The 5th Wife (Kolora Stories)

A gentle breeze brushed against Drahoe's skin as ash and embers fell to the ground. The mansion that she had called her home burned right in front of her. She watched helplessly as the other wives and slaves tried to fight the fire, but their efforts were in vain. The husband of 8 was kidnapped along with several of the children. No one knew who attacked or why.

Drahoe was nothing special, a non-magical halfling village girl in the middle of nowhere. However, one day, as she walked through the village market, she met a vendor selling a variety of produce and seeds. Drahoe had never seen this fellow before and thus knew he was an outsider. He was a male gnome, yet he was pleasing to look at. He wore a tunic, pants, and a hat in colors Drahoe had never seen before. His produce looked fresh and was larger than that of the others around him. His smile nearly made Drahoe fall for him. "Excuse me, sir, but um. How much for these carrots and the cabbage heads?" she asked. "For a bushel, 2 coins, for the basket, 10. That's for the carrots. The cabbage is half the price," said the handsome gnome. "You sell by the basket?" asked Drahoe. "Yes, ma'am," said the gnome, flashing his nearly perfectly white teeth. "How? What?" Drahoe was at a loss for words. Usually, vendors sold at twice that price. Which either means he's trying to scam her or he's a bad business owner. Yet the prices are so small that even if the produce wasn't up to a higher quality, it didn't seem to matter in the end. "Fine, I'll buy one carrot basket and 4 heads of cabbage," said Drahoe, finding the right amount of coin from her dress pocket. "It's a deal," said the gnome. His name: Master Zeallion Copperstem.

After that, Drahoe fed her family the food she bought, and they were amazed by how good it was. Drahoe kept going back to the vendor after that. Normal transactions turned to flirting, flirting turned to love, and love became engagement. During this time, Drahoe went to the Copperstem's estate, where she met the other wives. Wife one was Zera (Non-magical gnome), she was the most welcoming and ensured Drahoe was comfortable "sharing" a husband. Her job was handling finances. Wife two was Valka (magical-dwarf). She was quiet, but her druid abilities ensured the produce would grow faster, and any animals that got out of hand, she would tame or calm down. Wife three was Laragis (magical goblin), she was no-nonsense and in charge of security and chasing escaped slaves. Wife four was Lukva (non-magical dwarf), she ran the winery and took care of the vineyard. Drahoe (non-magical halfling) would be the fifth. Her job was head chef and cook for all the families and slaves. A year later, Xera (non-magical gnome) came. She was the most stubborn and would "compete" with the others for their husband's attention. Her job was laundry and mansion cleaning. After her was Tilsan (magical goblin), who was the loudest of the wives and would constantly argue about any wrong details. She ensured the slaves made it back to the slave house, made sure they were healthy, and that they were presentable to outsiders. Then finally, there was Unisyche (magical halfling ). She was the favorite, she was the gnome's assistant and right-hand woman. Her clerical background made her wise, and that wisdom made her the best choice to oversee the rest of the wives. She ended fights and solved problems.

Now those petty fights and drama seemed trivial. All that time fighting, gossiping, and arguing all burned with the mansion. All the good memories and bad were all ash now. "Drahoe! Drahoe!" yelled Unisyche as she grabbed Drahoe's arm. "Drahoe, you have to snap out of it and help put the fire out," ordered Unisyche. Drahoe was forcibly brought back to reality. "Yes, but what is there to save? What room hasn't become a pile of rubble now?" asked Drahoe as she stood up but didn't move. "Drahoe! Make yourself useful and help put out the fire!" ordered Laragis as she dumped water on the raging flames. "I don't care if you think this is a waste of time, but we have to stop the fire from spreading. The wind could fling the embers in any direction and ruin the current harvest," said Laragis as she grabbed Drahoe's hand and put the bucket in her hand. "You need to help save our home," said Laragis as they locked eyes. Tears slid down Drahoe's face, but she didn't cry. "Alright. What do I need to do?" asked Drahoe. "Ata girl. Get more water from the well," ordered Unisyche. Drahoe nodded and ran to the well, where slaves and Xera were refilling buckets. After much back and forth, the flames died down. The remaining members found room in the barn, the slave house, and any other place to rest for the night.

The next day, cleaning had begun. Slaves hauled off heavily burned wooden beams, remains of furniture, any remaining walls, and roof tiles. Laragis was trying to get volunteers to track down their husband and kids, plus there might have been some slaves who used last night's chaos to run away, so they had to be found as well. Drahoe, Lukva, Valka, and Tilsan, plus a couple of loyal slaves, volunteered. Unisyche wanted to go but knew someone needed to stay and oversee the recovery effort as well as figure out how to rebuild the mansion. After packing supplies on some donkeys, the rescue party began tracking the attackers.

