Peregrin Old-Fur: Captured

Someone was shaking my shoulders. I didn’t take much notice at first, but then I opened my eyes to see a worried dragonborn hovering over me.
“Peregrin. You need to wake up.” Hortamus demanded.
“What for?” I asked. No sooner were the words out of my mouth when the stalwart that was guarding us walked into our room and pulled me by my leg. I felt the rocky floor scratch my stomach like a cat pawing at a stranded mouse. I tried to grab the ground, but the stalwart was too strong. The great green goblin lifted me up in the air and threw me into The Centre landing on my head. At this point, I was fully awake; however, there was a terrible throbbing in my head. It felt like my brain and my heart had switched places. A figure walked up to me, and even though I couldn’t concentrate, I knew exactly who it was.
“Rise and shine, sleepy head.” Tylovine said with a great big smile. I lifted myself off the ground slowly and painfully, without saying a word to him. I would very much have liked to sharpen some knives with his head.
“Get to work, you filthy Halfling.” He turned around and walked away. I was about to tackle him, but then I saw Hortamus shake his head, as if telling me to stay calm. In anger, I balled my hand into a fist, and walked away. I looked back at Tylovine and noticed that he walked down the dark path that the girl had been dragged to yesterday.
“You will have to learn to be patient with him if you want to survive here.” Hortamus told me with concern.
“I know, he just makes me so angry!” I almost yelled. Before Tylovine went down the hallway, he turned his head slightly to look at me and grinned. He continued down the path and his retreating figure disappeared into the shadows. Even though I could not see him, I could feel his cold menacing eyes staring at me, waiting for the right time to attack. I turned around to Hortamus who was speaking to me.
“Peregrin. You need to control your emotions.”
“I understand.” I sighed.
“Let’s sharpen knives.” Hortamus offered.
After sharpening about three knives, I noticed an elf staring at me. He had brown hair and peasant clothes, but something was odd about him. A part of his hand was missing! Where the palm of his had should have been there was a gaping hole. I wondered how he ever got any work done. I couldn’t imagine myself with an incomplete hand and felt compassion for him. When the elf realized that I was staring at his palm, he immediately lowered his hand out of my sight. I would have gone to talk to him if it hadn’t been for the stalwarts. I noticed the look on his face, a look that made me feel as if I had taken something from him and he would stop at nothing to get it back. I then looked down to continue sharpening knives.
I felt proud of myself that I had sharpened 20 knives before I relaxed my arm. Berhin would have been proud of me. Two bells rung and everyone stopped what they were doing, as if they were under a commanding spell.
“Why is everyone stopping?” I asked Hortamus.
“Be quiet, Tylovine will be here soon to mark our progress, if we all do well, we will be able to eat.” I looked around at the other prisoners. Their hands were tightly gripped, either behind their back, or by their side. I thought to myself that they were trying not to show that they were starving. I decided to follow their example. Two stalwarts were blocking the entrance to the dark hallway. They stepped aside to let Tylovine come in to The Centre. It was at this time that I actually paid attention to his clothing. For a man that lived with Goblins in a cave, he was fairly well-dressed. He had short dark brown hair, but looked rather greasy. He wore a long-sleeve black shirt and gray pants. He also had a bone necklace which I assumed was from a Goblin. His hands and face were scratched, presumably from a battle or a fight. He wore silver boots made out of steel. I noticed they had blood stains on them. Tylovine walked around the tables to study our work. He showed neither approval nor disappointment. I watched as he walked over to my table. He seemed rather unsatisfied.
“You’re slow.” He stated bluntly. “I expected at least 25 from you today. You give me only 23!” I gulped.
“He’s new here. He’s getting used to his surroundings.” Hortamus stated. “Once he’s familiar with this place, he’ll make more.”
“Fine. I will allow you to have food today.”
I heard a few sighs of relief from dwarves. Tylovine retreated into the dark hallway. Before he disappeared, he waved his hand, and food appeared in the middle of The Centre on a table. The odd thing was, no one was rushing for the food. “Perhaps if they rushed, someone would get hurt,” I thought. The food was nothing special: just a solitary loaf of bread. We were each allowed one slice. I wanted to argue, but it would have been pointless. After eating the allotted slice of bread, my stomach continued to growl and I decided to take another while no one was looking. Before I could get my hands on another slice, Hortamus grabbed my hand.
“You don’t want to do that.” He insisted. I looked at the slice of bread and, although it was stale, it looked as delicious as a slice of pie.
“I assure you, I do.” I replied.
“Peregrin, you will be punished. If you grab another slice, they will force you to be sick.” I looked at the slice of bread, and then reconsidered. I backed away from the table to avoid the temptation. A stalwart was watching my every move. A bell rung and everyone walked back to their stations. Tylovine walked out of the hallway and into The Centre where he gave the leftovers to the stalwarts. The dark magician noticed me looking at him.
“What are you looking at?” He demanded.
“Nothing.” I insisted.
“Good, get back to work.” How could he waste food like that? Giving food to those creatures. They didn’t deserve anything after killing my brother.
