didn't think anyone could spirit an Arcan out of the compound. Kyven's eyes marked every single person, then he moved to go out, but a glance in the mirror saved him from what could have been a disaster.
In the mirror, there was a shirt and pair of pants hanging in midair!
The clothes could not vanish with him!
Well, not a problem. He shed his clothes immediately and looked at himself in the mirror, and saw that he was indeed nice and perfectly hidden.
He had to inwardly chuckle. My, did he ever adapt quickly to the idea of being naked. He hadn't really even thought about it since being changed. Even now, he didn't think a whit about it… it was almost like the fur made him feel like he had clothes on, even though his business was hanging out where everyone could see it. But in this form, this Arcan body it felt… natural to not have clothes on. He'd put on clothes to feel more human. But here, now, where he needed to stalk, he wanted to be an Arcan.
He climbed up onto his table, out the window, and then he climbed down the wall and was out on the compound, as silently as he could. He had to stay to the shadows. Any time he could see a light source that was, it disrupted his shadowy cloak. He had no idea what the range of that light had to be to break his shadowy cloak, and this was absolutely no place to find out, so he was exceedingly careful. He hugged the walls of the buildings, then darted to the next, skulking as quietly as he could–his shadowy camouflage did not stop any sounds he made–working his way to that large grassy area that would have no lights around it, where the Arcans exercised. He waited there as a lone sentry padded down, along the edge of that fence out there at the end of the field, clearly visible to him with his spirit sight. He skulked out from the building after the lone sentry went by, then raced up to the edge of that fence, slowing to a stop and staying down on all fours as he came up to the edge of it. This had to be the border that kept Arcans in, either this fence or just past it. He focused his eyes and looked at the fence, and saw nothing magical about it. But when he looked down, under the fence, he saw it. It was a bar of magical energy under the fence, about two rods deep in the earth, barely visible to his spirit sight unless he was looking almost directly down at it.
That had to be it. That was the barrier.
Alright, so, he knew where it was, and it was definitely a device of alchemy. It was buried too deep for him to quickly and easily dig down to it, so he went ahead and tried the obvious thing, tentatively reaching out through the rails of the fence. He saw the device buried under the fence suddenly flare as power generated within it, and before he could recoil his hand, it went off.
There was a brilliant flash of light, and a loud ZOT, and Kyven staggered back, gasping as an electrical charge swept through him. His hand buzzed angrily, and he shook it vigorously. But he learned something from it. That charge came from the ground. He saw it, saw it form under him and strike when he passed into the forbidden area.
Alright. If it came from the ground, then the obvious tack here was to get very, very high, and get past it before it could reach him. He turned and looked back to see if there were any buildings near the fence on the inside, and saw a guard rushing towards where he was, with another guard coming from the other direction, and still another coming from behind him. All three were carrying lamps and lightcones both, and he couldn't afford to be spotted stalking the fence in the middle of the night, or they'd restrict his movements and he wouldn't get another chance. He turned at an angle and bounded away, running fast and strong, going between two of them with the cool feeling around him holding strong. They hadn't seen him, and what was more important, their lamps had not broken his shadowy cloak. So, the light had to be relatively close to him, he realized. That, or they had to be bright enough to penetrate his defense, which those were not at the distance at which they passed. That was a very, very important thing to know.
It was also good to know how long it took the guards to respond to a disturbance… which wasn't very long. These men were alert, and had showed up almost immediately after Kyven tested the fence. That told him that if he made another mistake, he had to move first, then ponder what he did wrong.
He ran along the edge of the fence, looking around. He really didn't think going high would work, but it was a hypothesis worth testing. The problem was, there was nowhere around that was high. The fence was built out well away from all buildings, he saw as he ran a quick lap of it, avoiding lighted areas. He could try to make a jump at it, he supposed, see if the device reacted more slowly with altitude.
It was worth a try.
He backed up just one pace. He didn't want a full head of steam, since he was physically rebuffed by the device as well as getting shocked. If he failed, he didn't want to give himself a concussion. He wanted a nice high trajectory. He tamped his feet and bunched up, then sprang high into the air, almost as if he were reaching for an imaginary window ledge, vaulting nearly twelve rods into the air, twice the height of a normal man.
ZOT!
Kyven was physically rebuffed from the boundary, an arc of lightning rising from the ground directly in front of him, forming a shell of light, and it was that which he struck. It shocked him and presented a physical barrier at the same time, and he hit the ground literally running, both hands almost numb but needing to be far from that place when the guards got there. He bounded off, a little unsteadily at first, but much more fluidly once the sting faded from his hands.
Alright. Altitude didn't matter. So, he had one viable option left, and that was to try the front gate, to see if the boundary went across it. But that would be dangerous, since there as no doubt that there would be people there, and it would also be well lit. He loped easily across the compound, staying close to the walls and using the shadows as his spirit sight kept view of everyone and allowed him to keep careful track of anyone that might be close enough to see him. He then loped down a very gentle rise, swinging out to near the boundary, coming around the blue ring and coming in sight of the front gate.
He was right. It was both well lit and guarded.
He sat down on his haunches, considering the problem. He needed to kill those lights or make all the men move, and keep them away long enough for him to advance in, check, and then get back out or go through without being seen.
Wait. He needed to think about this. If he just bounded through there without any idea of what he was doing, he was going to end up right back in here pretty damn quick. He needed a plan. Yes, finding out if he could go through the gate was a good idea, but he couldn't leave yet. He needed to know exactly what he was going to do once he was outside, or this would all be wasted effort. He was literally in the Arcan slavery capitol of Noraam, he'd better have a damn good plan to get away from here or he wouldn't get far.
Alright, time to find out. He slinked forward near the boundary, watching the four men intently with spirit sight, his senses keenly feeling for a sudden warming of the air around him, which would be the warning to him that he was no longer invisible. If that happened, he had to close his eyes and close his eyes to the spirits both, do it quickly, then turn sharply to the left and run like hell. The gate was decorated with some hedges to either side of the road, and those were his saviors as he slinked slowly, cautiously, and carefully up on the gate, getting behind the hedge, getting close enough to look.
The barrier was there. It was only about six fingers deep–
That was it? Six fingers? He looked down at the barrier near him, and saw that it was also buried very shallowly.
He looked back towards the compound and saw something. It was built on a gentle rise, and on the far side, it was buried very deeply. Yet over here, it was buried very shallowly, which Kyven could estimate that the buried ring was laid flat and level when it was installed.
Two rods was too deep. But one rod was within digging range. Kyven didn't have big, nasty claws just for climbing, they would let him dig too. He slinked away from the gate, got back into the shadows, and then circled very wide of the gate to the other side. The area on the far side of that gate looked to be at the same level as the gate itself, which meant that it would be a short dig if he could pull it off. He'd just have to find a section of the fence where the guards didn't patrol often and where the device was shallow. He wasn't entirely sure if he could go underneath it safely, but he couldn't see much other choice. The only drawback was that he'd only have one chance at it. If he dug the hole and found that he couldn't get out, then there'd be a big hole left behind that would tip off the people that someone had tried to burrow under the fence. If he could get out, then it wouldn't be a problem.
