The slave pens were empty save for me. I sat in the corner nearest the trough where food was the warmest and newest or at least, where it stank the least. I wasn’t sure what it was except that it quieted the gnawing monster in my belly. Didn’t know how I’d gotten here, I just woke up from dreams of dying, in this pen with its slotted rails, matted rush floors and back of the throat gagging stench. Watched with dull eyes the parade of people, creatures and things that stared at me through the bars, inspecting the merchandise and understood finally, that I was the merchandise. The same gray twilight was here, along with a trough carved out of some yellow rock as hard as concrete that started near the gate and ran the length of the room. It was more like a feedlot alley and sometimes, I could hear what sounded like other animals eating at the other end of the trough. It was warmer here, but still cold. I shivered constantly, just couldn’t seem to get warm enough, not even the warmed up food could melt the ice inside me.
I had no way to tell night from day or how many days had passed. My thoughts wandered aimlessly, there were blank periods in my recollections when I didn’t even know who I was, where I was or what I was. I didn’t see anyone. Or anything. I think if I could have found something sharp, I would have cut my wrists for the boredom.
Gorillas came. They looked like gorillas. Short, squat hairy men wearing boxer shorts of leather and a harness from which hung a short black stick reminiscent of a cop’s baton and a hammer made of wood and shaped like a short club. A leather whip lay curled on their right hip. Their skin was gray and wrinkled giving their faces the appearance of a sad basset hound, oozing an oily substance that smelled bitter but didn’t stink. The hair on their body was concentrated on their arms, belly, back and none on their heads. Their eyebrows were one solid line, lips were ashy purple and moist, deep-set chocolate brown eyes under a prominent ridge. When they smiled, their teeth looked human enough except for four large canines. The tongue was short, shaped more like a Down’s syndrome child. They were ugly.
The language they spoke, I could not understand, the language of the stick was universal, the leader stuck it into my chest and pushed me back from the gate. It felt like heartburn first and then escalated to a fire in my chest so that I thought I was having a heart attack.
I scooted back from them, my hands pushing at the stick but that earned me another poke from the second one. In the balls. I flopped in agony, unable to breath and could only make noises like a dying kitten. They laughed and bent down to flip me over, dragging me back and forth by my ankles and shoving the stick into me until I was a twitching thing on the floor half insane and begging for death.
***
Lying on the bottom of a cage buried in old straw. Musty and rank. It hurt to breathe, hurt worse to cough but I couldn’t keep them in. I coughed. Sparks flickered across my vision. I tried to sit up and my body flopped, pushed off with one arm and shoulder. Could not straighten up all the way, something wasn’t right with the left side of my ribs. I could only take shallow sips of air.
Dully, I held onto the bars of the cage and watched the scenery roll by. My hands held hollow reeds that kept me in, and I thought if I tried really hard, I should be able to break what was essentially bamboo. As soon as I shook the pole, the stick came down on my hands smacking hard enough to break fingers.
People rode by on strange animals and in wagons glancing curiously back at me. I saw gorillas riding giant black dogs with red points above their eyes and ears, driving carts pulled by creatures like oxen only colored blood purple on a road straight out of a violent video game.
I shivered. Even here, under a blazing red sun that burned down on the travelers, I was cold. I looked down at myself. Saw skin that was pock-marked black, blue, green and yellow, red with sores and bloody scrapes. Welts and swollen flesh covered with mud, dirt and filth so that I was no longer skin colored but a road map of torture. My last clothes were gone, not even a rag covered me. Laboriously, I climbed onto my knees to my feet and smacked my head on the cage roof bringing a snort of laughter from one of the outriders. He leaned over and stuck me with the wooden baton, hitting me to the right side of my belly, just below a scar. I screamed as pain filled me, knocked me off my feet to bounce against the green bars and into the mats below me. He stuck me again and again until I vomited blood and passed out.
***
I could barely stand. The slavers wrapped white linen around my wrists and to the top of the stanchion so that I was stretched to tiptoes, every muscle, bone, scrape and sore exposed to the crowd’s pleasure and view. I could not see, my face was smashed against my arms and I was struggling to breathe, with my chest so extended, it was nearly impossible to lift it for exhalations.
There was a weird buzzing in my ears, I wasn’t sure if I heard or imagined it. I blinked, rubbed my face against my arms and swiveled to try and take in some slice of view as to where I was.
