A bad day

Rhonda Floam

Three of them

I’m writing this in a hurry. They just left. Three of them; an ushen (I was right!) and two humans.

All three are scoundrels, bullies, the kind of folk that really enjoy dishing out the punishment. They did a number on me. I can barely write, but I’m madder than a heolas in hell so here goes!

They keep asking me where the “stone” is. Sometimes they call it an “eye”. I don’t know what they’re talking about. The asked about my Nossring “buddies”. I told him I don’t know any Nossring. That got a fist in the face and a couple of lashes.

 —-

They came back before I expected it, so I had to stop, but getting back to it now while it’s still the same day. I think I passed out for a few minutes or maybe longer. Hard to tell when there’s no sunlight.

My jailors seem to be from Shawmancer. They were mostly speaking some kind of strong local dialect. I could pick out some of it from working with the folks at the paper. Most of the “dialogue” was non-verbal. Punching and slapping were their favorites, though they liked to kick the hell out of me if I fell down. They took that as a sign of disrespect. Metal-shod boots didn’t help. They looked familiar; a particular make. Maybe the boots of beast riders.

One of the human’s is named Torshan. The ushen called him, which got Torshan pissed, so he gave a hard jab in the ushen’s ribs. I could see it hurt the ushen. That was definitely the highlight of my day.

This “stone” that they’re looking for seems to be something powerful, and they seem to want it badly. I think for someone else; for whoever it is they work for.

—-

I think I passed out again. Not sure what time of day, or night, it is. I need to find out who they’re working for, and why they think I know where this stone is. I think it’s because of the nossring I met on the ship. There always did seem to be something more to those guys than they were saying.

No food today.