They were dressed in light leather armor over loose roughspun breeches. A strange sight, though it only struck her a moment later that Ilkea had been clothed the entire time. As little thought as she had given to it, she realized she’d never seen a satyr clothed before. To be sure, most of her interactions with satyrs were with corpses, but none had even had hints of armor about them.
A shrill sound made it to her ears. The tone was familiar but the sounds were not. Ilkea was speaking to the guards in her native tongue. She listened close for any words she might recognize as the talk went back and forth. It was all foreign except for her own name. It had sounded so strange in the satyr tongue that she almost thought it had been just another length in the string of incomprehensible noise, but the sounds were repeated by the guard as he looked past Ilkea to check her over. The conversation was mercifully short and they were waved past.
For the first time in their travels together, Aile made sure to put herself next to Ilkea as they moved around the edge of the camp, presumably toward whatever passed for stables.
“Since when have satyr worn armor? I have never seen one in it.”
“It is… a recent change. The centaur have begun to understand the power of the Halushek. Still, it is crude armor compared to what we used to wear.”
Aile shut her out at that point, expecting that she would ramble off into subjects that did not interest her. It was curious news, the centaur changing anything. They were not creatures who were wont to change their views for much of any reasons. Her companion’s willingness to trail off into useless subjects was one that limited Aile’s patience for her.
They indeed arrived at the stables, though they were not stables, as such. More a set of troughs where there were no hitching posts or stalls. Aile stepped down out of her chariot when they came to a stop and an older female satyr took charge of her horse. She waited as Ilkea said a few words. The girl joined her and began to lead her into the camp.
“Those were your stables?”
“Stables? No, we do not have such a cruel thing. The horses stay as they would not forsake us just as we do not forsake our own brothers and sisters.”
Oddly, that was all that Ilkea offered. She had gone quiet and her face seemed serious. As they entered the camp, the stares were blatant. The horsefolk made no qualms about openly speaking about her in unhushed voices. It annoyed her deeply that she did not know the words. Centaur was a language she had acquainted herself with so much as she could, and she knew a few words, enough to know if she was being insulted, but there were no satyr texts in the elf lands. If there were, they had been well-hidden and no one mentioned them, not even in passing.
They approached a small burlap tent. Small even by elven standards, though just about the right size to be Drow. Aile looked on it with suspicion. There could not be a Drow here, it would be unheard of.
Ilkea pulled the tent flap open and Aile stepped in. There was a strong, earthy smell, incense and the smoke of pipe herbs. Ilkea fell in behind her, crouching until she was away from the edge of the tent.
Aile’s eyes took only a second to adjust to the dark and across the room she saw an odd, small shape. Like a satyr, but small, rotund. The creature got down from his seat and walked toward her. He was clad in rose colored velvet from head to toe and as he approached he spoke.
“Aile the Cursebringer!” The voice was high and graveled. “It is rare that names of the north are spread among the hordes and yet yours is. One of only two. The other belongs to a female elf who I am told has slain more satyr than many warlords.”
The creature grabbed her hand and put a pair of wet lips to it. He was balding on the top of his head and his ears, pointy as any satyr’s or elf’s, were much shorter and close in.
“Come and sit.” He motioned toward a plush chair set at an angle to his that still afforded a view of the tent.
She followed him across the tent and took a place in the chair. It was a rare thing for a Drow in her situation to sit in a chair that fit her, and this one did. Though the creature before her was nearly a foot and a half shorter, he was as wide and seemed to enjoy a tall back to the chairs.
“I trust everything has been satisfactory thus far?” He smiled a merchant’s smile as he asked the question.
“No. The food has been disgusting and wanting for meat and the gold is poorly smelted with too much copper.”
The creature frowned. “That is unacceptable and will be rectified at once.”
He clapped and a satyr shuffled in quickly. The creature said a few words and left just as quickly as she had come.
“The hippocamps, as you call us, are new to the ways of goldsmithing, as I’m sure you’d guessed. One of many things that has been a learning process for our smiths of late.”
The satyr returned with wine on a silver tray and a small pouch that was almost entirely filled. The creature took the pouch and tested its weight a few times before tossing it to Aile.
“Those are newly minted by our best smith. The hordes in the grasslands and swamps have older stock and for that I apologize.”
Aile opened the purse. It was easily five times what
