Chapter 15: To fight or not to fight that is the question

I needed to keep up the psychological warfare on Roland to keep his focus on me and our fight, and more to the point, to keep his focus off the other activities that would be going on in his camp. I started training against Calvin in the circle. We would spend our morning there; my goal was to keep it noisy. I wanted the entire camp to know we were training. The fact that I was training with Roland’s blood brother, made it that much more interesting for them.

In the afternoons, I had the others stand outside our tent for a couple of hours while Jasmine and I trained. Calvin would give us points about the techniques that Roland would use in the fight, and Jasmine would talk about and demonstrate counters to that action. My goal had been to undermine all of the thieves with the help of the slaves. If that failed, I would have to fight Roland, and it wouldn’t have been a wise thing to be unprepared.

Roland decided to provide his own version of mind games, and would parade Kimberly past me as we were sparring. I decided that little jab deserved a larger counter one from me.

So the next day, when they stopped to watch me, I asked him, “Roland, did you know that the mere sight of a Hero is too much for a Damsel to endure?”

“You boast well. We will see if you die as well.”

“Do you doubt my ability as a Hero?”

“I believe nothing you say.”

“I could simply kiss her and cause a flush to come over her entire body, something that you would never be able to do.”

“You lie more every day, Hero; it is a fantasy to train to become the King of Thieves. Never in your wildest dreams will that ever happen!”

“Let me come up there, and I will but kiss her and prove this to you. Just as I will prove that you will die.”

I came out of the circle and went to Kimberly; I pulled her to me, and held my body against hers.

I whispered in her ear. “This is but a foretaste of the love we will share on Crossroads, my Damsel Kimberly.” When I kissed her, her entire body shook in orgasm until I released her.

Roland took her hand and dragged her with him. I didn’t know if he would beat her for her actions, but it was a clear blow to his psyche. That the others around us had seen his reaction would be the talk of the camp, I was certain. That ended his trips to watch me train, but I was certain that he was having my progress carefully monitored and reported.

It had been a week, and there was new activity every day. Thieves and their slaves were starting to arrive in the camp. The children had sullen looks, the ones you get when you felt there was no hope left in your life. I knew that it would be easier now for the sneaks to enter the camp. As the stream of thieves grew, there would be more opportunities for them to enter unchallenged.

I increased the tempo of our training to keep the interest of the camp focused upon what we were doing, and not what was happening on the fringes of the camp. It was the old magician’s sleight of hand trick; I needed to keep the thieves looking where I wanted them to look instead of where they could look. Of course, these were professional thieves so I needed to improve that diversion.

I added Jasmine the next morning. Her beauty, for now, was enough to make them flock to see us. Two days later, I added the orgasm trick with her; the hoots and hollers from the crowd let Roland know that he was not the one they were interested in.

We were entering the final week before the fight. I wanted to get Roland’s anger flaring; one way to do that was to have the thieves start wagering on me as the favorite. For that, I needed Jasmine and her skills. Her beauty was more than enough to keep them watching; however, it was her fighting skills that drove them wild. My odds of winning went from being the three to one underdog to even money the next day.

Two days later, after a very hard and difficult workout, my odds improved to a seven to five favorite and then the whispers started. Could I really defeat Roland? What would an outsider do as the King of Thieves? They carefully watched everything that Jasmine, Calvin and I did.

The most difficult part was the not knowing if the other part of the plan was working because we could not speak of it. Every one of our lives was in the hands of others now. We had three days before the fight; if the plan was working, we would start to know in the morning.

I had a restless night. I still was not comfortable trusting my life to others. Either the plan was coming together, or it would fall apart. We got up in the morning, and Chrystal gave me a very cute little smile. I hadn’t seen one from her before and that aroused my curiosity.

Once outside I knew why she was smiling. The camp was in the middle of a major outbreak of dysentery. There were groans and complaints about it from almost every part of the camp we encountered. What the thieves didn’t know was that the dysentery was only the first stage of the poison that the children had put in their food the night before?

Two days from now, the thieves would all be dead. We went into our tent and kept out of sight. I didn’t want anyone to know that we were the only adults in camp not sick. The sneaks would be watching for anyone coming or going now. They would kill them and drag their bodies away. No one would be allowed to escape. The Society would end in these high mountain meadows.

The next day we were the only adults walking upright. I went to Roland’s tent and all of them were inside. Kimberly was washing Roland’s head, trying to help him. I pulled her aside, and then spoke to Roland. “Your days as a Society are at an end, Roland. Every one of your thieves is dying like the dogs they are. This is for the Heroes you have killed and showing nothing but disdain for their bodies.” He looked at me as I cut his head from his body.

I took his head by the hair and placed it on the pike that was empty, and the pike with Roland’s head on it was raised. Then, we took the heads of the Heroes down. We found a suitable spot and buried them with honor. Then, we went about the business of gathering the children together.

I was now the Pied Piper with almost a thousand children in my care. They were unable to continue to care for the men who had taken them, so, I sent them to gather up all of the possessions and goods that they could find of their former masters, and any that were unclaimed in the camp. We would need all of the supplies for our travel back to the Citadel. I had left Roy with the task of creating an adoption system.

Jasmine wanted me to have a support network on Chaos. In one move, by rescuing the children, I had the beginning of a loyal support group. They would be the children of the Hero. Who would be more loyal than a slave that had been freed and then properly cared for? It took us days to get everything organized. However, as we went about our tasks, the thieves’ bodies had time to start decomposing. I was glad to get out of the valley and away from the combined odor of sickness and death. We had to leave the camp by the main road but that would not be a problem, since we now controlled the road.

Once we were on our way, I sent the sneaks back to set The King of Thieves camp ablaze. The buzzards would get fat feasting on their bodies this year; then the snows would cover their bones. A few years from now, there would only be a few scattered bones left to show where the camp had stood.

It wasn’t the epic story of the one on one battle to rescue the Damsel that others had written about.

It would be a story of the cleansing of a festered sore that had contaminated the countryside that would be told. Kimberly was ecstatic about being rescued; she had virtually given up all hope. After all, she had spent a total of eighteen years in captivity. When Jasmine explained how we found ourselves on Chaos, and the uncertainty of returning to Crossroads, her mood faltered for a while. But, when she realized she was not being held captive, and that she had the opportunity to be the surrogate mother for nearly a thousand children, her mood improved.

It was a struggle to get the group going every morning. Calvin and James came up with a plan to divide the children into an army of sorts. That got them accustomed to moving in a more orderly fashion. The problems of having that many children that were no longer slaves under control of their masters started to cause problems as we entered the Citadel lands.

They reverted to acting like children, since there was no individual to correct their behavior. It was beginning to get on my nerves; so one afternoon, when I had had enough, I stopped and had everyone set up camp. Then I had the children sit in front of a small hill and I got on top of it.

After a few minutes, when they finally quieted down, I began.

“Greeting to all of you! My name is Hero John. Today you are in the lands of the Citadel that I own. Here there is no one that will come and make you a slave again. Your actions in those mountains made that possible. You have earned the right to be free and in my lands you can choose to be free.” There was a great cheer; then, I waited for it to die down.

“The problem we have now is we must continue to journey to the Citadel. I need all of you to be ready to do that every morning, and you must help take care of yourselves. We cannot have you fighting among yourselves.” One of the sneaks rode into the camp at that moment. He rode straight to James and told him something. James came over and relayed the message to me.