Insignificance [Part Two]

I woke, curled in a ball, being pawed at by a skinny black mutt. It left paw marks in the congealed blood, and its tail swung excitedly to and fro in the mess. I tried to push it away, and it yipped, leaping away from me. It began to bark loudly in the doorway, calling for someone to come see what it’d found. 1

The next thing I knew, I was being lifted up into a sitting position. I cried out painfully and twisted away, but strong hands were stripping off my shirt, and then pain seared through my stomach once more as he examined it. I attempted to speak, to protest, but my mouth felt raw dry, and my lips and cheek crackled with blood. 2

‘All right there, son?’ the man asked in a gruff voice. I squinted, and saw he was a middle-aged man, hair falling in tangled blond waves over his face. He wasn’t one of the higher-class brats. We could usually tell them apart, because the higher-class were almost white in colour, and their hair was dark-coloured. We, the Scroungers, as the higher-class called us, were tanned from the sun, and our hair was bleached to a near translucent white, and we were always so much shorter than them. 3

I managed to croak, ‘yeah,’ and then he was plastering my stomach with a large bandage, wrapping it tightly around my body, to hold in the blood, I supposed. He pulled me up by the hand, and supported me as I dragged myself outside. The mongrel trotted along at our side, and then ran off in search of other survivors. 4

The man, who introduced himself as Graven, led me over to a horse-drawn cart. And that’s when I registered what he was, and what he was doing. Women, children, and a couple of men, were stuffed on board the vessel, most of them injured in some way or another. I recognised a few from the next village over, but none from my village. Graven and his troop of merry men were slave traders. They followed the armies around, collecting up survivors, and then took them to various towns and sold them off for as high a price as they could claim. 5

I didn’t struggle. There were too many of Graven’s men around to fight and escape in my current condition. He slapped my wrists behind my back with what felt like razor wire, and then he pushed me into the cart with the others. They were all silent and despondent. A woman wearing a sling in the corner was crying softly. 6

There were no other survivors. The horses were whipped into movement, and the jolt sent a shock of pain racing through my spine. Red ate at my vision again, and I struggled to stay awake as I felt sweat sluicing my body like rain. I felt filthy and unwashed, covered in both my own and my sister’s blood. 7

We picked up several more slaves on the road to mayhem that followed the army. Two young sisters were brought on board first, blood soaking their undergarments. A man and his wife came next, sobbing for their children. A teenage girl after that, clutching two babies close to her breast. The last was a five-year-old girl, twitchy and unresponding. She shrieked in the night. 8

It’d been six days since I’d been brought on board, when we finally reached the first town that held higher-class homeowners. Five of us had died on the journey, and I was almost there too. My eyesight was dismal, and my throat was parched from lack of water, my stomach rumbling with hunger, legs too weak to hold myself up, the unchanged bandage soaked in blood and some weird green mucus. 9

We were pulled ungracefully out in the middle of town, and thrown against pegs staked into the ground. There, Graven and his followers would fervently tie our chains to a loop of leather, which they would secure to the bottom of the stakes. As soon as I’d been tied, I fell onto my side and choked in the mud and dust. The five-year-old was just ahead of me, still staring straight ahead, her back sawed with deep gashes. Drool dripped from her lips onto the cobbles below her. All that came out of my mouth was a fine splattering of blood as I coughed.10

Darkness took me its cool embrace, and I found myself drifting back into the oblivion I had so easily welcomed when the wolves had left me. I woke when Graven kicked me in the side, hitting the wound dead on. I screamed and tried to twist away from him, finding myself now huddled against the legs of another. I tried to squint up at the man, but my neck was stiff and didn’t want to move that far. I settled for whimpering, my body shuddering against him, a fresh bought of the blood and goop seeping through the bandages and down my body. 11

The man knelt down, and placed fingers under my chin, tilting my face up so he could get a better look through the muck covering my features. What I saw surprised me. He looked like a Scrounger, but different. When he stood, he must have been almost six foot, but although his skin was like marble, his hair was a rich, white-blonde in colour. His eyes burned like green poison as he looked up at Graven and nodded. 12

