Chapter 1 - Slaves

---Last Seed, 18th, 4E 201---

Ra'Kam slowly opened his eyes, then instantly regretted it. His dreams of basking on a warm beach were rudely ripped away, replaced with the creak and damp of a slave ship. He sat up and surveyed the holding cell. The slave hold was separated into two sections, one for the lizard-like Argonians, and another for Ra'Kam's kind, the feline Khajiits.

The journey had been harsh. From bits of conversations they had overheard from their captors, the ship had become lost when it's navigator and captain both succumbed to a severe case of Brown Rot that had spread among the crew. The food and water supplies were running out, and the slavers hadn't given them any in two days. Ra'Kam shuffled over to the Khajiit who was keeping watch and asked, "What news does this one have for Ra'Kam?"

J'Dron turned to him with a weak smile. "Not good news Ra'Kam. J'Dron thinks our captors are all dead. This one hasn't heard a sneeze or cough in a few hours," he said, then a look of sadness crept onto his face. "Ma'Rul passed on to Paradise while you were asleep as well."

Ra'Kam closed his eyes to honor the young Khajiit who had died. "Ma'Rul is in a better place than this at least," he said, then looked at the other 4 Khajiits who were sleeping in a huddle to share body heat. "If Khajiits don't get some fresh water soon, we may all be joining him."

He put a comforting hand on J'Dron's shoulder and said "Try to get some sleep friend. This one had a dream of Mara and believes it to mean our fortunes may be reversing soon."

"J'Dron hopes so," he said, laying down against the other four.

Ra'Kam crossed his legs and began to meditate. It was a state most Khajiits could enter with ease, though not all went down to the level of Ra'Kam. He was an apprentice shaman of Mara before all this. In addition to keeping him calm, meditation was also the best way to overhear even the tiniest of sounds. The ship was almost as silent as a tomb, with only the occasional creak of the hull and rattle of chains breaking the silence.

It had grown colder over the past few days, and he couldn't help but to assume they were drifting north. As he sat there, he waited for a sign from Mara like he had seen in his dream.

The subtle rocking motion of the ship began to increase, accompanied by the sound of thunder which woke up the other Khajiits. They rubbed their eyes and looked around, bewildered. There was a thump and shuffle noise from the main stairwell and they all watched in horror as a man in the late stages of Brown Rot slowly came into view.

"Never never......never should have," he began, sounding delirious. "I knew there was something....." He suddenly broke into a spasm of coughing. Bits of brown mucus sprayed from his mouth and dripped from his nose. He wobbled on his feet for a moment. "Something wrong with what we were doing, but I had no idea..."

Another painful spasm overtook him and he fell to his knees. He began crawling to the cell door after it passed, and held up the key. "They we're going to kill all of you at your destination. It was bad business and I told the Cap'n as much but he wouldn't hear of it." He stopped to wipe the brown crud away from his nose with the back of his sleeve. He was wheezing like a bellows, his chest sounding thick with phlegm.

"Now it seems we've been cursed with this sickness. Everyone is dead, but their eyes.......oh their eyes follow my every movement! I cannot bear it!" he screamed at the six Khajiit faces that were watching him through the bars. Ra'Kam reached towards him with his palm upturned and the dying man dropped the key into it.

The man stared directly into Ra'Kam's eyes as he did this. "Free yourselves. I regret being a part of the things I've seen," he said, his eyes wet with brown tears.

His body went into convulsions, his jaw clenched in a hideous rictus grin. His body appeared to bend itself backwards with a crackling of vertebrae. He gave one last death rattle, then fell silent.

Ra'Kam winced. "This one has never seen a worse death. Let us hope we can avoid a similar fate brothers!," he shouted holding the key up for the others to see. Thunder boomed from the skies above. The Khajiit slaves were free.