In Your Shadow, Where I Stand. Introduction

If justice was as the sun, and peace was it's light, Cheliax would be the darkest and coldest winter.

Distraction is the currency, to keep the citizen/slaves free from thoughts of violence. Luxuries papered over the broken buildings, spreading illnesses and festering waste. Parties, parades, games and of course the pit.

The pit was the peoples favorite. A twenty feet deep, forty across. Where once there was sand, now there is mud made from the life fluids of those fallen. Rows of seats radiate outward, or what could be called pews if compared with the commitment of faith it's viewers held for their sermon of violence. Daily they come and spend their copper jot to watch the day's violent murder.

Man versus man got old. Woman versus woman was short-lived. Man versus woman too lost it's grip on the crowd. Now one man faces all number of perils. Tigers. Boars, Slave Goblins, or even Eidelons. Undead minions brought forth by powerful necromancers was very “in” this year. The devil tyrants watch from their golden booth, laughing and feasting. The peasants below scream for blood. Each warrior lives as a possession owned by a rich lord. A symbol of social standing to own the best killer. None escape, and none die of old age. Save for one day, when many were freed.

The Pathfinders had broken their ties with Cheliax when the Azmodean devils seized the throne, yet one group remained behind in secret. With force they stopped the pit games. Infiltrated and killed all in their path. They freed the warriors, and slew the devil lords. Or so the writings say. Twelve men escaped from the capitol city. Twelve men born into slavery, and raised to kill or die climbed the city walls and went forth into the world of light. Each had one possession. Their name.

One was named Mandrake.

There is little to say of his birth, save for there was no love in his conception and no comfort in his growth. They say he was dug out of the soil, not born of woman at all. His skin was dark and always dirty, like some root from below ground. A large cross shaped scar, the symbol of Cheliax, was carved into his chest. His hair was knotted and weaved down to his waist. He seemed to have the earth in his eyes. Nature in his blood. No one could explain his bond with the world around him. But they knew he could fight.

His specialty was the walking dead. He fought like a devil. He used his entire body as a swift weapon. He fought low to the ground, like an animal. He seemed to pounce, not jump. He seemed to claw, not punch. Yet he was not a crowd favorite, for he seemed to be plagued with a conscious his slave brothers did not. He refused to kill another man in the pit. Not for their pleasure. He learned to win by disabling them. The crowd grew bored, and so they threw him against the skeletons.

Sometimes he won. Sometimes he lost. He had died many times, and been brought back. The price of a cheap priests life magic was often cheaper than buying, training, and feeding a new slave warrior. Once one of great skill became known, they payed for themselves. They say each time the odds were too high against him, and he died, he would come back weaker. Cheap divine magic that took part of his soul each time new breath was put in his frame. He was weak from a recent raising when they were freed.

In my next writing I will begin speaking of the true trials of Mandrake's journey, which did not begin until long after his exodus from Cheliax. It begins truly when he arrived at Ustalav and met the others.

Prologue to “In Your Shadow, Where I Stand:The Warrior Mandrake” by Master Artificer Tyrmyr of Cheliax