They left to haggle over me, and I stayed in the dirt, shaking. The teenager who’d had the two babies, was now sat splayed legged off to one side, head hung, the babies in no clear sight. They’d probably been sold off. The young girl who’d been in shock had also been sold. 13

The wire was removed from my wrists, and then my buyer was back, pulling my wrists to my front and rubbing them gently, trying to unstiffen the sore, bruised joints. My hands trembled as he ran long fingers over them, and I pulled them away jerkily when a fingertip touched the cuts the wire had made. 14

He looked a little concerned as I lay back in the dirt, breathe ragged, squinting at him. He produced some strips of cloth, and tenderly wrapped them loosely round my wrists, tying them each with a firm knot. 15

‘Do you think you can eat?’ he asked, pushing the sweaty hair out of my face. I didn’t reply, but my stomach complained nosily to him. He picked me up his arms, cradling me against his body, an arm hooked under my knees and another under my shoulders. Even the small, juddering movement made me yelp in pain. I pressed my face into his clean shirt, and closed my eyes tight, fingers splayed over his chest weakly. 16

He took me into a cool, dark tavern, and ordered and paid for some bread, meat and beer. The barman nodded and watched as the blonde carried me to a corner booth and let me curl up into the comfort. He sat across from me on a stool, watching me as I peered at him. 17

‘I’m Doyle,’ he said, searching for something in a small pouch that’d been hanging from his belt. ‘What’s yours?’ 18

‘Asha.’19

He pulled out several green leaves, and scooted nearer to me. ‘How old’re you, Asha?’20

I winced as he pressed the leaves to the small fang marks in my neck, and fought the urge to push him away, ‘seventeen.’ 21

‘That’s good. My master likes us young. That’s where we’ll be going after this. He sent me out to get a new slave from Graven.’22

‘Why’d you pick me?’23

‘You’re fit for nothing except dying, so you were cheap, what did you think?’ 24

I felt a little hurt at his deadpan mocking, and pulled away from the leaves that were causing the stinging pain. He frowned, but went back to his place, placing the leaves back in the pouch. The tankers of beer arrived, alongside a platter of bread and sliced meat. 25

Doyle pushed the platter to my side and one of the huge containers of beer, and settled on his own, looking over the rim at me. I tried to eat the bread, but my lips were too dry, and the crusts scraped my throat like knives. 26

‘Drink some of the beer, kid. It’ll help.’ 27

I didn’t really want to drink it; I’d never had more than a glass of wine in my life. Fixing both hands around the metal, I pressed my lips to the rim and carefully took a sip. It was bitter and dissatisfying, but at least my lips were wettened now. After a few more sips, I was able to eat the bread, and then some of the meat. Doyle just watched me, drinking his beer and frowning. 28

‘I’m going to need to wash you,’ he said once I’d finished all I could eat. ‘You stink. The master’ll hate that. You need new bandages too, and clothes.’29

‘I can wash myself,’ I grumbled, glowering at him. I could feel the alcohol taking effect on me. 30

‘If you can walk, I’ll let you.’ 31

I stood shakily, and took a couple of steps, before stumbling and falling. He caught me, and smirked, ‘see? You need just a little help, I think.’ 32

‘Whatever.’33

He lifted me up again against him, and I couldn’t help feeling a little silly, like a spoiled child. Luckily, the house we were heading for wasn’t further than a block away, and he took me round back and into a pantry area. He placed me on my feet, and helped me to walk through into a darker area, where two dishevelled beds were placed. Slave quarters. Another slave sat cross-legged on one of the beds, auburn hair falling neatly at either side of his face, skin pale from lack of sunlight. He stood and came across to us, and he couldn’t have been much taller than me really. Five-eight at the most. I was only five-six. I felt like a dwarf next to them both. 34

‘This is Halee,’ Doyle explained. ‘Though I don’t know why he’s here and not cleaning.’35

