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Chapter:4-Slavers
When Leech finally came around he found himself in a cage. It was big enough for him to stand and walk around a little and it had horizontal bars. The room itself was so dark he couldn't see his hand in front of his face. He sat in the dark for what seemed like hours before he heard the noise of a door being unlocked. When the door opened the light from the other room blinded him a little. A large figure soon filled the door way, and Leech could tell the person was not there to help. The man pick up a small lantern from a table by the door and lit it. he walked to the center of the room and hung the lantern from a hook built into the ceiling.
Leech could now see the whole room, it was fairly small and the ceiling was low, he thought it must have been originally built to be a small storage room. The room also held six other cages like the one he was in, only two of them were occupied. One by a boy, possibly eight years old, he looked as though he had not eaten in several days and he had a hopeless look about him. He had short black hair and many bruises covering is body. The boy wore only a pair of torn pants that had a patch on them that said "Robert". The other held a girl who seemed to be only nine or ten years old. She had shoulder length brown hair and many scars on here arms and hands. She wore a dirty white shirt and a pair of old pants both of which were much to big. There was a patch on her pants just as with the boy, her patch read "Alice". Leech's attention soon returned to the man that unlocked the door. He noticed the man had been looking him over.
Leech took this examine the man. He was tall, and not too smart looking. He wore a black bandanna, a shirt that was covered in greens, browns, and reds, a pair of very old and used pants, and missed matched boots. The big man looked Leech over for several minutes before simply saying "You'll do" and turning and walking out of the room; he left the lamp, but closed and relocked the door. Several silent minutes passed as Leech sat confused by the man's words. The boy Robert broke the silence, "That means that you'll be going to someone soon" he said in a tone so distant and hopeless that it sent chills through Leech's body. Leech looked at the boy with a mixture of curiosity and dread, and said "What do you mean "someone"?".
This time it was the girl, Alice, who spoke. Her voice was harsh and full of anger as she said, "He means someone! You are now a slave. we are all slaves, doomed to a life of servitude and pain. The only thing we are allowed to keep are our names, but even that is only because it makes it easier for them to keep records of sales.". Leech looked at her stunned for many seconds, finally he asked "how long have you been one?". Alice look down at the floor of her cage for a few moments and then finally said "3 years, but Rob over there was born into it, he has no sense of freedom or pride.". Leech felt a wave of shame, fear, and anger overtake him, and he began frantically shaking and beating on the cage, trying to get free. This raised so much noise that it caused the man from before to come back. This time he was carrying a large, and slightly curved wooden pole with a cloth wrapping at one end were the hand was meant to be placed. Leech, in his fit of angry desperation, had not noticed the man enter, or his weapon.
The man walked over to his cage and said in a very calm voice, "settle down, and stop". Leech's anger flared at the sound of the man's voice, and he unthinkingly blurted out, "******** you old man! let me out of...", he wasn't able to finish his sentence before the man swung his stick in between the bars of the cage. There was a sickening sound as the pole landed a heavy blow to Leech's ribs, breaking them and causing him to bend over in intense pain and cough up a scary amount of blood.
While he was still leaning over the man sent the stick flying again, this time into the side of Leech's head. There was a loud 'CRACK' and he fell to the ground, before he blacked out he felt and saw his blood flow around and down his face and heard the man say, "I did ask nicely...".
When Leech awoke he found himself laying on a narrow wooden table, with bandages around his chest and head. He heard talking so he decided to remain still and keep is eyes closed. "BRIAN! come here!" a loud and angry man's voice shouted. There were the sound of running echoing off of the stone walls for several minutes. When they stopped a young, out of breath boy spoke hurriedly "Sir, Commander Heartman. Sir!". "You go tell that brain damaged fool Randel that if he keeps breaking the merchandise I'll take his legs. he doesn't need those to watch a locked door! is that clear!?" the commander said, his voice heavy with anger. The boy simply said "Sir yes. Sir!" and the sound of his running once again filled the area. Heartman soon began talking to himself about the situation, "That boy will be out for days and I'll have to lower his price now. Business already hard enough because of the crackdown on the slave trade, and at oaf decides to beat every one we round up, and no-one wants damaged good.".
