So, she turned to the young man who had led her there. "Would you go back to the inn and let the others know I'll be a while? Tell them not to worry and I'll catch up with them when this is over, okay?"
The young man nodded and left, the look of fear and uncertainty in his eyes helping steel Beth's resolve. She didn't plan on letting the young woman lose her chance at freedom when she had just barely even got out of that nightmare.
Beth leaned against the wall of the gate, as if she was unconcerned about anything happening around her. She didn't know how long it'd take for the people from the auction to arrive, but she was at least happy that they'd already been sent for so she'd be able to get this resolved that much quicker. Or at least she hoped that she would.
While she had thought it wouldn't be long, she was surprised, and more than a little annoyed, to find that the sun had risen and cleared the top of the wall before they showed up. It certainly didn't help Beth's outlook on the whole situation. Although, she was at least a little happy that the crowd had already dispersed.
The woman who showed up wasn't the one whom Beth had bought the slaves from, but she did have a book that Beth couldn't help but wonder if it would still contain the evidence that she had purchased them. She had dark blue hair, almost black, dark rose eyes, and a perpetual scowl on her face.
"Where's this runaway slave?" the woman asked, sounding more than bored. As if her being summoned here for anything was a waste of her time.
"Right here," the eager guard said indicating the young woman who really had been trying to runaway, just not from the people who did the auctions. Though, Beth couldn't help but note that apparently she wasn't picking up on the other woman's tone.
The woman looked at the young woman who was chained against the guardhouse. She then opened the book in she had been carrying with her. So, Beth stood up to get a closer look.
What Beth was able to see, didn't especially draw her notice any. She couldn't make sense of the written language, so she just let it go and moved away. She had hoped that she'd be able to not have to deal with more headaches during this day.
When the woman looked up from the book and looked at the girl, she sighed in clear annoyance. "This girl was already sold. If you want to challenge it, feel free to take it up with my Boss. She's the one who conducted the transaction."
The way the woman said 'boss' made it sound like a title. Which surprised Beth. She hadn't thought it was anyone important who she'd spoken with. Though, she supposed that it was understandable how the person in charge was working with all their employees during such a busy and chaotic time as that. Beth just wasn't sure what the odds were of her encountering that person with her request.
However, Beth wasn't about to wait for this to fully resolve itself. She'd wasted enough of her time here for these people to arrive. She wasn't going to waste any more of it by waiting for them to figure things out on their own.
"So, as you can see, she was sold, so if you would, please unchain my property," Beth said, feeling like she needed to spit when the word 'property' crossed her tongue in relation to the young woman. However, she did her best to hide her revulsion from that. She didn't want this to take longer than it was and she had a feeling the eager guard would be looking for any excuse to make this take longer.
"How can I know you're the one who bought her?" the guard predictably demanded.
Beth turned to the woman and asked, "Did your book say anything about who the buyer is? Such as any details about her?"
The woman looked between Beth and the guards in confusion for a moment before opening the book up again to where she'd had it. Then she looked at Beth and shook her head. Clearly the book didn't include that information.
"I knew it!" the guard crowed triumphantly. "You really aren't the one who bought her!"
The woman looked at the guard in charge, which made Beth wonder if she wanted to be out of here as fast as possible as well. Although, Beth suspected she had other reason for wanting to get out of here. "If you want to know who bought the girl, you'll have to ask my boss. She's the one who conducted the transaction, so she'd be the one to know. If you don't have anyone else looking for her, it probably would be better to just give her to them. You know how my boss gets if she feels her time's being wasted."
The older guard nodded, her eyes flashing a warning to the eager guard. "We'll keep that in mind," she told the woman.
The woman nodded and started walking away. Beth then turned to look at the guards. She could feel the nervousness of the young man who'd brought her here. She wished she could be more soothing to his agitated state, but she really didn't know how this was going to play out. All she could be certain of was that if they did call the 'boss' over, she'd verify that Beth did indeed purchase the young woman.
"So, how do you want to play this?" Beth asked, interested to know. Even if it cost her an entire day, she wasn't going to let this young woman end up who knows where for who knows what. She didn't get her out of that pen just to let someone else put her in a different one. Not when she could still do something about it.
The older guard glanced at the guard who had been eager to hurt the young woman, who was now glaring openly at Beth, and sighed. "You're free to take her," she said, sounding like she really didn't like saying this. "They're right. So, provided no one else comes looking for her, you'll be able to keep her with you and we won't bother you about her again."
