My name is Callan Blacklake, and I am the last male heir of the Blacklake Old Family. I was born in Midwinter in the 1020TA where I lived with my parents, older brother Connor and younger sister Elaine. We have always been a small family, with little interest in power and politics.
For centuries the family wealth has been based on the importing of rare spices from Al Jabar and the family lived comfortably. We had a house in Norn Hill, a shop in the Merchant’s District and four ships working the trade routes. My father and mother ran the shop in Midwinter while my uncle Malcolm lived and worked in Al Jabar.
The problems started over forty years in my grandfather’s time. Merchants from Zale had forged trade routes across the Thessan desert and began to deal directly with the Hamatic States. They were able to import spices directly into Midwinter without going through Al Jabar, cutting our trade and under-cutting our prices.
When I was born in 1020, my family was beginning to feel the pinch. Father had been forced to sell two of the ships and it was looking like he would need to sell the house in Norn Hill.
Everything changed in the summer of 1022 and the beginning of the civil war. My father called our ships back to Midwinter along with my uncle, but they were intercepted by Midwinter ships flying the Loyalist banner. One ship, with my uncle on board, was sunk. The other was commandeered for the Midwinter navy. Fortunately, my uncle was rescued by a ship from Hawkwind’s navy and made it safely to Port Newland.
With our business in tatters and the family close to bankruptcy my father needed to make a decision that would shape our family’s future. Unable to side with the Loyalist government and their Zalian allies he gathered up the family and fled to join Hawkwind’s growing rebellion.
My father and uncle were reunited and they fought at Hawkwind’s side during the battles throughout the summer and autumn. With Hawkwind’s victory and the end of the war, Hawkwind rewarded those who had helped him. The Blacklake family gained a lot and we were able to purchase new ships and renew our trade with Al Jabar.
Things were looking up for the Blacklakes and they got better. In 1023 the government announced its plans to spread west into the Athas Valley. Many of those who supported Hawkwind benefited from the expansion. Father was asked to take control of a newly built keep on the edge of the Barrens. Hawkwind placed the safety of the country in our hands.
My father accepted and in the spring of 1024 we moved into Blacklake Keep. We had a comfortable life, even here out on the border. Government subsidies paid for the guards and taxes from the new farmers and miners in the area bought in a steady income. My uncle, along with his wife and children, moved here, leaving a locum to run our operations in Al Jabar. We looked set for life.
We lived here happily for many years. My brother, sister and I became close to our cousins Ellen and Sean, They had been born in Al Jabar and we had never seen them until their return to Blacklake. We spent weeks exploring the area around the keep, often riding into the barrens on ‘adventures’ and saving Midwinter from savages.
As I grew older my father began to instruct Connor in the running of the keep and I began weapons training with our Master-of Arms. His name was Arthur Hightower and was of a minor branch of the Hightower family. He was a grizzled veteran of the eastern border and the civil war. He taught me much, but I was never able to quite master the weapons drills to his standards – I always had the feeling that I had other skills.
When I was 15, I manifested my first power. Hightower had been pushing me harder and harder, trying to test my fighting skills, when I willed myself to fight better – and I did. Hightower new what he was doing – he himself was a Psychic Warrior. My father, who later admitted that he too had a smattering of powers, had hired Hightower especially for this purpose. While generally rare, psionics had been common in the Blacklake family for generations. My father had some powers, as did my uncle. Elaine, though, was the strongest to be born in four generations.
Under Hightower’s tutelage my skills improved and my range of powers grew. Elaine went away for training – I was never told where – but when she returned in 1040 she had mastered her skills. As I worked with Hightower he told me more of his past and of his training at a secluded Monastery in the east. There they trained warriors in the art’s of war – perfecting their martial and psionics skills. I was and intrigued by his tales and I planned to follow in his footsteps and train at this monastery.
All that was ruined when the Horde came. The temperatures had begun to drop in 1036 and we had seen an increase in goblins and orcs raiding the farms looking for food. They had not caused a problem and the garrisons along the Iron Hills had dealt with them successfully.
Then in the spring of 1040 came the dragon Annatharoth. The keep’s walls were no match for the dragon’s breath and it cracked and fell. Orcs and goblins poured in to the keep overwhelming the defenders. We fought like demons to defend our property but we overwhelmed.
I saw my father and uncle cut down trying to defend my mother and aunt. Hightower and I fought back to back defending my sister but we were soon exhausted. Hightower gave his life to save us, trying to carve a path through the attackers. He too was hacked down and cut to pieces. Exhausted, my sister and I were soon overwhelmed.
We awoke later to find us captives along with other younger inhabitants of the local area. I saw my brother and cousins, alive but battered and bruised. We had been captured by an orc chieftain named Drogba. In halting Tradespeak he told us of our fate – we were to be ‘gifts’ to his loyal warriors, slaves for their pleasures. The five of us along with half a dozen others were given to an orc warlord named Lokun. We were marched south in the hills for a day until we arrived at Black Mountain and we became slaves of the Black Mountain orcs.
Life became hell. The women were put to work in the kitchens while the men worked in the forges and mines. I found myself working with my brother and together with other slaves we plotted our escape. My skills my brother learned from my father proved invaluable organising our small band but it still took us months to prepare.
Six months into our incarceration we attempted our escape. Our plans, meticulous though they were, were to no avail. My cousin was killed in the initial breakout, cut down by an orc with a pick-axe. My brother and I managed to make it to the shafts to the caverns below before Lokun and his shaman caught up with us.
The shaman conjured magical webs to halt us in out tracks and then the orcs beat us unconscious. We awoke to find us in chains again. Lokun offered freedom to any slave who would betray the ring-leaders of our little plot. I will never forget the horror I felt when one man stood and pointed at my brother.
Connor was dragged out by Lokun’s bodyguards and before our eyes Lokun strangled him with his bare hands.
Following the failed escape, we were split into small groups and spread throughout the mountain. I occasionally saw my sister when my slave gang was taken down to clean the warg-pens but we were unable to speak to each other for over two years.
I was a prisoner for three years and not a day has passed when I have not thought of my family and what the orcs took away from me. I will not rest until my family has been avenged.