Wait a minute. He was being stupid. He was going about this all wrong. The way out was very clear and very straightforward. All he needed to get out was a collar. They had to get all of them out of the blue ring, and that meant that they had to have collars in the compound that could do it. He wouldn't have to be wearing it, odds were, he just needed to hold it to get past the barrier. Needless to say, those collars would be guarded, but Kyven would be able to see them with spirit sight because of the crystals in them.
The collar would serve a double purpose, he realized. He could remove the crystal from it and put it on, which would allow him to move through Alamar virtually unmolested, because people would think he was already owned. Sure, some few might try to poach him because he was so exotic and valuable, but he wouldn't have throngs of men chasing him down the street like he would if he was uncollared.
That was it. That was the way out.
Casing the administration building showed him everything he wanted to see. The collars were indeed visible to his eyes because of their crystals. They were held in a room on the second floor, there was only a very small number of people in the buidling, and none of them were near where the collars were. They were working on the far end of the building, probably in the kitchen, which left the collars undefended. The room they were in had to be windowless, since the collars seemed to be in the middle of the building. That meant that it was a locked room of some kind, most likely.
Thank the Trinity for summer. Kyven found an open window up on the second floor, left open because of the heat, and he vaulted up and managed to get a grip on the sill. He climbed in and found himself in an office of some kind, with books in a shelf and two desks and chairs facing each other. He slinked past the desks and to the door, and found himself looking down a long, dark, empty corridor. He could see the collars well down the hall, and stalked down on all fours, staying low and keeping silent, skulking up to the door that held the collars behind it. It was a sturdy metal door, not a normal door, with writing on it he couldn't make out with his normal eyes, because of the darkness. The door itself had a crystal embedded in it, telling him that the door itself had to be an alchemical device.
Plan, meet snag.
He backed off. He had to think about this, and besides, he could not tackle that door until he was ready to escape, for getting past that door would require him to reveal that someone tried to escape, or did escape. He would come back tomorrow night, if he was ready to try, and tackle the door. But, he was fairly confident. If he couldn't get through the door, well, there was always the wall. He doubted the wall was similarly protected, and he could try to rip through it to reach the collars.
He returned to his room, put his clothes back on, then went to bed, confident that it was the last night he'd be spending in Alamar.
He spent the entire day considering that door.
He split his attention between the door and playing cards with Buster, finding that two people who were beginners at a game made it challenging, if only because both of them were so bad at it.
How was he getting past that door?
He didn't know what it did or how it worked, so that severely limited his options. He would have to just get there and wing it, which Kyven did not like to do. He was a crystalcutter by trade and nature, and that meant he liked to have a plan. The recent past had robbed him of his natural tendency to like to plan, but now that he had a moment's respite to do so, he was going to plan the hell out of this. He had analyzed his problem, and now he had a solution, but he still had the snag of the door.
Outside of that, he had a plan. A very good plan. He would pack his pack and take it with him. He would place it near where he entered the administration building, enter the building, and then be forced to wing it with the door. Once he got past the door, he would come back down, get his pack, and then immediately escape the compound in the fastest direction. Once outside the compound, he would pull the crystal from the collar, put it on, put on clothes, and then run. He'd have all night to get as far from Alamar as possible, which for him, might be a good hundred minars if he ran straight through. They wouldn't know he was gone until morning. He would run until he couldn't run anymore, which would hopefully be far enough to evade capture.
After that, he still had a plan. It was abundantly clear that he would never be safe in the human lands as an Arcan. He was too exotic, and would face constant harassment and attack from hunters trying to catch him for his pelt. His only hope was to escape into the frontier, to find that city of Arcans, Haven. And to find it, his only recourse was to return to Atan, to return to Virren, who could get in touch with the Masked and have them send someone to guide him to safety. It was his only chance. If the fox changed him back, until that happened, he was very vulnerable. His only chance of survival was to get as far from humanity as he could. So he needed to get to Haven, and the only option he had was the only man he knew who could bring someone to guide him.
He had to go home.
The plan still hinged on the door and the collars. He had to find a way past the door to get to the collars, and then hope that his assumption was correct in him not needing to wear the collar to get him out. If those two assumptions were correct, then he was free of the blue ring. If either of those assumptions was wrong, then not only was he stuck inside the compound, but they'd know an Arcan tried to escape… and that would definitely complicate things. If they found out it was him, then whoever bought him would be very careful not to lose him, which would make escaping much harder. So, he realistically only had one chance at this.
He could not fail. That meant that if he had to take chances, or even kill, then that's what he'd have to do. He only had one chance. If he failed, he'd be a slave for the rest of his life.
He had to capitalize on it.
"Gin," Buster called, setting his cards down. "So, what ya got?"
"Too mruch," he said, putting his cards down.
Buster looked at his hand, then laughed. "Uh, Kyv, I threw down a four like three cards ago. Why didn't you pick it up?"
"Eh? I didn't notice. Sorry, mry mrind's not on the game."
"Well, it's letting me win. How many hands is that?"
"Fib–Five to twro," he answered. He picked up all the cards and deftly shuffled them, not marking them despite his claws, then he dealt.
"Still thinking of escaping, eh?" he asked in a low voice.
Since Buster had no intention of trying, Kyven wasn't about to be honest about it. He liked him, but there was no telling if he'd run off and warn the people here of Kyven's intent to get special favors. "Trrying," he said. "I don't think it'rr be easy. This pr–plrace is a fortress. I don't see anry wray to do it yret." He picked up his cards. "But I'rm still lrooking."
"Well, good luck," the rabbit said as he picked up his cards.
After lunch, which was served to them in his room while they played cards, they got two more Arcans in their dorm. One was another mink, this one male and tame, but the other was a silver fox, a female silver fox with bluish fur with silver and white highlights. They were brought in together and placed in rooms opposite his own and Buster's, the mink facing Buster's and the silver fox facing his. Both of them were brought in naked, and while the male asked for clothes from the little man, the female said that clothes chafed her fur and she hated them. The fox came into his room without asking while Buster dealt a new hand, and boldly nuzzled Buster from behind with her muzzle, giving physical contact as a matter of greeting. "I'm Silver," she told them, nuzzling Buster fondly. The silver fox was taller than the average female Arcan, and much more voluptuous, with wide hips and very large breasts for an Arcan, which meant they were still smaller than what a human would consider large. Her fur was thick and perfectly combed, her tail bushy and silky, and her hair was actually a shade of blue, like her fur, long and thick and done up in curly waves that fell down her back. "Who are you?"
"I'm Buster, and he's Kyven," the rabbit answered. "Welcome to good luck."
"Yah, yah," she said, coming around the table and nuzzling Kyven. She gasped when she looked behind him. "You're a fox!" she said in surprise.
He nodded.
"What beautiful fur!" she said, stroking the fur on his neck. "Are you red or gray?"
"They say I'rm a mrutated gray," he said carefully.
"Pity," she said, stroking his fur in a strange manner. "I'd love to see what our babies would look like."
"I thought foxes could crossbreed, like canines," Buster said curiously.
"We can? Hmm," she said, giving him a speculative look. "Maybe we'll get lucky and the same human will buy us to see," she told him.
"Kyven was free," Buster told her.