Halee waved a hand dismissively, and eyed me curiously. A smirk came over his face, and he looked up at Doyle, who grimaced back at him.36

‘Skinny little thing, isn’t he?’ Halee said silkily, settling himself back onto the bed, head cocked slightly to one side. 37

‘He’ll do,’ Doyle growled back, and half-pushed me out of the room into a tiny courtyard. A metal bath was in one corner, and he unscrewed a tap above it to let the water fall into it. Halee appeared with a rag of a towel, and dropped it in my lap as I sat waiting. He was still smirking malevolently, blue eyes glittering with anticipation. Doyle shoved him back inside, and then took me over to the bath. 38

He pealed off the bandage, to reveal a gooey layer of blood and pus, which he wiped aside with a cloth. Underneath, the wound was healing over miraculously well, except for a few broken parts to the scab from where Graven had kicked me.39

‘I think that’ll hold up under water,’ he said, and stood me up as he removed my sweat and urine soaked trousers off of me. It was a relief to be without them, but as I stepped out of the bottoms of them, I felt very bare. He helped me into the lukewarm water, and set about washing my filthy hair first. I squeezed my eyelids shut and tensed up, wrapping my arms around my chest. Blood soaked the water red from Fonda’s blood as he rinsed it out. He washed the rest of my body, and I stayed totally tense as he did so. I let my head slip under the water when he washed the more private parts of me, trying to block it out. He took no prisoners that were for certain. He was going to get me totally clean even if it meant I’d take an axe to him afterwards.40

He pulled me out of the water with a whoosh, and wrapped me in a towel, and then disappeared into the room again. I sat on the edge of the bath and shivered, pulling it tight around me. When it became apparent he wasn’t coming back, I slunk into the room after him. Halee was laid back on one of the beds, smiling to himself. He waved his hand in the direction of a small pile of clothes, and I made for it. I looked back round and he was still watching. With a little disgusted shiver, I let the towel drop and pulled on the clothes as quickly as I could and then sat on the end of the other bed. 41

Doyle came back shortly, and rebandaged my waist, padding the wound first with a softer material. He ran a comb through my hair, and arranged it back into a small ponytail. 42

‘Is he going to go see Julius today?’ Halee asked, examining his nails. 43

‘Yes.’ 44

‘Think he’ll want me there?’ 45

‘No.’46

Doyle’s voice was undertone with a firm growl, and Halee’s voice was purposefully suspicious. I was left wondering what was going on. There was no time to ask however, because a bell overhead rang. 47

‘That’ll be him now,’ Doyle sighed, ‘come on.’ 48

I followed him, trying to stay on my feet as we winded up the stories and into a cavernous, beautifully decorated room. A bedroom. A man was stood at a window, facing away from us. His black hair was cropped shortly, and he had the air of regalness about him. 49

‘Asha, Sir,’ Doyle said softly. 50

The man turned and looked at me over the distance, brow creased as his eyes examined every inch of my body. He was middle-aged but in a better condition than Graven had been, tall, well built, and pallid from living inside. He even had a moustache. 51

‘Is this the slave you bought today, Doyle?’ the man asked in a rich, drawling voice. He eyeballed the older slave with mild interest.52

Doyle nodded, and the man looked back at me. ‘Good, very good, Doyle. Very well, you may sit.’ 53

Doyle backed off, and sat on one of the chairs at the side of the walls, and his eyes burned as he looked deliberately away from me. I swallowed. The master walked up to me, towering above me more so than Doyle had done. ‘How old’re you, boy?’ 54

‘Seventeen.’ 55

‘You look younger.’56

His hand brushed over my chest, and I tensed up again, blinking up at him. He took my chin in a visegrip and bent down to kiss me, his moustache scraping my face. My eyes flew wide, and nails shoved into my palms. And then he was gone, walking back towards the window, ‘he’ll do. You can take him back downstairs now, Doyle.’ 57

The other slave leapt up as if he’d not expected it to end there, and raced over to me and took me quickly from the room like he was scared the master would change his mind.