Beth nodded, feeling a little satisfied with what the older guard said. She didn't like how she had said 'no one else comes looking for her,' but she didn't have any reason to believe that would happen, so she just pushed it to the back of her mind.
Beth then looked at the young woman who didn't seem to like Beth looking at her, but Beth wasn't concerned about that. What she did notice was that the purse she'd taken from Beth wasn't with her. The bag of food she'd brought with her was, but not the purse.
Beth then looked at the older guard as the eager one moved to unlock the chains. "I believe she had a purse with some coins in it. I'd like to have it back," she said flatly.
"You're the one who trusted her with that much?" the guard asked with an arched eyebrow.
Beth nodded. "I have my reasons, but since I can't let her continue the task I'd set on her earlier, I'll just need to get the money back and figure out what to do next," she said, trying to come up with an excuse that sounded plausible, but only able to come up with a vague statement.
The older guard sighed again, looking annoyed now, which Beth didn't really care about. If she didn't get her money back, it'd essentially have gotten stolen by the guards of the city. The ones who were supposed to prevent crime from happening in the first place.
After a moment, she walked to the door of the guardhouse, opened it, reached in and pulled out a purse. She then turned and tossed it to Beth. While she didn't want to spend any more time here, the way the guards were acting was starting get on Beth's nerves, so she opened the purse and started counting the coins in there. She knew how many there should still be, so she knew she'd be able to tell how much might be missing.
While it was possible that the young woman had spent some on her way out, Beth seriously doubted that would have occurred. She was confident the young woman wanted to get as much of a head start on any pursuit as possible. Which meant she wouldn't have stopped at a food stall for even a small snack or piece of fruit, if only to make the food in her pack go farther. As such, when Beth's count came up short, she looked at the older guard.
"There's three tish missing."
The older guard scowled at Beth, but her statement was clearly for the other guard. "Give her the coins back. If this girl was in fact on a task by her owner, we didn't have a right to stop her."
Beth didn't let her gaze move away from the guard's. She wanted to make it as clear as she could that she wasn't accepting her dominance. That she wouldn't roll over so easily.
When the eager guard held out her hand with the coins in it, Beth only saw it out of her peripheral vision. Which was enough for her to hold out her hand to accept the coins. Though, she didn't say anything.
When she had the coins put in the purse tied to her leggings, she turned and jerked her head at the young woman to indicate that she should go with her. She didn't wait to see if she complied, mostly to try and give an air to the guards that she was in fact in charge. That she was used to those around her doing what she said.
Right now she had a feeling that appearances were more important than anything. At least if she wanted to avoid further trouble in this city down the line; at least with the guards here.
When they had been walking for at least five minutes, Beth was pretty sure they were safely out of sight and hearing of the guards. So, she quickly led the young woman following her to a nearby alley that didn't look to have much traffic in it.
When they reached it, Beth turned to her and sighed. "Where were you planning on going?" she asked, mostly curious about the matter.
The young woman didn't seem to want to look Beth in the eye, but rather look downwards, her hands both holding tightly to the bag she had over her shoulder. "It doesn't matter," she mumbled. "I'll never see it again anyway."
Beth wasn't sure how to react to that. While she didn't care if this young woman had left with all the money she and her friends had gathered together to this point, she certainly didn't want her to feel like she was about to lose her life at this point. Yet, she also wanted the young woman to not look so miserable.
"Look, tell me and my friends your story when we get back to the inn and we can talk about it, okay?" Beth finally said after a few minutes of debating what to say and how to say it.
The young woman's gaze lifted to meet Beth's suddenly, surprise clear in her expression. "You'd do that?"
Beth nodded, giving the young woman a friendly smile. "Of course," she said. "I only cared to come after you because I heard you were in trouble this time."
While Beth had hoped it would help calm the other person down, it seemed to frighten her more than anything else. Which merely made Beth sigh. She really didn't want to deal with having to settle this girl's nerves constantly. Yet, she had a feeling she'd agreed to this just by choosing to help her out in the first place. Even though she hadn't realized that was what she was agreeing to.
As Beth opened her mouth to say more, she suddenly realized how public their surroundings were and what she wanted to say might not be something others would like to hear. So, she put her hand on the young woman's shoulder and squeezed gently, hoping her gesture was coming across as friendly as she hoped it was.
