Spring Raine...

SPRING RAINE's STORY...

A child of industrious workers who presided over a Pesh house in the squalor of a non-existent speck on the map in the far-reaching shadows of Katapesh, quivering with merchants and slavers; a child of poor farmers whose rise to mediocre success was quashed when they were accused of stealing an entire shipment of Pesh, slated for the palace that looms over Katapesh itself!
             
It wasn’t true, but they could not prove it, and they were hauled off to prison leaving me to the fates of such abandoned urchins. Nearly captured by the slavers, I scrabbled for myself, scrounging food and hiding under the brush to sleep.
           
Finding a job that offered me little more than a slave’s lot – I fooled the owners assuring them my mother was just behind me – emptying the chamber pots of the guest houses, I was at least free, although more often than not my pay was overlooked.
             
Unfortunately, I also caught the attention of the smelly, ignorant, ruthless Gnolls roaming the lanes gathering up the unsuspecting in the dead of night and shipping them off to the Fleshfairs; or the Docks, before anyone knew they’d gone!
             
Being lugged by one such creature (after stupidly cutting through the dark alley) toward a wagon used to secure kidnapped victims before they were shown at the Fleshfair and sold, I was liberated by a flash of speed and a ‘poof’ of disbelief! One minute the hand encompassed my arms strongly enough to leave deep bruises – the next the creature lay sprawled on the ground and a woman’s voice urgently directed me to follow her.
             
Haleen. A woman who risked her freedom to rescue me, an orphaned nobody, facilitating my escape – gathering me and two other orphaned youth and removing us far away from the dangers of the addictive lifestyle, to the southern regions of the rocky desert that borders Nex. Nowhere was safe from the slavers.
             
Haleen taught us how to hunt and trade in pelts and parts of the odd animals many have never heard of. Camels, (the leather is prized for tents), sand eels, (which make the best slippers) basilisks, behirs, wild horses (taming these is a rite of passage in one culture), scorpions, (crazily enough, the milk is prized for its aphrodisiac qualities!), and buzzards (feathers, beaks, and talons are use in all sorts of spells!). (She threw her arms up in frustration when I began to keep smaller animals and train them. A merchant thought I ought to sell them; and, for a while, it brought a lucrative amount of coins into the household.)
             
She offered us the space to expand our imaginations; to grow and follow our hearts, while teaching us life skills and empathy. The other two, Nasko, a Dwarf and Gryfaw, a Human-Elf, like me, left to seek their fame and fortune, whilst I remained, feeling an obligation and love for Haleen, delighting her as I discovered my magical abilities quite by accident at the age of fourteen Springs.
             
A Sorceress, caught in the heavy spring rains, begged shelter for the cost of training me. Although her visit was brief, even Haleen was amazed by what I learned and how I well I was able to control my gift! Constant practise honed my ability to a sharp point. I can recall and perform my spells with a mere flick of my mind.
             
A visit from a well-dressed Human-Orc one evening, after the autumn harvest, and I knew something was amiss. I wondered at the change in Haleen in the few days after the Human-Orc’s visit. She seemed agitated; frustrated, worried. Then one morning, about a week later, I awoke and she was gone! Her bed was tidy, but her things were missing. She left a note, but it only served to make me confident she was protecting me from something - at the risk of endangering herself.
             
The Human-Orc claimed to have nothing to do with her disappearance – I hate to admit it, but I believe him.
           
I must find her; I must help her, if I can.
             
Setting out on my journey immediately as I heard the watch say they’d seen her moving swiftly through the desert heading toward Katapesh. After many false leads and visiting many towns, villages and markets; among the nomads, mercenaries and desert tribes; many enquires and false hopes, I overheard, inside the Bath House near the Docks of Katapesh (funded by disposing of my meagre collection of bizarre, wild, partially-trained animals to Cindra's Exotic Pets, in the Lower City), two shadows conversing in low voices describing a fierce woman they’d come across in the deserted town of Kelmarane.
             

They described Haleen! I was sure of it. Someone fitting her description was seen amidst the rocks and crumbling structures of Kelmarane!
             
It may be a false lead, but... 
             
Needing to find a way to get to this place, this Kelmarane, I chance upon Garavel's advertisement for mercenaries, and, although I have to convince him a Sorceress can come in very handy, he agrees to let me join with the others who've volunteered their services.
             
I believe in fate. I’d not intended to sell my animals until someone pointed me in the right direction. Cindra herself suggested the bath house! Now the gig as a merc!? I feel that this is the right course to take.
             
I hope I’ll have time to visit the fabled, grand College of Dimensional Studies in the Inner City, before we set out; my mentor mentioned it during my study with her and I am eager to visit and see its wonders.

o0o