~ Darrilkin ~

Now, when it comes to towns, the one I grew up in was verging on being able to call itself a city. The port of Darrilkin, however, was well past that point. I had never seen anything like it.

It had two layers of city walls, and it looked like it had simply overflowed both of them at one time in the past. I guess they gave up, because there was no wall around the outermost city.

Passing through small towns and villages, we got a lot of looks. We had come to enjoy it, really. The good ones anyway. Here, on the other hand, there was so much going on that a pair of twin slaves barely got more than a curious glance.

I found myself disappointed. I guess I was getting used to the attention.

I soon forgot about it as there was just so much to see. Soon I found myself gawking with as much awe as the farm boys that visited our town, and had never seen one before. Made me feel like a hick to be honest.

There were a few large guilds that called this place home, and it served as the northern capitol for the empire. Why didn't they have their base of operations in the capitol itself? Well, during one of the wars when the northern regions were their own country.... oh, skip it. They just never bothered moving because they were there.

In the case of the Slaver's Guild, this meant that there were two major markets in the empire, the north and south. This was the northern big market. It was active all year round, but the market weeks, twice a year, were the time big business happened.

As we rode up, I guess I can see why they didn't want to move.

The place was huge.

I mean, it was bigger than His Lordship's keep back where I came from. The central building alone, the auction hall, was bigger. It's center was round, and it had a few wings haphazardly tacked onto the sides. It's pretty clear that it happened rather than being planned, even to my untrained eye.

Now here, at the guild, we got some curious looks. We were product. And an unusual one at that.

I snuggled up closer to my brother's side. It was nice, not having to worry about people seeing us do that. The idea that it actually added to our value I for some reason found highly amusing.

I'd gotten pretty used to how we were not dressed by now, and people looking at us, but there were a lot of people here. It made one feel small. Slavers, slaves, people looking to buy directly from the market, more slaves, even more slaves. The general flow outside looked like market day back home.

I was also reminded that pleasure slaves are actually a rare item to begin with. Most slaves are farm hands and other generic workers. A smaller number work in the homes of people who were rich enough to afford a staff. And a tiny number, like ourselves, were dedicated to those rich enough to waste money on their personal pleasure.

The labor type slaves all had at least pants, sometimes a vest, that sort of thing. The household slaves somewhat nicer clothing.

And then there were us. In little loincloths. On display to the world.

Made me feel both vulnerable and special at the same time.

I thought myself well educated, I mean, I've read a lot of books and all. Still, I didn't know there were this many breeds of Thinking People. There were slinky things, big buff things, tiny canids with ears as big as their heads, all sorts of things not even native to the Empire.

Slaves come from everywhere.

Oh, and the less than well behaved slaves kept in chains, sometimes in lines. I quietly asked Master Radam about this, and he said that some of them were fresh off slave ships and yet to be broken or trained. Some were just impossible cases. I made the mistake of asking what happened to those cases, and he said, "it's unfortunate, but if they just can't accept being a slave, they have to be put down. We don't run a welfare office."

My stomach suddenly got unhappy, and I squeezed my brother's hand rather tightly. That was a rather nasty reminder of just what our place in the world was now.

From there, things were quiet for us. It was late, so we moved to one of the outlieing buildings along the courtyard. They were essentially Inns reserved for visiting slavers, and were pretty packed this time of the year. A lot of slaves were transferred to barracks, but some of us were kept with our masters. I was rather glad for that.

Kaust took the team to the stables while we helped Radam unload. he was being particularly cautious about how much work he had us do right now, he said it would be a bad time to hurt ourselves. Limping when we were being sold would be a detractor.

They gave us only light instruction that night, mostly about how the sales worked, rather than training.

Then it was time to sleep. I couldn't manage until I curled up tight to my brother.

He didn't mind. He never did.