“Goblins and stalwarts need to eat as well.” Hortamus replied to my thoughts.
“Wait, how did you know what I was thinking?” I asked. He slightly hesitated.
“I could see it in your eyes. Besides, after being called a ‘Goblin Hunter’, it’s obvious of your hatred towards them.” I shrugged. His statement made sense. I did have hatred towards them. They were ugly and very stupid. They didn’t care about anybody else except themselves. They also did not take the time to clean themselves! Goblins irritated me a great deal.
For the rest of the day, I sharpened knives without taking any breaks. My hand cramped a few times and I stopped, flexing my wrist to get relief, and then continued.
“How long was I out for after the... incident with my brother?” I asked Hortamus.
“Two entire days. You occasionally gripped my arm in your sleep.” I looked down to the floor in embarrassment.
“Sorry.” Hortamus smiled.
“It’s okay, Peregrin.” I looked at his scales. When I pictured dragonborn scales, I never envisioned they looking so rough. I smiled, more questions going through my mind.
“How did you get here?” I asked, really curious as to what the answer might be.
“I was a close friend of Tylovine’s father. His father and mother were nice people. They were very much in love and got carried away with their feelings. They were not ready to have a child and they thought that leaving Tylovine as a child in the forest was the best idea. They would not have to pay to get rid of him, nor would their social status decrease because no one would find him. His parents were well respected where they came from, but they were not married and they would have been put to shame having a child without first getting married. When Tylovine grew older, he thought that if he threatened to kill me he could force his parents to like him. Then he realized that he did not need them in his life, so he killed them and took me as his prisoner.”
“Why didn’t you save them? You had the power to do so.”
“I was weak and he was strong. I could not let him know what I was capable of because he would sacrifice me to his god. I guess Bahamut wanted me to die another day.”
“I’m sorry, who’s Bahamut?”
“The dragon god. He is also known as the King of the Good Dragons, the Platinum Dragon, and Wyrmking. As you can probably tell, he has good morals, and aids his believers in battle.”
“Wow, I never knew there was such a thing. My mother worships Yondalla, so that’s all we heard about in the household with regards to religion.”
“Bahamut is a kind dragon, but has his enemies, for example, his evil sister, Tiamat.”
“He sounds different than the one mother worships.”
“Anyways, he took me as prisoner, and I have been here ever since.”
“Why didn’t he kill you?” Hortamus responded slowly to the question.
“I don’t know.”
“How long ago did he bring you in here?”
“10 years ago.” I couldn’t help but stare in disbelief. Hortamus had lived here for 10 years, and I could barely stand two days in this place.
“Why does he hate me and my kind?”
“He was raised by goblins, he was taught to hate everything. Also, the Halflings did not accept him when he tried to live with them, so he went to war with them.” A stalwart walked closer to us, which was his way of telling us to be quiet. I decided not to ask any more questions and get back to work.
About 30 more knives were sharpened by the time I went to bed. I figured I must have sharpened 60 today. Four bells rung and everyone headed back to their rooms. Hortamus tapped my shoulder, offering for me to walk beside him. I was not sure why, but I trusted him a lot. I would trust him with my life. We entered into the room and Hortamus used his magic to light a fire. The room immediately brightened into a dark orange glow. Being a cleric looked like it was an interesting life choice after seeing Hortamus use magic, but my mind was still set on being a rogue.
“Goodnight.” Hortamus said.
“Goodnight.” I replied, but I did not believe it was a good night. My eyes eventually grew heavy and I fell asleep.
“Wake up.” I heard. My brain was still trying to sleep, as if there was a magnetic force pulling me back to unconsciousness.
“Wake up.” The voice demanded again. I lifted myself to see someone I didn’t expect. A brown haired elf stared at me with a deep frown. It was the same elf I had seen earlier with the missing palm. I looked at his palm but the hole was gone.
“Where’s the hole?” I asked.
“What hole? Oh that. That’s not why I’m here.” He kicked me towards a wall, his knee pressing into my neck. The elf slowly lifted his knee higher and higher until it came directly under my chin in the hopes of tearing off my head. He made it nearly impossible to breathe. Then he hit my head off the wall and I fell to the ground.
“Will I never wake up normally?” I thought. “Why are you doing this?” I asked.
“Goblin hunter, you know why. As a child, I visited Kemadri with my Halfling friends, and you stole money from me. I was supposed to by food for my family with that money! That was the only thing keeping me alive, and you took it from me. I walked home to tell my family, and a goblin kidnapped me. You’re the reason I’m here, thief!” Something moved over my hand. When I looked at my hand, it was gone! I pulled my arm back in shock, but then my hand reappeared.
“You have an invisibility cloak!” I exclaimed.
“How else would I sneak into here?” He slapped me.
“You better not steal anything from anyone again. Most of these people are in here because of you. Think about that.” Before I could say anything, he vanished before my very eyes. Until tonight I hadn’t realized the impact my stealing had made on these people. Did I really want to steal for a living, knowing how much pain the victims would go through?
I did not sleep again that night.