by Nelson, J P
The other boys were screaming and I heard shouts from the guards outside, but I didn’t stop. Hamges’s pants were now around his knees and as I got up I saw he was clearly exposed. I felt a rage emerging within me and embraced it. I remembered Cordis and his razor the day he meant to geld me as I brought my left knee up into Hamges’s exposure, hard. As he buckled over I aimed an awkward right fist down and into his left ear. I had no understanding of fighting science, but I was giving it everything I had. Then hands were grabbing me from behind and I found myself falling backward.
I had grown up on stories of Kn’Yang fighting trolls on a regular basis. He had perfected a method of fighting them which included lots of diving techniques and rolling on the ground. In play I would often fight the trolls myself and I had a talent for such movements. Rolling backward was easy and as I fell I simply rolled out of it and came to my feet. Again I caught the boys by surprise.
One grabbed at me and I ducked under and caught his knees, then standing straight up I threw him over my back. Next I seized a piece of board and swung hard at anything I could make contact with. My first target was a face which I smashed with full force. I hit another boy across the shoulder followed by a thrust into a third boy’s stomach. There wasn’t any skill, I was just swinging wildly. As I swung I moved rearward to cover my backside and keep them from circling around me. Backed into a corner I saw the door shatter and guards piled in.
Immediately, I found myself facing down two drawn crossbows with nothing but a broken stick in my hand, but I didn’t care. I was sure I was going to be shot and they were yelling at me in words I didn’t understand. Then Stagus’s voice boomed and he angrily pushed his way into the room. He glared at me, and then he glanced at the pile in my bedding and back at me again.
He barked a couple of orders to the guards, glanced at my bedding again, then a side-to-side look at the boys and back to me. Looking me square in the eye and with a nodding motion, he said in an angry voice, “A regular bad-ass, ain’t ya kid? Ready to take on the whole damned world … not in my camp! Not here!”
His eyes seemed to glare deep and grow wide. I found myself caught in his gaze and he advanced one step. “You want to fight?” He raised his voice louder, “Do you want to fight?! You want to swing on me, you little spike-eared slink?”
The whites of his eyes seemed to grow wider and looked to bulge out of his skull. I was captivated by his gaze and before I could react, he snatched the piece of wood from my hand with his right. His speed was startling as he circled the hand downward and back, as if to hit me, and his left hand grabbed me by the throat. Stagus then slammed me into the wall, his grip like iron around my windpipe and I felt the wall groan from the impact. From the size of his belly, I had assumed he would be slow and lazy in his movements; not so. He brandished the wood high and for a moment I thought I was dead.
Stagus held me like that for a long moment and I looked back at him with a firm resolve. Child, though I was, I had already accepted my death. I would not whimper for a human, or anyone else for that matter. He then released his grip and slowly nodded his head. There was a look of study on his face and he said, “You’re not crazy. You’re not crazy at all.”
He pushed me against the corner and I half fell but quickly regained my balance. Speaking in short sentences he said, “No. You’re not crazy. You’re smart.”
Stagus pointed the wood at me and hunched his shoulders while giving me a vulture-like glare, “Maybe, maybe you’re too smart, but there’s some wild in you, too. You’re like a domestic dog gone feral.”
There was a cruel smile on his lips as he looked me over like he did on that first day, “But I like it.” He went to my bedding and rolled it up. “If you don’t want your bunk mates to shit in your sheets …” he thrust the roll at me, feces and all, “… then don’t let ‘um.”
He barked another order at the guards and they prepared to lead me out.
“I’m sending you to the front line.” He nodded his head with a violent motion, “That’ll take the piss out of you.”
I made my way out of the shack with my soiled bed and clothing in my arms. Hamges slinked back away from me as I walked to the door. Two guards led the way and as I stepped into the blackness I heard thunder shatter the night sky and rain began to fall. I longed to see that Emerald Lightning streak against the sky, but it wasn’t to be.
The guards weren’t very happy about standing in the torrent of rain while I washed out my things. But I took my time and relished every moment. Up until then I had never thought much about rain except it was wet, often cold and it made plant life grow. My momma had always liked the rain. She even sang songs about it. But this night it was becoming my friend. From then on I would always like the rain.
As I rubbed a soap bar into my blankets and scrubbed, I found myself thinking again about my momma. Unbidden tears suddenly began pouring from my eyes. Hard and fast my emotions released against my will. The guards were not close, but I was terrified that they would see me crying and think me weak. But as I scrubbed the tears came.
My momma … my loving momma was dead and defiled and there was nothing I could do. Not … one … damn … thing!
My insides were ripping as I thought how I was so undeserving to be the son of my momma. Somehow it had to have been my fault, but how? What had I done? Had I angered the powers that be? Maybe if I had of worked better in the fields I wouldn’t have angered the owners. What could my momma have done to have deserved such treatment?
The answer was nothing. She hadn’t been mistreated until me, I, until I had been resistant. Well, no more than she had been.
Again, I longed to hear her voice, to feel her touch. But she was gone, gone forever. I was completely and utterly alone in an existence without hope.