Days after tracking, the party found a bandit camp. They saw a giant wooden cage with people inside, but couldn't tell who they were. The party surrounded the camp and charged in, causing chaos and confusion for the bandits. Drahoe charged at the cage with an axe and embedded it in the wood, but it got stuck. Drahoe pulled, but her efforts were in vain. A human bandit charged at her, only to be shot with an arrow in his head and fall to her knees. Drahoe looked around and saw that Laragis had found a bow and arrows and began shooting them. Drahoe then tried to find keys or something to use to open the cage. Then she found a dead man who had keys tied to his tunic and took them. She freed the prisoners, and they fled from the cage in all directions. Yet none was her husband. However, some of the kids were there. Drahoe hugged them and then asked, "Where is your father?". The kids shrugged their shoulders. "They said something about taking him somewhere else. They also said something about him owing their boss money," answered the kids, crying from fear and relief. Shortly after the bandits ran off, the camp was theirs. Drahoe then walked to the other wives. "The kids say that they heard the bandits take Zeallion to their boss. They said that he owes the boss money," she said. "So that's how Zeallion got all that land. He was given a loan and I guess never paid it back," said Laragis. "So our guy owed another guy money? How much are we talking here, and why were we never told this? Unless Zera knew and never told him?" asked Valka. "I wonder if she was also in the dark, but it doesn't make any sense. She would've seen something and told us. No, no. I bet he was framed. His boss needed money from somewhere and knew exactly where to look for it," said Laragis. "But if that's true, why not ask? Why attack in the middle of the night when half of us weren't even on the farm?" asked Drahoe. "Hmm. None of this is making sense. Best to split up. A group continues to find the bandits and asks questions. While the other half goes and drops the kids off at home. More hands mean less time on rebuilding," said Laragis. "What if we all went back and gathered more people and weapons..." Drahoe couldn't finish as she saw Laragis and Valka staring at her with distaste in their eyes. "What's wrong with that?" asked Drahoe. "Just...just take the kids back and tell everyone to prepare for another attack." said Laragis. "Why?" asked Drahoe. "Because this was a trap. A decoy. DANGIT! I was a fool. I shouldn't have believed it was going to be this easy," said a frustrated Laragis. Valka put a hand on her shoulder for comfort. "It's not your fault. We can still find and rescue Zeallion. However, Drahoe is right, we need more bodies. More weapons. More magic. So what we'll do is loot this camp and carry it until we find the bandit's hideout. Then we send a message and stall until help arrives," said Valka. Tilsan and Lukva then came running with tears falling from their faces, which were red from running and crying. "Zeallion is dead," said Lukva as she fell to the ground, crying and gagging. "THEY KILLED HIM! THOSE MONSTERS KILLED OUR HUSBAND!" screamed Tilsan as she too fell to her knees, crying. Drahoe and Valka knelt and hugged Tilsan and Lukva. Laragis stood there, tears forming. "Where is his body?" she asked. "The slaves are getting him now. They found him, and we double-checked. He. He wasn't breathing, his. His heart wasn't beating. We started to cry and knew we needed to regroup with you," answered Tilsan as she slowly regained her composure. While Lukva kept crying loudly. Laragis then looked around to see if the slaves were on their way, and once she was able to see them, she ran to them. "Is that him? Is that really his body?" asked Laragis. "Yes, mistress," said the slaves as they lowered the body and uncovered his face. "No. No. This can't be him. This can't be him," said a frantic Laragis as she ripped the cloth off of him and looked for anything that might tell her otherwise. "This must be some spell, some imposter. This can't be him." Laragis wrapped her arms around herself and cried loudly. Drahoe, Valka, and the kids all wept with the other wives.

After much mourning, the rescue party looted what little they could, set the camp on fire, and left the bodies to rot and be eaten by savangers, not even caring if a necromaner came and raised them. They hitched a wagon to the ponies and placed Zeallion on it, and thus they began to make their way back home.

A couple of days later, they were greeted by slaves and neighboring villagers. Once told Zeallion was dead, they rode ahead to rally the others. Once they reached the reconstructed mansion, everyone flocked to the wagon to see their master and confirm that he was dead. The rest of the wives looked at his rotting face and cried into each other's arms. The slaves took his body and began to dig a grave. The village paladin and warlock were brought to offer Zeallion's soul to the Great Lion Gods. They also consulted the wives. Most of them cried during the entire ceremony, while Laragis, Valka, and (surprisingly) Drahoe tried to hold back tears. On that day, 8 widows were made, 17 kids became fatherless, and 23 slaves lost their master.

The wives refused to divide up the land and decided to still live together. While some refused to remarry. Several did, Drahoe being one of them. She married a young man from the Crackfoot tribe, and they had a child. They named him Zedral Crackfoot. He would grow up to become a commander of an army of the Wheat Horde. He would become a military advisor for Kamo. He would become Emperor Noone's rival. He would become the last defense for the old way and old monarchies. He would be: Commander Crackfoot.