[hider=Kinara's Memoir]

The earliest chapters were the shortest, filled with more obvious details.

[i]My name, Kinara, used to be something of a luxury to me, back before the Order took me in. Bishop Robert of Eastcaster told me that it meant 'Candle Holder.' For a time I believed this to mean that my masters had named me 'candelabra' as a sick joke. It wasn't until Grandmaster Aquila told me that the name wasn't Rosilandic, but Foverosi-Samothraki. A candle holder was either a candelabra or a person, such as a deacon, who would hold candles or torches during Samothraki religious liturgies.

I suppose it made sense, then, that my parents thought of me as a little light in the dark, eternal winter of Rosiland. Such affection was endemic to my immediate family, for the other slaves had no time to deal with weak yet energetic children, and the elves saw my family and I as little more than cattle. A cattle child I was, yet to receive her brand.

As they considered my kind to be little better than the animals they used to plow the fields of rye, potatoes, and whatever struggled to grow in that frozen soil, we were certainly considered lesser beings than the elves who ran shop. We were even beneath the soldiers they imported from the Sindhus. As such, they took great delight in chipping away at our sentience, and the things that made us proper beings. Since my arrival in Klyesha, the date of my own birth remained a mystery. As count of the time escaped us, I managed to estimate my age based on what I heard eavesdropping on my masters as they fondly discussed the day they razed Nikidon, a little fishing village in the north of Samothrace.[/i]

The chapter was filled with similar material, denoting the meticulous process of dehumanization and humiliation the Shadow Elves had put her and her family through...

[i]I remember my father's voice, still. Deep, rumbling, and powerful. It wasn't the voice of a slave, meek and obedient, but the gods-given voice of a warrior-king. I remember my mother's touch. Gentle, tender, yet her hands were calloused and rough, dried from the crisp air and cracked from her labor in the fields. It hurts more than anyone can imagine to recall how broken his voice had become as he lay dying, beaten and defeated by both elven cudgels and Shaitunic diseases. The same plague took my mother not days later, and for fear of taking me with her, she could no longer bear to hold me. I believe I was but 15 years when she took her last breath. Six years fending for myself felt as though I had already spent eternity in the realm of Molarten.

They learned their techniques from their repugnant bastard god Dolekar. First there was the simpler strategy of whipping or bludgeoning slaves to keep them working and properly disciplined. For the most part this was what I had received in recompense for my misgivings to my masters. Then, there were the punishments which were meant to punish one's physical insides when damaging their exterior was not enough. Frequent bouts of starvation followed by "recovery binges" weren't out of place among those who worked the mines. Weak poisons were sometimes administered to cause intense nausea, as to make us suffer but not to kill us. We were still useful.

Then the creative punishments. For slaves who stole, the elves or taskmasters would bring out a box of acidic venom with the stolen object placed within. On pain of death the thief would be forced to try and again steal the object. The humans and elves did not last, their fingers melting to the bone and dissolving from there. Most passed out. The stubborn ones continued until they couldn't move their bony fingers to properly grab the object, at which point they died anyways. Us Samothaurs lasted longer, with similar results. I was fortunate enough to have never been caught with stolen food. Yet, the screams haunt me.

The treatments of the mind with the body were by far the worst. "Conditioning" they called it. Where they sought to produce better quality in their property. Discipline befell those who could not properly kiss up to the masters, agreeing to their every word. Rewards came to those who served well by acting as taskmasters and guards, snitching on their fellow slave and damning them to what torture awaited the guilty. I cannot bring myself to describe in detail what else they did to us. Though as hedonistic as the shadow elves could be, many a bored noble shit took out their... "Frustrations" on the slavewomen of the plantation. To include myself. I suppose then that it was fortunate that I would be unconscious as they had their way with me, that I cannot remember them claiming my maidenhood.[/i]

Further elaboration on the crimes against the races follow this paragraph in greater detail, seguing into the next chapter.

[i]I had met a Samothaur bull by the name of Themistokos. As gentle as he was headstrong and passionate about the possibility of freedom. He taught me what my parents could not about the culture of our people, for he had been brought to Klyesha as an adolescent, whereas I was but a babe when I was damned to servitude. Of all the slavewomen in Klyesha he had gravitated to me, seeking to get to know me. Some months into our time together he pulled me aside and spoke of a plan to escape. It was a wild and futile strategy looking back, but the determination he possessed moved me and captivated me. It was a passion I hear now in the voice of the Grandmaster when he addresses his legion of soldier-disciples. He too would have made an excellent Apostle.