I cried without control and no longer cared, alone in the pitch blackness with the storm of life beating upon me. Me, a slave with nothing but some clothing soiled by human filth. I threw my head back and screamed my defiance at the top of my lungs as thunderstruck, drowning my curses. With all my strength I beat my clothing against the washing rocks until I was exhausted. Falling to my knees I sat for how long I don’t know. My tears finally ceased and mingled with the sheets of rain washing over my body.
Finally the guards came to get me through a lull in the storm. I let them lead me to another shack as another thunderclap shook the valley. A guard shoved me inside and I heard him lock the door as the rain came down again.
Looking into the shack I saw five sets of bunks. Two sets on each side, one set on the back wall. Nine of the ten beds were filled. Several pairs of eyes peered at me in the dark as I stood there with my dripping laundry, the rest apparently asleep. It dawned upon me that I was in a cabin of adults. All, that is, but one. Jared was in there and he got up slowly and walked over to me. One of the others said something in a language I didn’t know and Jared half turned and answered. Then he took the soaked clothes from my arms and hung them on a drying rack.
One of the men got up and brought a blanket to me. He motioned me to take off my clothes and I stared at him numbly. I then realized I was shaking with cold. Jared motioned me to remove my clothes and indicated to me through hand movements that it was okay.
The man with the blanket, a middle-aged man called Sym, said something in a low voice and another fellow tossed him a cloak. I tried to dry myself but my hands were starting to shake badly. So Jared helped and once I was well wrapped in a blanket and cloak, Sym sat me down in a chair and started to massage my legs. It scared me at first, to have his hands on me. But Jared instilled in me a sense of trust.
Sym started pushing his fingers into places I didn’t know existed in my legs, then my calves and finally my feet. Each place he pushed hurt badly, at first, then the pain would ease away and I would feel a pleasant, smooth and warm sensation.
He was indicating to me to breath deep and slow, which I did. Then I thought of my momma and her touch, and the way I had touched Jared’s broken leg
. Slowly, I felt a kind of heat seem to rise up from So’Yeth, through my feet and into my legs and body.
I saw Sym pause and look at Jared for a moment with a curious expression on his face. He then gave my knee a gentle slap and with a nod of his head he got up and went back to bed.
Jared led me to the remaining bunk, making sure I was comfortable and covered with adequate blankets. It was an odd feeling. It was the first time I had actually been in a real bed since before my momma’s death.
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Breaking down and crying like I did left me feeling ashamed, yet clean at the same time. And no one knew anything about it but me. The guards had stayed where they could see my outline through the storm. But they themselves had stayed under shelter.
When I fell asleep I slept soundly for the first time in years. It’s not that I felt safe; it’s that I was completely drained in a physical and emotional way. There were no dreams, I just slept.
The next morning the storm was still in full force. It was so powerful that everyone was left to their own shacks. That storm lasted for four days. A guard came to check us at irregular intervals and threw a big sack or food inside. Water was easy, we just put our water cruise outside for a couple of minutes and it was full. The meat was dried, but that was okay. And there were carrots and potatoes as well.
When I awakened on the first morning after the storm, everyone else was already up. It was embarrassing to me, because I am normally up before the break of dawn. But no one said anything about it that I could determine. They seemed to be more concerned with the idea of a holiday to notice me right off. Jared noticed, however, and he greeted me with a warm smile. The first I had seen in a long time and I wasn’t sure I was comfortable with it. He sat down beside me on my bunk then pointed at my blanket and said, “Pendalt …” He looked at me for a minute, then pointed at it again and repeated, “Pendalt.” Then he touched the mug in his hand and said, “… cuitt …” and poured a little water out into his hand and said, “… adwa.” That began my learning of the Fhathern tongue.
Those of us in the shack had been designated to go to the very front of the road building in the Black Aggie Mountains. There we would be paired off and would spend our working time slinging stone picks, shovels, and clearing rock. A lot of rock stood between Tremount and a perfect stretch of flats which would make for the shortest route to the Sahnuck River and Stone Bridge country.
When I realized exactly where we were, map wise, I was amazed. All of that travel time to the south, around the Jutte Horn, up the Phabeon coastline, and now I was going to be maybe two weeks journey from my birthplace. No wonder they wanted a road. Merchants could shorten travel time by literally months.
Of the ten of us, only three had just come in. That included Jared, me, and the burly fellow who kept laughing to himself in the caravan, Ghyd.
Sym was the senior among us. He was of average height and lean of build. Looking to be in his mid fifties, he was actually over one hundred years old. He was a member of the Nakoai race of humans, a race of philosophers, seekers of wisdom, and natural healers. They practiced lots of meditation, lived close to nature, and practiced a form of healing based on deep breathing and massage of places on the body I learned were called acu-points. I had no idea what all that meant, but it worked for me. He was good at what he did. He had also been a slave for most of his adult life.
Being strong and full of endurance, Sym was an integral part of the point team. Not just for his tireless labor, but he was the designated healer as well. Magical healing was rare out in these parts. And not being a religious man, Stagus wasn’t likely to attract many of the ordained clerical healers.
