It was easy to hate the beast races. They were wretched things reflecting none of the beauty of the the speechless animals, yet none of the refinement of humanity either. Orcs, goblins, imps. Corin wondered if there was any difference between them. They seemed different between one another, but ultimately all were little more than perversions of mankind. They were Humanities macabre reflection in a tarnished mirror. The fact that they'd managed speech was surely an accident of imitating humanity, and the mockery of order their tribes had was little more than the same beastial instincts that organized wolves or hogs. But beasts were more destructive than either.
Like wolves, they gobbled up the livestock of any village in the outskirts of the kingdom. Like hogs they rooted through the homes of other creatures... But wolves eat because they're hungry. Hogs destroy in search of food for their young. Beasts? Beasts, rape, and murdered, and destroy. The frail cognizance that their minds afforded them was never used to build, or create, but rather to creatively defile. Wherever they went, they left weeping widows with monsters growing in their bellies. They left starving orphans with scarred bodies as much as scarred souls. Corin clinched his jaw tightly. They left a boy in the blood of his family amidst a burning home. He bit the inside of his cheek, and focused on the pain until the thought faded.
He sighed, and leaned over to his pack. He could barely see the contents in the failing light of the day, and their nearness to the orc warlord mean that they would light no fire for camp. Even so, amidst his meticulously ordered gear he soon found what he was looking for. It was an old long pipe, stained in ash, and wrapped in a leather envelope containing aged cavendish. The sweet smell reached his nose before he even unfolded the pouch. It was a bad habit, perhaps the worst he had, but it brought a shallow relief at the end of hard days. He had no wife at home, and as a paladin, he was naturally, forbidden from visiting bordellos or similarly unsavory places. Pipe smoke and Silence were his nightly companions. He tamped the aged leaf into the bowl of the pipe, struck a match, and drew the fire into his pipe with deep methodical puffs. As he did so, he caught Shea glaring at him. Her nose was wrinkled, and her nostrils flared. Corin merely met her gaze until she looked away.
He closed his eyes as he enjoyed the first few puffs. Yes, it was easy to hate the beast races... But he didn't... In spite of all the reason he had to hate them, he held no great malice for them in his heart. They were beasts, it was their nature. He had no greater reason to hate a beasts than he had to hate a mosquito for biting his arm. But just as you smack mosquitos, so too did you slay the warlords of beasts to bring respite to the villages near the wilderness. His adoptive family was noble. They had taught him such patience and wisdom. It's not good to let evil fester in your heart, even if that evil is directed at your enemy. It is stern resolve and righteous fury that should drive a man. Not seething hatred. Not malice. He didn't torture the ugly beasts. He exterminated them like vermin. Just as he should.
He leaned his head against the tree behind his back. This guide however... This "Shea" bothered him. She had a Cealian name. She spoke the human tongue. And she wore human clothes... even if they were clothes meant for a young man. Most bastard beasts are drowned or smothered soon after birth. Some would be tossed to the forrests, where goddess knows what happens to them. But that was not Shea's fate, and he did not know what to think of her. He felt great sympathy for her. To be neither man nor beast. To have enough of a mind to recognize the horror of what you are, but not enough to attain Cealia's enlightenment. In spite of her tough jaw and tusks, she even looked human. Her mother must share likeness with the goddess herself to redeem such ugliness.
He huffed a lung full of smoke. The air was heavy and still in these parts of the woods, so the smoke lingered in the air around his face as he thought. Part of him wanted to trust her... To trust that beasts could be more than enemies or slaves. He wanted to believe that they could cooperate, that they could build a divine civilization together... But three immortals were missing. Sir Bowan. Sir Ursa. and Sir Obir, his father. Now was no time for such thoughts.