She gave him a startled look, then immediately sat on his lap. "Oh, tell me! What was it like? Were you free long? How did they catch you?"
He gave Buster an annoyed look around Silver's rather large breasts. The male mink came up to the door and peeked in, and Silver beckoned to him. "This is Softtail," she said. "We met already, we were brought by the same human to be sold. We came in the same cage."
"Hi," he said shyly, coming in and taking Buster's hand, then nuzzling the rabbit's cheek and short muzzle.
"Nice to meet you," Buster said, reaching up and patting him on the side of his neck.
"What are you doing?"
"Playing cards," he answered. "Kyven taught me this game."
"So, what was it like to be free?" Silver pressed him.
Kyven went over what he'd told Buster again as he tried to play the hand around Silver's body, but he wasn't rude. He touched her with his free hand when he wasn't drawing or discarding, putting his hand on the small of her back or her leg or her hip. "I wras doing fine, but then I got caught, and hrere I am," he grunted, discarding.
"You're not bred at all?" Silver said in surprise. He shook his head. "What an amazing thing!" she said. "I was bred," she said, rather proudly. "I'm a Snake River Silver. I even won a contest for who was the prettiest Arcan!" she gushed. "I have a pretty blue ribbon too, but I don't like to wear it because I might lose it."
"Nice, you're a show Arcan?" Buster asked.
"Not all the time," she said. "I only got to do one contest, and as soon as I win, whoosh! My master wants to sell me. In the blue ring!" she said excitedly. "I might get to be a breeder!"
"I throught femrarles didn't like being breeders," Kyven said, struggling with the words.
"It's the easy life, especially if you're sold in the blue ring," she told him. "You don't have to do anything! You just get to be pretty and have babies!" Naturally, Kyven misunderstood the idea of it. Arcans wouldn't see the sex as a potentially negative thing. It was comfort, the chance to lose themselves in a moment of pleasure and forget about their lot in life in that fleeting time of physical bliss. A female breeder may hate giving up her babies, but odds were, she'd welcome the sex that created them.
"Whrat about your babies? Whrat happens to them?"
"Why, whatever my master wants," she shrugged. "I wish I could own my babies, but I don't. I'll love them as long as I have them, but when I have to let them go, I'll let them go and hope that the spirits watch over them. There's nothing more I can do."
She said it with a simple voice, but there was a crushing, haunting aspect behind it that made Kyven's blood run cold. There's nothing else I can do was like a mantra among the Arcans, for it rang so true, so true. They were totally controlled by humanity.
Clearly, Silver represented another aspect of Arcan society he'd never met before, the show Arcans. They were bred, bred like animals, bred for physical traits that humans found attractive, which explained her more voluptuous form than the usual female, and then pitted against each other in contests of prettiness. It was the kinder, gentler version of fighting Arcans, where the weapons were pretty fur or perfect hair or an attractive figure. She'd been produced to look pretty, and she was trained for it, probably from birth. But now that she was a winner, her owner was going to cash in by selling her, with the hopes that she was the dame of a line of champion show Arcans… which someone else could raise and train.
"What about you, Softtail?" Buster asked. "How did you end up here?"
"Luck," he said with a shrug. "I was working on a plantation in Georvan, and a roving Arcan trader bought me. I thought I'd be killed for my fur for sure, but here I am. Never thought I'd sell in the blue ring."
"Well, you'll never work another day," Buster chuckled.
"May the spirits watch over me," the mink said with a sigh.
"When are you going to finish your game, Kyven?" Silver asked.
"Dunno, whry?"
"I want to see what you look like," she giggled, nuzzling him. "Why do you hide under clothes? I can't see anything good."
Kyven actually laughed. "You're the first girl to ever ask mre to undress," he told her.
"Clothes are silly," she stated. "They hide what makes me pretty. They hide what makes you pretty too."
"I wear them to keep my fur," Softtail said simply. "You lose it in the cotton fields if you don't have clothes on. Don't see what the roaming trader saw in me, my fur was a mess and a lot of it was missing from the work."
"That was a good thring," Kyven noted, which drew an agreeing nod from the mink.
"Why do you talk funny, Kyven?" Silver asked. "I don't have any problems speaking right."
"I don't talk much. Lrack of prractice," he shrugged.
After the game, Kyven humored Silver and undressed for her while Buster taught Softtail how to play gin. He felt a little self-conscious as she brazenly looked him up and down, then giggled and sidled up against him and nuzzled his cheek. "You're very pretty," she told him, reaching down and cupping his testicles brazenly, then fondling him. "I love your fur, it's absolutely gorgeous."
"Thrank you," he said, allowing her her little feel.
"Am I pretty?"
"Verry prretty," he nodded.
She absolutely beamed. "Oh, sorry, I'm getting you a little big," she said, letting go of his penis. "I'm a little tired right now, and me and Softtail were fucking on the way, so mind if I rest a little while before we fuck?"
"Uhh, surre, but it's not a botherr," he told her.
"No, no, I'd be happy to. You're cute," she said, giving him a toothy grin. "Softtail thought it was his last chance, he didn't think he was coming to the blue ring," she laughed. "So we fucked on the way up from the boat."
"Thought I was going to a furrier," he said. "Silver gave me what I thought was my last hurrah. Was great, too. Silver is amazing."
"You really thought you weren't making it here?" Buster asked.
The mink nodded. "Thought I was going to be pulled out of the cage any minute. The human never said what he was doing with me, only talked about Silver. He looked about ready to shoot me when I mounted her, but I thought it was my last chance, so we kept at it even after he told us to stop."
The silver fox laughed. "He looked sooo mad! Such a silly human, a mink can't give me a baby, only foxes can!"
It was a curious insight into Arcan society. He already knew that sex wasn't taken the same way as it was among humans, that sex wasn't a private act in the Arcan world, but that was… brazen. Having sex in an open cage in full view of everyone on the street, but then again, Softtail thought he was about to die and Silver was much too valuable to punish, so what did they have to lose?
Kyven rested with Silver on his bed while Buster and Softtail continued to play cards in his room. She wanted to take a nap, but she also wanted to nuzzle and huddle, and picked Kyven to stay with her. He didn't mind all that much, he'd been up late last night and he'd need to reset back to a nocturnal activity cycle, so they lay on their sides, her back nestled up against him, arm draped over her as she napped and he rested. He rather liked lying with her, for she was warm, her fur was soft and inviting, and it was almost enticingly pleasant to close his eyes and imagine that they weren't lying in a prison, but instead were snuggled up on a bed back in his old room, napping through the day while the apprentices below were working…
He woke up some time later to find her looking at him curiously. He must have rolled over during his nap, and she was now behind him, raised up over him as her hand stroked the fur on his shoulder and upper arm. He just looked up at her calmly, then she gave him a toothy smile and leaned down and licked him on the face. "I'm ready now," she said huskily in his ear, just before biting it.
He leaned up and put his muzzle under her chin, and he felt… excited. Trinity, what was wrong with him? He was actually getting aroused at the idea of sex with an Arcan! But this female's sexual attraction was almost undeniable, almost as if he was responding to her in a way he didn't respond to the wolf. Could it be because they were both foxes?
Trinity, was being in an Arcan body now changing him beyond the superficial?