"We'll talk more at the inn. I'm sure you'll be interested in what we have to say, okay?" Beth said, wondering how much more of a bite she had bitten off with just deciding to help these slaves out in the first place.
The young woman didn't say anything, but merely nodded, though the tears in her eyes didn't disappear. Which Beth decided she wasn't going to be able to do anything about. That was just a fact that she was stuck with in the end.
_
While Beth had been gone by the time he woke up, Ralph wasn't too worried, but he couldn't help but wonder what had dragged her out of bed so early. The sun was still low in the sky when he'd gotten up and noticed her absence.
It wasn't until there was a knock on the door a few minutes after he'd gotten up that he even noticed some of the slaves that Beth had saved weren't in the room anymore. Which Ralph could only shake his head at. He couldn't say if that was related to why Beth was gone or not, but it wasn't something that really bothered him.
Though, as he opened the door, he saw that the person knocking was one of the 'missing' slaves. Though, he hoped that he wasn't there to let everyone know to expect more slaves Beth had decided to help out. He had a feeling their own ability to help others was at it's limit. That any more and they might as well create a refugee camp for slaves in need or something. He had brown hair and purple eyes and a slight limp that didn't seem to bother him any, even as he moved quickly.
When the young man explained what was going on and that Beth wasn't going to be back for a while, Ralph could only sigh. He'd hoped to talk with her about what plans she had for this city, now that they hadn't been able to save the girl they thought might have been Charlie.
Still, while he had been willing to wait for Beth to get back so they could discuss their next move, he hadn't expected it to take until nearly noon for her to get back.
When she arrived, she casually walked in as if she'd just been out on a simple walk. The other slave she'd rescued following behind her.
"Sorry it took so long," Beth said as if it wasn't a big deal. "The guards were more annoying than I thought they'd be."
"What exactly did happen there?" Wes asked before Ralph could say anything.
Ralph had wanted to ask that, but he couldn't help but wonder if he'd have been so nice about it as Wes had been.
"Nothing big, really," Beth answered. "They thought she was a runaway slave, but I was able to convince them that I'd bought her and sent her on a task that she wasn't supposed to let anyone know about."
Ralph sighed. "Is that all?" he asked, though he hadn't expected to sound so hostile as he did.
Beth blinked at him. "If you'd like to go talk to the guards, I'll let you know which gate to find them at."
Ralph waved his hand like he could get the subject to just go away like that. "Don't worry, I'm not going to go to that effort."
Beth nodded as if that's what she'd wanted to hear, making Ralph roll his eyes. She certainly seemed to have determined that she was the one in charge here.
"Well, I believe we were going to visit, uh I think the church here, right?" Beth said, clearly not wanting to talk about what had happened anymore.
Though, Ralph had to admit that he was interested in moving on as well. It wasn't like he could think of how he'd benefit from keeping that same topic going.
"Did we agree to that?" Wes asked, sounding a little confused. "I think it was merely mentioned that we could give the remaining funds there, but we never really did decide on that either."
Beth shrugged. "If we give these coins to the church, we can still get more, right? I mean, we did start out with nothing. So, it's not like we can't just do some more street performances and get more."
Ralph nodded. While it wasn't like Beth had been doing anything directly with that, they did seem to get more the longer they played their songs in the same location. Although, it wasn't like they got that much more. That's just how it had seemed to him.
"Uh, can we go to the church?" Feon asked, her voice almost inaudible.
"Even if we don't all go, I'll be sure to take you there," Beth said, smiling at the girl.
"Uh, can I go too?" one of the slaves that Beth had brought in the night before asked rather timidly. "I haven't been there in a while."
Beth nodded. "The more the merrier!"
"Uh, not to rain on your parade or anything, but I think I mentioned about their names to you last night, but you didn't know what they were," Ralph said, feeling like if he didn't say anything, that the conversation would become a flood and wash away any chance of taking care of a few other pieces of business that he was pretty sure Beth had forgotten about. Especially since she hadn't been the type to just ignore certain points like that.
"Oh yeah!" Beth said, as if she just remembered on her own. "I did say that I'd talk with them about what their names were."
Ralph shook his head in exasperation. He wanted to get Beth to slow down, but it felt like she was on a roll here. Like she was building on her own energy, no matter how much of it she spent.