"Are you out of your mind!" Allaric said, shocked at what he just heard.
"Well, we might as well take the opportunity and make the best of it," Damian reasoned. They were once again in the blacksmith's workshop, in the yard enclosed with high stone walls.
"Allaric, if the general is plotting to kill me, I need to have a plan of my own," Victor said, looking at how Allaric pulls a red heated blade from the forge.
"It's very dangerous to attempt an escape, especially during an objective," Allaric warned, placing the heated blade on an abused anvil, "It's quite impossible as well. You wear the enemy flag when being sent into battle, so your chances of getting killed by magic or a soldier are much higher," Allaric said.
Victor sighed. He was almost feeling hopeless. Damian took a glance at him as if he felt the emotion Victor was experiencing. They have been best friends since childhood.
"Victor, we will plan something, we will make it out. One way or another," he assured.
"That's why," Damian looked at Allaric, "we need your help."
Allaric blinked a few times, taking a deep breath before releasing it with deep thought.
"I don't know much, but I have enough information to help support whatever you're planning," Allaric stated, nodding his head with approval.
Victor swayed his focus to the blacksmith, "What do you know?" he inquired.
Victor and Damian were in the trenches, having their pickaxes with them. It was busy all around them. The echo of many miners working echoed through the labyrinth of trenches. The sky was dark with clouds again, shielding the sunlight from shining.
"There you are," Victor said, finding Nathan swinging his pickaxe against the hard corroded wall.
"Watch out," Nathan nodded his head in the direction of guards patrolling upon the walls of the trench, "they are watching."
Victor grabbed a pickaxe resting against the wall as Damian climbed onto poor wooden scaffolding to start hammering into the wall. They must look like they are working, or the guards might lock them.
"How are you, brother," Nathan asked, remembering the events of last night, "I saw what happened last night and I wonder what the fucking general wanted with you," Nathan asked, his language raw and his tone vengeful. Nathan always had a bad mouth. Victor was used to it by now.
"Most slaves," Victor started, swinging his pickaxe with an echoing bang against the wall, "are going to be sent on an unprepared objective."
Nathan's brows lifted, "Unprepared?"
"Yes, but I am planning an escape during the objective," Victor said, receiving a cocky smile from Nathan's amazing face.
Damian looked down from the low scaffolding, "that's why we were looking for you," he said.
"Yes," Victor approved, "your tasks in the stockade are different from ours, and you regularly do work within the keep, right?" Victor asked, knowing that Nathan is part of a group of slaves who are ordered to complete tasks within the stockade's keep.
"Scrubbing the keep halls are no different than scrubbing ship hulls," Nathan said, thinking back at the days of his childhood.
"If you help us, it would be easier to escape, and you should come with us," Damian said. Nathan instantly stopped working, resting the pickaxe on the ground. He was thinking hard now.
"I'm in, as long as we escape this shithole."
"Okay, do you have any ideas or helpful information?" Victor asked, swinging his pickaxe against the wall.
"When are you planning to escape?" Nathan asked.
"During the objective. But we need to know what outpost we are attacking."
"We need to know what the general's plan is," Damian added.
"How is that possible when no one was told about the objective?" Nathan said, trying to search for ideas in his mind.
"Exactly, that's the problem. We can't plan an escape if we do not know what we're dealing with." Victor said.
"Wait," Damian snapped, holding the hammer against the corroded wall, "Victor, you said that Sedric and other Warlords are going to plan the onslaught today, right?"
"Yes," Victor answered, concentrating on Damian.
"No carriages or noble coaches have yet arrived at the stockade, so if we could breach the Keep, we might have a chance to eavesdrop on their conversation while they are planning," Damian suggested.
"That's risky," Nathan said, almost ignoring the suggestion, but then he remembered something "But, I know someone who drew blueprints of the keep, and he designed the war room of the place." Nathan continued.
"That's perfect," Victor said.
"But there might be a slight problem," Nathan said, "it's the guy I fought with the other day."
"Nathan," Damian moaned, followed by a little laugh from Victor.
"I could speak to him," Victor said, "where is he?"
"He is currently on duty inside the keep," Nathan said, banging his pick against an ore that broke from the wall at the instant.
"How are we going to get in the keep?" Victor puzzled.
"On my next task, I am ordered to work in the keep. Since Warlords are coming, they will have a feast, like usual. Then slaves working in the keep are pressured to clean the place." Nathan explained, "I'll let you slip into my position to get you inside, from that point on you are on your own, you could find the guy I beat up and ask for his help."
"So, what is the plan now?" Damian asked, presenting his help.
"That ore," Nathan said, picking it up from the ground, "is the chance of having a day of rest. You could use it to buy time when the guards start to think you're gone."
"Before you switch positions, the trench guards would think he is in his cell the rest of the day," Damian puzzled the pieces together, "brilliant."
"The plan now is to meet me at midday, because that is when my Keep duty is active," Nathan said.
"I'll find that guy in the keep and convince him to join our plan, and I'll try to get the map to navigate to the war room before the Warlords come."
"I have an idea," Damian said, "these slaves," he started, looking around at the slaves who work hard, young people, children and exhausted people. "If you find out what the plan is, we must inform them, and if they could be a force to help us escape, it would give us a greater chance." He reasoned, feeling empathy to all the slaves because he has been serving as one for three years.
Nathan sighed painfully, knowing it could also be a risk when they tell everyone about the objective, Victor could get into a lot of trouble because he is supposed to be the only one knowing about it.
"That's risky as well," he said.
"But," Victor started, "It would hurt if we are the only ones who escape, and who knows how long these slaves have been labouring here, they must also be desperate to escape," he said.
"When a lot of people have one common purpose, it would work perfectly," Damian said.
"We'll plan this together," Victor said.