He wasn't sure, but what he did know was that Arcans lived in the moment, and in that moment, he was very much interested in this female. He was overtaken by that desire, getting aroused without imagining it was a human woman–that sexy Loreguard captain was always a favorite fantasy–that was with him.
The fact that Buster and Softtail were still in the room playing cards didn't touch his mind once. For the first time, he was not just willing, but actively engaged in the idea of sex with an Arcan, and his interest caused him to be much less passive. He rolled over and took hold of her, then nuzzled, licked, and bit at her face and neck before clamping his jaws down on her upper neck and mounting her. She didn't seem to mind; in fact, her breathing became faster and she put her hands on his shoulders, then slid them down his back with a soft growl as he penetrated her. He released his grip on her neck once he was fully inside her, and they had sex while the mink and rabbit finished a hand of gin, then they heard them laughing as someone called dinner. "What?" Buster called, though Kyven and Silver weren't paying attention.
"Trinity!" a very young voice called. "Uh, d–d–dinner."
"Just set theirs on the table, they're not paying attention," Softtail said absently. "Deal, rabbit."
It was no different from sex with a human, outside of certain little surprises near the end. When he felt her do that, that thing as she climaxed, clutching him so tightly he couldn't even move, it triggered his own. But unlike the other two times, whatever she did didn't stop. It was as if she gripped him inside her and wouldn't let go, which startled him, and it wasn't entirely pleasant for him.
"Guess… we are… compatible," Silver panted, keeping a grip on him, holding him against her.
"Whrat's hrappenring?" he asked her fearfully, in a whisper.
"We're… joining," she said, quite obviously finding tremendous pleasure in it, whatever it was. "You've… never mated… your own breed?"
"Nnro," he said as she took a very, very firm grip on him, even wrapped one leg around him.
She actually giggled breathlessly. "Then just… hold still, it hurts… males… if they move around."
That was an understatement. Since he'd climaxed, it left him hyper-sensitive, and the pressure on him made every little wiggle a little painful. He just collapsed on top of her and didn't move while she continued to pant and growl softly, literally trembling under him until she clamped her jaws on the side of his neck, immensely enjoying what was going on for long moments, then she let out a long, quite contented sigh and let go of him as she, well, unclenched. "Mmmm," she hummed, licking his neck in satiation.
"Good luck, Silver," Buster told her.
"Good luck, Silver," Softtail mirrored.
"Lruck?" Kyven asked, looking down at her.
"You really were a virgin," she giggled. "Didn't you learn about sex when you grew up?"
"I was alrone with humans," he told her. "And nrever been with arr–anrother fox."
"Well, Buster was right, we're compatible," she told him with a smile. "That's why I joined you. We can have a baby," she said when she saw his blank look. "Now it's just a matter of luck."
"You incited her to ovulate," Buster explained. "Human women ovulate on a regular cycle. Arcans don't, it's triggered. Now it's just a matter of luck if she conceives. It's usually pretty much well guaranteed if you two stay together for a couple of weeks, but since we're being sold on Friday, well, it's a matter of luck. Not much luck, though. It's very rare for a female to conceive from the initial joining."
"Ohr," he said as he rolled off of her. He wasn't sure he rather liked the idea of having a baby with her, but from the sound of it, the chances were very poor after just one time.
"They say babies conceived on the joining become Shaman," Softtail noted.
It also showed him that Arcans and humans were very different in some ways, ways that weren't entirely apparent. The lack of, of stimulation to ovulate had to be some kind of control on female Arcans to prevent possible breeding outside their species, or maybe it was just some adaptation to allow them to breed only when the conditions were favorable.
And that was how the humans could control Arcan populations… just keep the males and females of compatible breeds separate.
"Well, we have three more days," she said huskily, rolling up on her side and nuzzling him. "I'd love to have a baby with you, to see what it would look like, with your thick, amazing black fur and my fur."
"Onry three days, I dunno," he hedged.
"Then we'll just have to work for it," she said huskily, nibbling on his ear, then climbing out of bed. "Let us clean up, and we'll come eat dinner, boys," she told them.
The encounter troubled him a little bit, on more than one level. First, he'd been willing that time. Not just willing, but willing. She offered, but he was the one in command, in control. He wanted it, he wanted her, he'd been aroused by an Arcan, and it made it… strange. He'd always been creeped out by the idea of an Arcan before, but not that time. He'd been highly aroused, and not just because he was fantasizing about that Loreguard captain. He'd been aroused by an Arcan. That almost made him shudder now, but at the time, it was making him feel something entirely different.
Lust.
Lust, for an Arcan. What was happening to him? Was he becoming an Arcan? Was he losing his humanity?
Well, the last few weeks, since starting the Walk, they hadn't endeared him very much to his own people. He'd seen the human race at its worst in the faces of Bella, and that Loreguard soldier who killed the girl, and the crew of the slaver. And after he'd been changed, he'd seen the ugliness of humans from an entirely new perspective, seeing it from the receiving end, seeing just how cruel people could be. The viciousness of Arthur Ledwell, wrapped in an urbane exterior, showed what monsters could lurk behind the masks of upstanding people.
But humanity wasn't totally rotten. People like Virren, and Master Holm and Timble, and the farmer family who he hoped were now taking good care of the ferrets, they were good people, they were the best of humanity. They showed the spectrum that was humanity, from best to worst, and the many shades of gray between them.
He'd been an Arcan for… he didn't know how long. In that very short time, thanks to Arthur Ledwell, he'd tasted the savagery that the Arcan race faced on a daily basis, and it sickened him. But, it was the Arcan mantra… what else could they do? They were slaves. They were beyond slaves. Some of them had their very wills crushed and became slaves in every sense of the word, who were so conditioned that they couldn't even fathom life as anything other than a slave, and accepted whatever they were given meekly.
So, now that he'd seen the real world, as the fox had probably intended all along, what would he do about it? What could one man do about the whole world? Not much. But Virren had said that he helped where he could, when he could. He achieved little victories, like saving the mouse, which may be a useless gesture in the grand scheme of things, yet also mattered in that there were people out there risking their lives to do what was right.
Maybe, once enough little victories were piled up, they could become a great victory.
So, Kyven was a man who liked to plan. What would he do after he reached Haven? Hide? Live? What if the fox never gave him back his powers, or he never tried to please her and maintained the rift between them, and stayed as an Arcan for the rest of his life? Well, he certainly had some advantages. He could hide in plain sight, he was stealthy. He could serve. He could become one of the Masked, like Virren wanted, and work for those little victories, do what he could where he could to try to help the Arcans. He was special, unique. He was certain they could find uses for him, if only as a crystalcutter.
He would help. He had seen too much, had experienced too much, to turn his back. He would work for the Arcans. He was an Arcan at least for right now, he tasted the misery of their lives first hand, and when he changed back to a human, he would never forget. Never. One could learn to ignore what one saw happening, but it was impossible for them to go home and forget what was done to them.
Perhaps that was the lesson the fox wanted to teach him, but fucking hell, what a brutal way to go about it. Emotionally scarring him for life did get her point across, but couldn't there have been a slightly better way?