A row of stakes led away from me and other figures were tied or chained to them. Some were female and naked, customers explored the flesh with hands and paws, sticks and whips, checked teeth for age and experience. Currency and gold exchanged hands and the purchases were carted off to be replaced by the next body. Through it all, I watched dully, sagging lower until all that held me up were the ties at my wrists. The arrival of the last customer brought an excited murmur to the crowds. A palanquin entered the marketplace to disgorge a man dressed in dark robes of silk that glimmered as if lit from within. Tall and broad shouldered, he moved like a warrior. When he threw back the hood of his cape, the entire crowded assembly sucked in their breath in an audible gasp. He was nearly human, save for a strange distortion of his face and clearly someone or something of which the merchants were afraid. No one bid against him and he merely pointed to those he wanted to purchase.
He came to stand before me, lifted an ebony cane and placed it under my chin to shove my head up off my chest. Extending his arm, he reached out a finger tipped with a filed nail covered with a silver tip. Stuck it into my neck and drew a bead of blood to the auctioneer’s protests. The tiny pinch roused me and I stared back defiantly into his gray eyes. He smiled.
“Serve me and I will let you live, boy,” he said. “You’re dying.Without my aid, you will be gone in another day or two.”
“I’m already dead,” I mumbled. “This is hell.”
“You think so. You’re a slave, serve me willingly and I can free you from pain.”
“I am a free man,” I sobbed. “I serve no one!” He cut me loose and I fell to my knees, bowing my head to the floor before him.
“You are a slave, mine to do what I will, mine to break, to use, to abuse, to maim, torture or kill. How painful your life will be depends on how well you obey me,” he repeated gently.
I raised my arms, stiff from hanging overhead for hours and tried to hit him. He took the whip from the slaver and introduced me to ten of his more gentle reasonings. He called his whippings that. He could flay the skin off your back or just raise the faintest welt.
Ten could cause you great anguish and fifteen could kill. I took twenty-five before he broke me, twenty kisses of respect and five lashes of death before I called him Master and never looked up at his face again. He said I spent months hovering between life and death and only his healing skills kept me from dying.
He renamed me, calling me Corbel, the Blackbird, dressed me all in shadow and smoke. Made me sleep at the foot of his bed on the floor. I was his slave, his pet and plaything, sent out to kill those he disliked, steal for him, rape, torture, whatever he commanded, I did and obeyed. Yet, he never touched me other than with the whip or cane.
His name was Lucian Webster, a Magister and merchant, a dealer in death and wars. His influence ran through several shadows and he was forever entertaining visitors from other realms. On those instances, he kept me close but had me wear a mask over my face that resembled a black crow. Once he placed it on my flesh, it melted into it so that it could not be removed until he removed it. It felt weird, as if a veil was between me and the rest of the world.
The gorilla guards were his, hired from a distant shade and regularly brought exotic merchandise. I, he told me once, was a special order he had been asked to purchase and keep safe for an old friend and acquaintance.
I coughed and shifted on the floor, rubbed at my chest surreptitiously. If I showed too much discomfort, it irritated my master and brought out another training session. Still, I could hardly hold them back, my lungs were weak and gave me much trouble, especially in damp, smoky conditions.
He made an annoyed sound. Said, “Corbel, come here, Blackbird.”
I leapt to my feet, crawled forward towards him and knelt before his countenance.
“Master,” I whispered, choking back another cough.
“Open your mouth,” he demanded. I shivered and did so. Screamed once and cut it off as he stuck his cane down my throat. It burned as it hit my lungs and I flopped like a gaffed fish until he stepped on me and held me still. “You have pneumonia and scarred lungs,” he grunted. “Hmm. Unless I do something, you’ll be no use to me. You’ll be dead.” He pulled the thing out. Gagging, I fell over and scrambled up but he fluttered his hand to push me away. Went to his desk and pulled out a silver tube that he unrolled revealing a small vial of clear liquid in a syringe. This, he placed against my neck and pushed. It stung and a rush of heat went up into my face and down my chest. I remained still, afraid of what he had done, but knew better than to question him. “Go to your corner and rest, Blackbird,” he ordered. “The treatment will make you very ill and I prefer not to have you puking all over me. Be quiet and do not lay on your back lest you vomit and aspirate, drowning yourself in your own puke.”
“Master,” I whispered and retreated. Before I could reach my corner, I was violently ill. Trying to puke and make no noise was nearly as bad as the act itself. I threw up so many times during the night that my ribs and stomach muscles cramped in agony. I got no sleep nor comfort and in the morning was required to perform my duties as if nothing had afflicted me.