There were several minutes of silence, then out of nowhere a woman's voice spoke, her voice was independent yet obedient. "Sir, you wanted to see me?" she said. "Yes i did. Please, have a seat Sara.", the commander said. Leech was surprised that the man even knew the word 'please', and there was now something new in his voice; Leech couldn't place it, but it was some kind of kindness. the commander continued, "Please have a seat. Would you like a drink?". The lady, Sara, said "I'll sit, but i'd better pass on the drink. I have the news for you that you asked for, sir.". Heartman's voice was once again serious, "Well, what did you find out?". "Well, the boy, the new one that Randle beat today. I could find no-one that could say they recognized his description!". "So he's a street kid then is he? that's good, means nobody's gonna be looking for him." the commander said sounding relieved. "But that's just it sir!", Sara said, "I mean nobody at all. If he were homeless he woulda been living at the one of the shelters, or he woulda been with one of those street clans that roam around. either way someone would know him. It's almost as if he fell out of the sky or something!". the commander let out a small laugh, "ha. Maybe he did, but he's mine now and by the looks of him he'll fetch a price too, so all in all i don't care, but what i do care about is what happened in Virgal! How did it happen?", it sounded like he was staring to get angry again.
Sara, with a touch of shame said, "It was my fault. I wasn't watching carefully enough and the woman caught us sneaking back into the forest with her chickens. One of the new recruits freaked out and went too far. But i guess on the bright side if that lady hadn't screamed, we wouldn't have grabbed that boy.". "True as that maybe, it was very risky. Do the people there suspect anything? Because if they find out and alert a patrol of guards we're done for. We just don't have enough gold to hire any mercenaries, so we're defenseless." Heartman said starting to sound slightly worried. "Well, don't worry, they don't know anything. As far as they know wild animals got her." she said. "well that's good. I'll let you return to your duties then." the commander said signifying the end of the conversation. For several minutes there was silence, and after a while Leech couldn't stand to just lay there anymore. He opened his eyes to look around, there was no one in the room with him.
The room was small, the walls and floor were made of stone, and there was no door only an open doorway. There were torches burning on the wall, so he figured it must have been night time. For the fist time Leech noticed his feet were strapped to the table, but to his bewilderment his hands weren't. He quickly went to reach for the straps, but he stop just short of grabbing them. The straps just simple rope tied with a knot that was easy for him to figure out, but on the ropes were tied bells. Leech figured this was to alert someone when he awoke, so they wouldn't need to have someone sit in the room and watch him, or it could have been some kind of cruel game they liked to play. Leech didn't want to get caught either way, so he decided to lay back down and try to think of something. Not long after there was a lot of shouting and sounds of running through the corridor outside the room, the good news was that they were headed away from him. Leech decided to take advantage of this commotion and quickly sat up and ripped the bells from the ropes around his feet, grabbing the bells themselves to be sure they made as little sound as possible. When he was sure no-one noticed him he untied the ropes and stood from the table, he got up so fast his head was spinning and he almost lost his balance.
Now that he was free, he began to think about the conversation he had heard. He was wondering how he had heard it at all, there was nobody in the room with him, nor did see any chairs, only a small stepping stool for high shelves, there was no way anyone had been there. There was a loud crash of something glass shattering somewhere nearby, and that was more than enough to bring him mind back to his present situation. He crept slowly across the floor to doorway and consciously peaked out. He had finally caught a break, the room he was in was at the end of a short hallway, and there was a window like opening on the wall that ended the hallway,but there was no glass. He also realized he was slightly underground, the opening must have been there for ventilation. He was right in his previous assumption, it was night time. The only problem was that it was too high for him to reach, but then he remembered the stool he had saw. He quickly grabbed it and returned to the window and used it, he could reach but just barely. It was extremely hard to pull himself up and out of the opening, but he knew if he didn't he would be trapped forever in a life of servitude. When he finally made it out he looked around, half expecting some kind of trap, but he saw nothing. He expected to see guards or at least someone looking out for intruders or escapees, but all he found was darkness, the full moon, and a forest.
 randomizor301 · Thu Jul 29, 2010 @ 12:49am · 0 Comments |
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