The Order arrived late one August morning. As I toiled to harvest what was planted in the potato fields I heard a slave soldier shouting alarums to his brethren, the first line of defense. That was when Themistokos came running from the mines, pickaxe still in hand, his fur matted and caked with dirt, blood, and whatever had come off the walls of the mine. He practically scooped me up off the ground as we made haste for the stables, set to steal what horses were left and ride south to Glorious Samothrakia as he called it.

The slave-soldier, a Sindisi thug named Nima, whom I recognized from many a Rosilandic Acid Washbox treatment, approached us and warned of the consequences of swiping the horses. Themistokos, Solanius rest his soul, only kicked the horse into a charge, attempting to run the ashskin over. All that did was make it angry. Everything went by in a flash, but I recall being frozen in place, helplessly watching as the blood ran off into the fields, mixing with the painfully frigid rain as it poured down upon the Plantation. The Sindisi would have claimed me next had it not been for his cohort, which had called by horn to summon him to the heat of the battle.

The sound of clashing metal, braying horses, and screaming men filled the air as I wandered the plantation, searching for other surviving slaves. I knew not of any places where I could find safe harbour, and with Themistokos slain, there was no hope of getting to Samothrace on my own. As time passes, the sickening realization that most of my fellow units of property had either been executed out of spite for our rescuers or had understandingly escaped while the chance presented itself. Returning to the now burning manor, I found bodies littering the courtyard, belonging primarily to what had recently been slave-soldiers. 

My parents had once told me that it would have taken angels sent by the Gods, perhaps the Gods themselves, to deliver us from captivity. As a little girl I had always imagined them to be humanlike creatures with large, pristinely feathered wing with which they descended from Heaven, enrobed in simple cloth. I have since come to understand that angels could come from any of the races of Thurius, and had not wings but instead wore armor and beared arms.

And these angels were commanded by a Prince, the Grandmaster of the Order claiming descent from the Divine King of Kings Solanius. For all of his wealth, his property, and his devoted levies and Apostles, I had assumed he would be no more personable than the nobility he had slain, that he would pay no mind to a slavewoman as she stumbled about the ashen barrens of the plantation that once housed her. I was mistaken, for as soon as he and his men spotted me, he called me over to him. He asked me my name and, after I had given it, he bowed to me. Lightly, amiably. It was not a deep bow of reverence as one would give to an Emperor or a God, but it demonstrated a kindness I did not know men of status could possess. He invited me to their camp, as I found he did all survivors we came across. The Order clothed me, fed me, treated any injuries they could find, and offered to deliver me from Rosiland, 'home to Samothrace.'

There and then an indescribable feeling of comfort and relief had consumed me. For all of the evil the world is capable of, for the chilling emptiness and indifference men and elves alike could feel for their fellow being and for the way they saw reality, here stood an army of men and women who still possessed hope in their minds, love in their hearts, and light in their souls. [/i]

Much of the following, in summary, spoke of how Kinara came to join the Order that had saved her. Kinara wrote of the initiation process, the chores and training given to squires seeking to become knights or clergy, and the process of ordination. 

Starting as an illiterate ex-slave, Kinara had undergone several long courses in language both written and spoken, becoming literate in Common at a staggeringly swift pace as she served the Order alongside the pages and squires before becoming a knight herself, at which point she trained to wield a bow and arrow.

As a knight, she fought and survived many battles, the worst of which she detailed graphically. Having once fought a small herd of rampaging karkadanns, a lone, roaming band of troublesome zombies, and a branch of the cult of Lotec, the Samothauress displayed a powerful force of will in overcoming each challenge and surviving each fight.

It was part of what caught the Grandmaster's curiosity. Lucian, as Kinara writes, stationed her in the Order's capital of Thysdrus, where he tutored Kinara in High Aesernian and patristic literature as she continued to assist in the Order's operations in Aesernia. Her piety and loyalty to the Order and the ideals they fought for is what garnered the Grandmaster's *attention,* whereupon Lucian offered her the position of Apostle, and due to the induction of Apostles being a matter of secrecy, the memoir ends there on a positive note.
[/hider]

As the band of adventurers continued on their path to Viarosa, Herbert set down the book beside him and took a long gulp from a waterskin. He idly reflected that the memoir had been somewhat interesting and he was certainly sympathetic to the Samothaur's misfortunes. However, the monster hunter still had his doubts as to whether or not the cow-woman should be brought along. The book had certainly given a glowing report of Kinara's abilities, but as it had been written by Kinara, it was bound to be at least somewhat biased. He sighed. If only there was a way to simulate a moment of crisis without the actual danger to see how she'd perform.