Ghyd wasn’t crazy. He was just a hard working, simple-minded human who dealt with his problems through jokes and laughter. A one-time farmer, he had run up so much debt that he and his family had been taken in by the local lord and sold to pay his bills. That had been years before. His private jokes were his own way of just trying to get through life.
Dotch was a six and a half feet tall mountain of a man who had been caught in the wrong bedroom. His tongue had been cut out and certain parts of his body completely removed, his face was a map work of branding scares. Dotch never tried to communicate and clearly the spirit had been beaten out of him, but he worked like a horse.
Siu and Liu were sixth generation slave brothers who had been bought as a team. The smarts had been bred right out of them but they could work all day and night, then start on tomorrow. Both geldings, their only purpose in life was to do their job well.
Jared was the son of a scholar and teacher who traveled a lot and gave lectures. His name was Jethroas and had mastered several languages, memorized several volumes of poetry, and had written two volumes of history. Both Jethroas and Jared’s momma had taken the spotted fever and died when he was fourteen. Jared had tried living on the streets, but was caught trying to pick the wrong pocket and ended up in a jail to be sold.
Carrot? Well … he got his name for his hair color. It seems most red headed people I have known get nicknamed Red, Carrot Top or something like that. He had once been Stagus’s private boy, but he was gelded and put to common labor some time ago. Apparently Carrot outgrew Stagus’s preferences. It seemed Stagus had a fetish for boys in their mid teens to early twenties. He liked them with fair complexion and light colored hair. The consensus was that he had his eyes on me, but was waiting for me to grow some more and fill out.
I was a slave, right? Property, right? He had the option to do what he wanted with me, his property, right? I made a resolve, then, that my first priority would be to make sure that would never happen. How? I had no idea. Escape was always a first choice. But that didn’t look to be very likely at this point. Unlikely, yeah, but not impossible.
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After the storm blew itself out, the point team was gathered together. The Black Aggie Mountains were named for a witch woman who was said to have lived there. She supposedly died a couple of hundred years before, leaving magical secrets galore. No trace was ever found of her and it is believed her home was a secluded cave, but that range covered several thousand square miles and the cave had yet to be found by anybody. It was generally believed to be located somewhere in the vicinity of where the point was currently positioned.
Along with a few wagons full of supplies and several guards, we made our way to the work site. It took several days to get there and we made good time. At the front camp were more tents and more shacks with several guards posted here. These guards weren’t there so much as to watch the slaves, although that was always important, but more so to protect them.
In the beginning I didn’t understand much of what was said. But the guards were experienced in using hand gestures in getting the right ideas across. Believe it or not, they weren’t cruel. Like I have said before, Stagus believed in taking care of his property. So, while we weren’t treated like anything special, we were treated well. As long as we did our jobs we were left alone.
The food was plentiful and served three times a day. We also had plenty of fruit and vegetables to eat.
Work was staged out to maximize our potential and proper rest breaks were mixed in. Production moved like nothing I had ever seen before or since. Stagus had worked his methods down to a science.
Our objective was to pick and cut our way through a huge, towering ridge of rock. Then smooth it down so the next teams could polish it up, so to speak, for transit. The high point of the ridge before us was over fifty feet high. Tunneling through wasn’t an option because the ground was just loose enough to not be practical for a tunnel. And this route was to be the major highway for the entire western side of the Sahrjiun Mountains.
There had been a rough trail through the region, said to have been used by those had come before, but nobody knew who they had been. The existing trail wasn’t wide enough for a horse in many places, and only the toughest of mountain people could endure the passage. This road was
to change all of that.
Even the weather was perfect for a trade route. Although the Sahrjiun’s were known for an abundance of snow, and possibility of snow anytime of the year, something about the wind currents among the passes chosen kept the trail swept relatively clean.
Huge forces weren’t being employed by Dahruban’s investors due to the many dangers around and about. The people in charge wanted the actual route cut out, first, and then they would send troupes to enforce the road’s safety and build fortifications. This trade route was to be over three thousand miles long when completed. It was said that it would open up the central continent for exploration and settlement.
The operation was simple. Everyone was matched up with a buddy. Pairs would go to the top and chip and hammer. Pieces of rock were then lowered in a controlled manner by other pairs. At the bottom the next pairs emptied the rock into special carts. Finally the carts were wheeled to a debris zone. If there were fissures or cracks then other teams were utilized to scatter the rock and fill the fissures in. And our tools; we had those custom picks and hammers Stagus had picked up in Gevard. During the winter months, Stagus even sprung for a wizard to melt the snow and keep ice from building up on our target projects.
Simple; but who ever said that simple was always easy?
From the beginning it was intended that I should get burned out quick and have my anger curbed in short order. After all, I was small and not exactly formidable looking. But you should never underestimate someone because of their size or build. Many a horse has won their race over so-called superior animals due to heart and courage alone.
An older, more experienced teammate might have carried the slack they expected from me. Or worse, I might have slowed them down. So by orders of Stagus I was paired with Jared. After all, we were both green. And, hey, what if we turned out to work well together? The crew would have another productive team. As for me, personally; elvin blood took time to grow. And if I filled out from good, hard work … when the time was right Stagus would have a prize to break into his pleasure. At least that was the talk.