Water under the bridge, he supposed. There was no way he could go home and ever ignore their pain, close his ears to their pleas. He would work for his own little victories, and try to change things for the better… one Arcan at a time.
When he reached Haven, he would ask to join the Masked.
"Such a serious face," Silver teased, leaning over and nuzzling him.
"Silrver, thrank you."
"What for?"
"Forr your cormfort."
"That wasn't for comfort, that was for fun," she giggled, licking his chin.
"It wras forr me," he told her.
"Well, then I was happy to make you feel better," she told him.
"Yrou did more than help mre feel better. Yrou showed mre the wray," he said simply, putting his hand on her shoulder.
"So mysterious," she grinned at him. "What does that mean?"
"It mreans that I know whrat to do now," he answered. "I know whry I'm here."
"Same as me, to be sold."
"Nno, to find mry prrace," he told her. "I wras free, but mry eyes were crrosed. I had to be caught to see, and nnow mry eyes arre open. And I see mry path."
She gave him a long, look, then she gasped and squealed in delight. "By the spirits! You're a Shaman!" she said in a sudden low whisper.
"Nno, I'm nnot," he said simply. "Mmraybe, I wrill be someday, through."
She gave an excited little squeal, and hugged him. "A Shaman, I got to meet a real Shaman!" she whispered in glee. "And maybe I'll bear your child!" she realized with wide eyes. "What a gift you've given me!"
"Nno offense, Silrver, but I hope not. Not lrike this. Not in hrere."
"Then we'll have to disagree," she said with a grin, taking his hands and holding them. "You may be Arcan, but your life away from us shows. Without life, we can't go on, and if we don't go on, then nobody will remember us. Even if he's born in a cage, our baby will be the symbol that we go on, we survive. Every baby is another victory, in a world where victories are few and far between."
Such eloquence and wisdom, from such an unlikely source. He leaned down and nuzzled her gently, and she put her hands around him. "Thren I hrope you find yrour hrappiness, Silrver," he said, putting his chin on her head and holding her close.
"You're escaping, aren't you?"
"I'rm going to trry," he answered. "One wray or anotherr, this will be my lrast day herre. I'rll eitherr leave on mry feet orr butcherred in pieces, but one wray or anotherr, I'rll be gone by morrning."
"I'd be tempted to try with you, but I'd just slow you down," she whispered. "I'll be alright, I'm too valuable to the humans. I'll be fine. But you're not fine. If they discover who you are, they'll kill you. So you have to go. But don't forget me."
"Neverr. I wrill neverr forrget you, Silrver."
Silver never said a word to the others.
She remained her upbeat, almost obnoxiously perky little self all afternoon. She didn't feel like playing cards, so she just sat in laps and paid attention to the males, chatting away… she was the most talkative Arcan he'd ever seen. But, her chatty nature made the time fly by, until the sun set outside of their window, they were brought dinner, and then Softtail went to bed. Buster retired not long after, leaving just him and Silver. She nuzzled with him for several moments, leaned up and whispered "may the spirits watch over you," then got up and went across the hall and into her room.
Trinity, he hoped not. He didn't want his spirit with him. He a still too angry with her.
He waited about an hour after dark, while the sun was well down but before the moon rose, and then he got up and got to work. He packed one set of clothes in his pack–he'd need clothes to get out of Alamar unmolested–then slipped out of his window. He carried the pack under himself as he ran on his legs and one hand back to the administration building, his spirit sight keeping track of everyone, then he cased the administration building looking for an open window. Trinity praise the predictable, the same window he'd used the last time was again left open. That was fine with him, for he knew his way to the room from that office. He put the pack's straps in his teeth and again vaulted up and grabbed the sill, then pulled himself into the room through the window. He left his pack by the window and stalked into the hallway, keeping alert for some straggler wandering up, staying down on all fours as he padded silently down the hallway, coming up to the door. He could again see the collars behind it, and could see the crystal embedded into the metal door.
Now comes the tricky part.
The door was a solid piece of metal, from what he could see. The door was hinged on the other side, meaning it opened inward, away from him, and it had no knob, ring, or any other external feature. It was seated firmly into the wall, meaning that one couldn't wedge anything into the doorframe from the sides to pry it open. From what his spirit sight could see, the crystal embedded in the door could only empower the door itself. The frame around the door was normal wood, not laced or prepared wood. The frame made it impossible for him to tell which way the door opened.
Kyven first lightly touched the door, then recoiled, seeing if it reacted, but it did not. He then put his palm on the door and pushed, but found that it was indeed closed and locked. And since there was no handle or ring, it meant that the door opened via some kind of external control, key, or command.
Alright, he established that he could not open the door by normal means. Now, the planner in him examined the door, the wall, even the ceiling and the floor, analyzing it to find an unusual way into that room. The walls were paneled wood, thick and varnished, and from the sound they made when he knocked lightly on them, they were solid and thick. The floor was hardwood, and from the sound of it, it had a hollow space under it. Looking up at the ceiling explained the hollow sound of the floor; the floor under his feet was the ceiling for the level below, held up with sturdy beams. Those beams were small and sturdy, and ran perpendicular to the hallway, about six rods apart.
That was the way in!
Kyven went back for his pack, and then found the stairs. Keeping a wary eye for roaming guards, he again padded down the halls, staying to the shadows as much as he could then darting through the lit areas where lamps illuminated the hallways. He found the room under the room holding the collars, which presented him a challenge of another locked door This door was not alchemical, however, and that meant that he could use direct methods to getting past it. His choice of methods wasn't a swift kick, but slow, inexorable pressure. He set his claws of his feet to the floor, leaned into the door, and began to push. He pushed with slowly increasing force, putting more and more stress on the blocks keeping the door locked, until he heard them snap and all resistance vanish. The door swung open loudly, crashing into the wall as it swung on its hinges, and Kyven quickly darted in and dropped his pack, then closed the door and grabbed a nearby chair and wedged it against the door, making it appear to be locked, which he would have never been able to do if he'd broken the door down. He found himself in a well-appointed office, one of the two chairs facing a large, rich-wooded desk used to bar the door now, an office with a large dark-wooded desk and a padded chair on the far side. Kyven looked up and saw the crystals of the collars directly over him, then waited for long minutes as he checked to see if anyone came to investigate the noise the door made when it swung open and hit the wall. Nobody did. Most of the people in the building were on the far side, where the kitchen was, and the closest roving guard was outside the building, about two hundred rods away. He waited for that guard to roam away, then hopped up onto the desk, jumped up, and sank his claws into one of the support beams in the ceiling. He got one of his feet on it, giving him a solid foundation, then he put his other foot to the boards, drove his claws into it, then kicked. He gouged the boards with his claws repeatedly, using his claws like a saw blade, ripping more and more wood away with his large, sharp claws, literally digging through the wood. He ripped completely through the wood of about eight boards, ripped holes big enough to put his hand through, then crawled down along the beam using his claws to get within reach of his hand. He put his hand through the hole and grabbed one board, then pushed it down until he heard it crack. He pushed it down to get it out of the way, then did the same with the next board, then the next board, and down the line until he had a hole big enough for him to get through. He leaned over and hooked his claws into one of the ungouged boards at the border, grabbed the other side, then swung out under the hole and then pulled himself up and through using raw strength. He pulled himself up into the room above, then stood up to look around.
