Feathers: Hi people! What cha doin?
Felix: What kind of question is that? what does it look like there doing?
Rin: Why so sullin, Felix?
Felix: hump!
Jena: Ignore the fox, (Rolling of eyes) he's just grumpy to day.
Love, Truth, and Loyalty-
Chapter One
Once upon a time I was the daughter of a wealthy trader who was very successful. But, as is seen so often in life, all good things must come to an end. So, as you may have guest, there was a time when we could no longer afford to live the way we were accustomed.
Unknown to me, for I was very young then, father was about to loose the business because we (the Talmarines) were at war again with the Narnians and the army had bought all the supplies from Father at war time price, which I know now to be three-fourths the average.
I still remember that day.
When Father came home with a worried look on his face and ushered Mama into the bedroom to talk, I didn't know what was going on, but decided to listen at the door. I stood there with my ear pressed to the door, but all I could hear was urgent whispers. I gave up after a moment and decided to set the table for dinner.
Dinner its self was a quiet affair which was normal since my sisters and I had been raised to be "seen but not heard". I'd say that was quite an achievement with six girls ranging from three to eleven, but back then it was a common sight. Nowadays children are allowed to run wild in the streets, carefree and unattended, but that's for another time.
Shortly after dinner, Father left again on some errand or other while we were tucked into bed and Mama told us a bed time story. I could tell her heart wasn't in it though, she seamed waited down. Whatever Father had said couldn't have been that bad.
Could it?
That was the last thing on my mind as I slid into sleep. I don't think I slept much though because next thing I knew, Father was shaking me awake with a finger to his lips. It wasn't an hour past dawn yet and I wondered what was going on. I opened my mouth to ask but Sara, my eleven-year-old sister, shushed me. When I gave her a questioning look she just shrugged like she didn't know any more than I did.
Megan, the youngest, came over and grabbed hold of my hand. I looked down to see her sucking on her thumb and her stuffed bunny firmly held in the in the crook of her elbow. Ella (eight) came up and grabbed my other hand and we fallowed Father down the hall to the room at the front of the house. In the doorway stood a short, grubby man in wrinkled cloths.
I didn't like him one bit.
He was the sort of man Mama would warn us against approaching, especially at night. Father, oblivious to our wary dislike, took Rebecca's (5) and Alexis' (9) hands and pulled them towards the door. We fallowed.
The man stepped aside to let us out the door. In the street stood a string of scraggily, young boys and girls all with there hands in chains and eyes to the ground. Father led us over to them and the dirty man grabbed Sara's arm and shackled her to the line. He quickly did the same to Alexis and Ella.
I was well and truly scared now. "Father, what is happening?" I asked as the man dragged me over and added me to the end of the line.
He did not say a word as the man locked Rebecca and Megan into place behind me. I stared at him in confusion. "Father, what is happening?" I asked again. He gave me such a cold and uncaring look that I shrank away from him, but could not look away until the man kicked me so I stumbled and had to look forward.
We didn't have far to walk, just to the cities holding pens. For three days I held on the hope that this wasn't happening, that it was all a dream. Some cruel nightmare my imagination had conjured up. We didn't see anyone in those three days, our food was slipped under the door on trays.
That is, if you could call it food. It was some kind of porridge the color of mortar and just as hard and tasteless.
On the third day someone did open the door. At the creaking of the hinges we looked up, hope on every face. In stepped….. "Mama" I cried and was about to get up when I saw them. Encircling her wrists were shackles and covering her face was the burse the shape of a large man's hand. The indentation of the ring on Mama's cheek made it unmistakably Fathers print.
That was when I realized that this was not a dream. I was not going to wake up. My Father had sold us, his family who he had supposedly loved, into slavery.
On that day, my seventh birthday, I learned my first lesson of many I would need to survive in the unforgiving clutches of the slave trade.
Trust No One
So... what do you think? let me know by sending me a review, please (begging on bended knees)