It was exactly what he thought it was, a storeroom for the collars the blue ring used to move the Arcans here in and out of the compound. The collars were kept in a series of shelves, each one in a numbered slot so they could keep track of them.
Paydirt!
Kyven didn't take just one, he took fifteen collars. He took fifteen because when they figured out that Arcans had broken in, they'd find many collars missing instead of just one, which would make them waste time and resources getting a headcount instead of immediately sending everything they had out into the city to hunt for the lone escapee. He hooked them all over his arm, then he lowered himself down into the hole and dropped down into the office on the first floor. He immediately bent to the task of working with one of the collars, managing to open it, then he pulled the crystal out of its setting and put it around his neck and bent the joining ends so it would stay around his neck but also be easily removed with a sharp tug. He then put on his clothes, put the other thirteen collars in the pack, kept one in his bare hand, and then looked outside. He spied the closest border to the building, and then spied out the guards to see exactly where they were and when he could move that would maximize his time. With the collar and pack he'd be visible, so he decided to just put on his clothes too so he could immediately move right into the city, where his clothes and collar would discourage immediate pursuit, would give him just enough time to get out of Alamar and into open country.
Now!
He opened the window of the office and dropped down onto all fours and charged across the field, racing up to the fence. He slid to a halt just at the edge of the fence, mindful that he'd knock himself out running into it at full speed if the collar didn't work. He grabbed the collar firmly and reached out with his hand gripping the collar.
ZOT!
Kyven staggered back. Fuck, it didn't work! No, wait, it wasn't lost yet. They had to get Arcans out using the collars, maybe he had to go to the gate. Maybe that was the only place the collars could be used. He turned and raced away, using spirit sight to avoid the approaching guards, relying on the moonless night to hide his clothing as he raced across the compound. Now this time, there would be no caution. If the gate didn't work, then he'd still be trapped in here, and they'd know who stole the collars eventually anyway, so he now had nothing to lose. They'd know he escaped immediately when he blew by the guards at the gate, but there wasn't much he could do about that. He would attack them, but Kyven was really no fighter. He had no idea how to fight in close quarters without magic, claws or no claws. The claws gave him a natural weapon, but he didn't really know how to use them, and he'd be coming up against men armed with pistols and alchemical weapons, most likely. No, his best option was just to charge right by them, use that moment of surprise to his advantage to blow past them and into the city. If it failed, the worst that happened was they kept a much closer eye on him until he was sold, and then his buyer would also be more careful knowing that he'd bought a known escaper. He'd have almost no chance to escape, and he was down to his last, best option, because he really didn't think trying to dig would work.
He lined himself up with the gate. He had to take it at a full, flat run, going as fast as he possibly could, so he either raced by the guards, or he was killed by the impact with the barrier, one way or the other. Either way, he'd be free. He got out in front of the gate, just by the platform of the blue ring, and then jumped out into a run. He went faster, and faster, and faster, until his hands and feet were barely touching the ground, and his lean body was loping across the ground as fast as a running horse. He heard nothing but his own breath and the wind in his ears as he rocketed towards the four men standing by the gate with its two bright lamps, as they stood around casually talking to each other. Kyven gauged the gates and adjusted his speed so he could make the leap to clear them. He charged the four men, who had not noticed him, not even when he came into the light and the coolness vanished around him to tell him his shadowy cloak was gone. He thundered up to them, then bunched his legs and exploded from the ground, starting his leap before he even reached the four men. He rose up higher and higher, saw the four men almost as if they were in slow motion, as one of them turned towards the motion, then his head tried to snap the other way to lock onto him. He was above the level of the fence, his paws reaching out, one of them holding the ring–
ZOT!
Kyven gasped when he was attacked by lightning, but he did not ram the barrier. Electrical sparks danced around him as he laid out in the air over the gate, coming from the gate itself, causing him to release the collar in his hand. He saw it spin away from his hand slowly, almost lazily, rising over him as it went up but gravity reclaimed him and began pulling him back to the earth. His arms felt like he was stung by a thousand hornets from being zapped by the barrier, but he braced himself to land, knowing that it was going to be hard and painful.
The landing was not pretty. His hands hit the ground, but the lightning had numbed his arms, and he plowed into the cobblestone street, tumbling and rolling. The ground and sky traded places wildly as he felt a hundred bites and stings from the stone street jabbing into him, as he skidded to a stop laying on his side. He pulled himself up onto his hands, shaking his head to clear the stars, and control of his body returned almost instantly when he heard the shouts of alarm, and then a piercing whistle. He scrambled to his feet and turned, then darted down the road leading to the city, free of the blue ring. Free of the blue ring, free of any collar, free of any constraint.
He was free!
He couldn't leave without telling them how he felt about them. "FRUCK YOU!" he shouted when he looked behind himself at the four stunned guards, then he looked ahead, found a nice rhythm, and charged into the night as whistles, and then sirens, erupted from the famous blue ring behind him.
Kyven had escaped.
He had a lead, and that lead saved his ass.
By the time organized pursuit got going, Kyven was already several blocks into the city. He dared not use spirit sight or he'd be found out as a Shaman, so he relied instead on his Arcan eyes, which were attuned to the darkness, allowing him to navigate poorly lit streets in the moonless night. Quite a few men and women saw him race by, but they hadn't quite made the connection that he had escaped yet, since the sirens from the blue ring weren't easily audible that far away. Kyven's clothes and the silver collar around his neck, easily visible, made the few that did see him coming and think to take a step to intercept him or pull shockrods or other weapons hesitate for that critical instant that was all he needed to blow by them and be long gone before they made any decisions.
By the time word did get out that one of the valuable Blue Ring Arcans had managed to escape, Kyven was already out of the city, having escaped to the east and then turning to the north, loping along the border of a swampy fen and the city, then finding a road and turning onto it, allowing himself to fully stretch out his strides and put increasingly large distances between him and Alamar. Once he was far enough away, he discarded the other collars, took off his clothes and collar, put them in the pack, then strapped the pack to his underbelly and continued to run. By putting the pack under him, it wouldn't be quite so obvious to people in the darkness… but that seemed to be a moot point. In the hours after escaping from Alamar, he ran though three small villages along that road, but there was no one about.
He was too focused to get too excited. He'd get excited about his escape when he had a couple hundred minars between him and Alamar. He was an Arcan on the run, he was in outstanding shape, and he had a lead. He intended to run literally until he could go no further, and hoped to have at least two hundred minars between him and Alamar. That far ahead, any pursuers would have to literally kill their horses to catch up with him. He'd stay on the road for a good part of that, because the open road allowed him to run at the pace of a running horse, but then he'd cut across country once he reached a point where he felt that horses would start dying. In the forest, he would go slower, but the cover would give him a tactical advantage. Unless they had some way to track him, the forest would give him cover and allow him to hide. He would run by night and hide by day, finding areas of darkness like dens or fallen hollow logs, areas of both shadow and darkness where he could merge with the shadows and rest, invisible to any hunters.
He ran through the night at that same powerful, ground-eating pace, putting nearly eighty minars behind him, stopping only to drink as much as he could and have short rests, then continue on, staying on the road. He knew that there would be pursuit, and a hell of a lot of it. Word would get out that he escaped, and he was a prize worth the time of every hunter and glory seeker all over the Alamar region. He was clearly the property of the blue ring, but there would be both one hell of a reward and a hell of a lot of prestige for whoever managed to catch the only Arcan that had ever escaped from the blue ring. That would put a lot of pressure on him, but he was more than willing to put up with it for his freedom. He knew that as he got further and further from Alamar, the pressure on him would lessen, since the hunters would spread out and have to cover a lot more territory. Some would even go the wrong way out of Alamar, thinking he might go due north or northwest, towards the sparsely populated areas of the Alamar region, when he was going northeast, into populated regions. From what he remembered of his geography, there were quite a few plantations and farms north and east of Alamar, cut out of the forests in the region. His destination was Atan, so he had to stay on the east side of the Smoke Mountains, skirting them on his way north. That was forest terrain, hilly, with many streams and rivers to cross, and that was conducive to an Arcan on the run. It would slow down the horses chasing him much more than it would him, though his inability to swim was going to be a problem in a few places, he was sure.
Maybe he should spend a little time in a stream trying to figure out how to swim, so he could cross rivers anywhere. It might be a wise use of his time.
At dawn, he turned off the road towards Morat and turned more easterly, vanishing into the forest. The forest reminded him of his initial Shaman training with the wolf, running through the forest as a human while chasing that damned wolf, wanting to kill him if he could catch him, but never able to do it. But now he was the one in front, the one running on all fours through the forest, ghosting between trees and around scrubs of thornbushes, racing along ridges, down game trails, bounding over streams. Well after dawn, he pulled up and again put on his clothes and the fake collar, but then realized that they might be able to track that collar. He tossed it aside. Yes, anyone who saw him would see that he was uncollared, but he really had no intentions of being seen by any humans. He was a unique-looking Arcan, and he'd be recognized on sight, collar or no collar. If he bounded through a village that didn't know about him, then word would spread of the sighting, some enterprising hunter might deduce his path, and somehow get ahead of him and try to ambush him. The key to his survival was to outrun all opponents, stay ahead of them, stay ahead of news that he had escaped, which would seed his path with a gauntlet of hunters that sought to capture the black fox Arcan that had escaped from the blue ring.
And Toby Fisher figured highest among them. He had little doubt the sleek, dangerous man would be coming for him, since he escaped before he was sold, and thus Toby had no money to take back to Cheston for Annette Ledwell. She was out his sale price, and Toby was out his deposit. That would put Toby solidly on his tail, and Toby was one man that Kyven feared and respected enough to want to stay as far away from as possible. He had no doubt that the man was good, good enough to track him, so he had to move fast and steadily, push the man, keep him from having any chance to stop and gather himself. If he kept Toby constantly running to keep up with him, it would minimize the danger the man could pose to him.
Kyven's main advantage was endurance, a powerful endurance that would let him keep ahead of men on horseback. His disadvantage was mainly right here, right now, when he was forced, in this first day, to run in daylight, because he was just too close to Alamar. He would have to be very careful not to be seen, or word would spread of the sighting, and the hunters would have a new point from which to work to try to find him.
Thank the Trinity Toby had never asked him about himself, so he had no information to go on.
Fuck. He'd told Buster and the others that he'd been raised in Atan! They'd be interrogated for sure, and that would come out. That meant that there would definitely be hunters coming to Atan to see if he showed up… and that meant he had to get there first. And since some of them might take a ship to Avannar or Stinger Bay, trying to get ahead of him to wait, that meant he had to completely bust his ass to get to Atan first.
It was time to push his endurance to the limit. He had to get to Atan first. He just had to.
He did the math as he ran. If a steamship sailed non-stop from Alamar to Avannar, the closest port to Atan, it was seven or eight days provided it had good weather. Add two days to ride a horse to death to get to Atan, and he was looking at seeing his first hunter show up in nine or ten days, assuming word was not sent ahead using alchemy. If word was sent to Atan that he was coming, well, then that changed everything. But assuming that they did not, that no one would risk losing the reward, that left him nine days–well, eight now. He had to assume the worst and that there were hunters already on a ship heading for Avannar.
Kyven was in great shape, and in this Arcan form, he could go faster than a horse over the span of a day. Those combined would give him the ability to cover about a hundred minars a day through virgin forest, given stops to drink, rest, and hunt for food. It was about a thousand minars from Alamar to Atan, if he remembered his geography right. So, if he could cover a hundred minars a day, he could reach Atan in nine days after subtracting the distance he'd already covered.
Not good enough.
He had to stretch it out. He had to run all night, and run hard. He had to cover a hundred twenty minars a day, cut at least a full day off his travel time, and do it through forest and without roads. He'd have to kill his food just before he stopped and eat only when he was hiding during the daylight hours, cut down on his drinking to only when he literally had to cross the stream or river from which he drank. Rest breaks were out of the question, he'd do his resting when he stopped for the day. If he was too tired, he could slow down for a while, just so long as he continued forward.
From that point on, everything Kyven did, every single thing, had to be done with an eye on saving time and keeping him moving forward. He absolutely had to beat his pursuers to Atan, get in touch with Virren, and then escape into the frontier.
As he considered that, he came to his first real obstacle. It was a river, a narrow river, but it was deep. He stopped at the bank and paced back and forth on all fours, considering the problem, but then he decided to risk it. He waded in, where it was deep but not over his head, and tried to swim. He floundered around, kept going under, until he got a kind of idea of it after about a half an hour. If he paddled with his hands while he kind of rolled his legs, almost like he was running on two legs underwater, he would shuffle forward and keep his head above water. Once he got the hang of it, he turned his muzzle to the opposite bank and paddled out into the river. The current pulled him downstream as he slowly worked his way across, but he kept his head above water and moved inexorably towards the other bank.
After about twenty minutes of slow paddling, he made it across. He looked back and just had to smile. Horses would not cross that river easily, not where he did. There might be a ford or ferry nearby he didn't know about, but they'd lose time getting to it which he'd make up right now. He dropped down to all fours and shook the water out of his fur, then bounded off into the summer morning, quickly vanishing among the tall pines of the Alamar forest.
The deer never saw it coming.
Kyven exploded out of the trees and into the clearing as the afternoon sun cast long shadows across the grass, startling the small herd of deer. They turned and tried to bolt, but the predator was literally on top of them before they could get a single jump. He singled out the smallest of them, a yearling, and drove it to the ground. It bleated in terror, but that bleat was cut brutally short when Kyven's jaws literally ripped its throat out. He didn't even wait for the animal to die before he tore into it, sinking his fangs and claws into its belly as it twitched and jerked, but then it mercifully went still when he literally disemboweled it with his claws and teeth. Bones snapped as Kyven's jaws drove into the animal's belly and tore out its liver, which he ate quickly and greedily. He hadn't eaten since he escaped, and the time in the cage had made him almost phobic about being hungry. He'd held off eating as long as he could stand it, until the pangs started awakening a nameless dread in him, which forced him to stop running and hunt. The luck of the Father was with him by stumbling across the small herd just minutes after moving from running to hunting, and he'd used his stealth to get so close to the deer that they had no chance to get away when he pounced.
He didn't have much time, and he knew it. He was a little sleepy, but not too tired. He could easily keep running, and he fully intended to do so, all night. He'd stop to sleep in the morning, which would give him a night, day, and night of constant running to get ahead of the hunters behind him. And that made him feel safe enough to stop and rest when the sun came up tomorrow morning, as he'd have a nearly insurmountable lead on those pursuing him on land. He didn't really feel safe enough to stop and eat, but hunger had forced it of him, and that lingering fear made him eat fast. He tore the deer apart, ripping the tissue to get at the most nourishing organs and devouring them, then going back to tear out mouthfuls of the choice meat, avoiding the intestines and stomach, which never failed to make Kyven nauseous if he wasn't careful to shake out what was inside of them before eating them.
Trinity, he was starving. The carcass of the deer was dragged back and forth through the clearing bite by bite as Kyven ate as fast as he could, spitting out pieces of bone and tufts of fur, leaving smears of blood on the grass and small bits of meat torn free by his careless tearing at the carcass. He wanted to eat more, but he felt the ticking of the clock, and he'd reached the point where he'd have to work on the legs to get meat, the torso was cleared of all the meat that was easy to get. He did tear one hind leg off and strip the hide off it, then rip the entire muscle off it and hold it in his mouth as he abandoned what was left of his kill and started running again, carrying the meat in his mouth to eat on the run. He did that, finding that it wasn't easy to eat and swallow while dodging trees, and spent much of the time after that licking the blood out of the fur around his mouth. He stopped at a small stream and drank his fill, but the faint sound of voices alerted him. He bounded away and into the trees, took off his pack, and then found a patch of shadow in the sunset dark enough and deep enough for him to feel the coolness surround him, telling him he had blended into the shadows and was now invisible.
It was a pair of kids. Two boys, looking to be about twelve or so, wearing rugged clothing of cotton and leather.
"No way!" the smaller of the two said as they came into view, along the creek.
"Ah did too! It was right heah, or heah abouts," the taller dark-haired boy replied. "A wild Ahcan, Bo, a small one with brown fur an' big round eahs! Ah think it was a beah!"
"Mebbe it was a real beah," the smaller one said. "Not an Ahcan."
"Ah guess it cudda been," the taller one agreed. "Look, heah's its tracks!" he said, pointing to where Kyven had stopped to drink.
Tracks. He hadn't considered that… but by now, he was so far ahead that it didn't matter.
"Those ain't beah tracks, those are wolf tracks!" the smaller one protested.
"Wolf? You sho' it's a wolf?"
"Ayah, look, it's like the hound-dog's foot, just biggah. And see, heah's a handprint, so it was and Ahcan." He knelt down, then pointed in Kyven's general direction. "It went off dat way to'ds the Blackstone plantation. Ah sweah, Tem, them's some big prints, and dey fresh. The Ahcan has tah be full growed, and somethin' close."
The two boys looked around fearfully, then both started backing up. "Ayah, Ah think we'd bettah be gettin' back home, Bo," the taller one said with a slightly quivering voice. "An' warn Paw they's an Ahcan out heah, mebbe wild, mebbe slipped a collah."
Smart kids. But, their talk revealed a flaw in his plan. Sure, he could cover a hundred twenty minars a night, but in the forest, did he know he was going the right way? He almost stumbled right into a plantation he didn't know was there. Was he still moving north, or was he now going west? It was easy to tell in the daytime, but it would be harder at night.
He needed a compass. A map would be nice too, but he'd settle for knowing where he was right now and a compass. So, he needed information… and he had two fountains of it right here at his fingertips.
They'd never talk to someone in the shadows, he realized, so he had to reveal himself… in a way. He'd have to attack them, scare them into answering him, but not let them see him. He also couldn't kill them, or he'd have humans crawling all over the place looking for them, in an area he might be staying in for a little while as he secured a compass.
They were scared, but they were kids, so it was very easy to ambush them. While they hurried up the streambank, he slipped behind them, then bounded up, reared up on his legs, and grabbed each boy by the back of the neck and drove them to the ground. They screamed in fear as he gripped their necks and kept their heads squarely forward. "Hrow farr to Morrat?" he demanded.
"Who are yah?" one of them asked in fear.
"Hrow farr to Morrat?" he demanded, gripping their necks more firmly, a squeeze they did not miss.
"Fifty minars no'th!" the smaller one said.
"Whrere is the nearrest virr–vilrage?" he demanded.
"Yo' an Ahcan!" the taller one gasped. "Y'all done slipped yo' collah, ayah!"
"Then I have no reason not to kirl yrou if yrou don't answer," he said coldly. "Talk and lrive. Stay quiet and die. Now, whrere is the nearrest vilrage?"
"Up the stream, past our fahm!" the short one said immediately.
"If I go downstrream, wirl I find empty lrand? No farrms?"
"They's two fahms dat way, but dey small, and dey be nothin' past 'em!" the taller one said.
Kyven tamped his feet. Now came the tricky part. "I'm hungrry, hrumans, but I don't lrike easy meat. I'rl give yrou a ten second head starrt, starrting when I lret go of yrou. Rready?"
They started trembling.
"Then go!" he barked, releasing them. Before either of them even reacted, Kyven had turned and bounded over the stream and into the trees. He felt the coolness wash over him as the two boys scrambled to their feet, too afraid to look back, then tore upstream as fast as they could run, screaming at the top of their lungs.
Now, while everyone went downstream to warn the farms of an escaped Arcan that was hungry, Kyven would slip around them, to the village, and find a compass.
The plan worked pretty well. The village was right where they said it was, and the boys raised an uproar in the small hamlet. Men grabbed muskets and crossbows and headed off into the woods, leaving the tavern and general store, which were in the same building, rather bare. Kyven dropped his pack off near the edge of town and crept into the general store through its second floor, through an open window and past a sleeping child. His spirit sight told him where everyeone was, allowing him to slip past a nervous female and down the stairs into the general store. He found a compass in there, a very nice compass that had a thin rope tied to it that would let him hang it from his neck for easy access, basically exactly what he was looking for. After finding the compass, he looked around for other useful things. He came up with a blanket, two waterskins, and some dried jerked meat that he felt might come in handy for eating and drinking on the move. Outside of that, he had everything he needed, and besides, it all had to fit in his pack with the single set of clothing he kept, just in case.
He slipped out of the general store through a locked back door, got his pack, then bounded into the trees. He put his stolen goods into his pack, then checked the compass. If he was fifty minars south of Morat, then if he remembered his geography, he needed to go northeast to stay on the east side of the Smoke Mountains, maybe even edge to the east side. The Smoke Mountains' south edge was in Georvan, and Sagrad, which was a mining town at the very end of the Smoke Mountains in Georvan, was northeast of Morat.
He was indeed going the right way.
But he had a long way to go, and he had to put as much distance between him and Alamar as possible before he finally stopped. The night was young, and the meal had recharged him. He was a little sleepy, but he was ready for a full night of running. He put the compass around his neck, shouldered the pack, then dropped down to all fours and bounded away from the nameless village, ready to face the challenge of racing the hunters to Atan.