A Sendoh ficcie! I don't know exactly what I'm doing, but I seem to be writing a fic for every ace from every school. *shrugs shoulders* Oh well. One a crazy girl, always a crazy girl. Anyway, this was a request from ice .. um, with some numbers at the back. Sorry! I have a terrible memory! I hope you'll like this!
Slave trade was a popular business in the region of Horgo. It was the only trade that brought in more than half-a-million a year. The Horgo slave system, however, were slightly different.
Only women were sold off as slaves. Another stark difference would be the fact that the power of the transferring between masters was up to the women themselves. The slaves determined the choice of new masters and the price to pay. They would receive half of the payment.
The slaves would, of course, do what their masters wanted them to do, but should the masters cross the boundary, which was set earlier, then the slaves could – and would – physically harm them in their own personal ways.
In a way, a slave wasn't exactly a slave, but more of a property. One that could fight back and defend herself when the need approaches, but otherwise serves dutifully. The namesake was just for convenience.
So it was that on one chilly night, Master Inando burst into a busy tavern, with a dozen or so slaves trailing behind him. "I've got wenches for sale," he yelled drunkenly. "Who wants 'em?"
The crowd in the tavern turned their attentions on him. "Whatcha got?" someone yelled out.
"Plenty," Master Inando grinned. "Take your pick."
Porka had seated herself at the farthest end of the room, drowsily staring at the flickering colours in front of her eyes as one by one, the slaves paraded themselves to appreciative onlookers. She yawned once.
"It's no wonder nobody ever buys you," her friend, Kuran slipped up beside her with a drink in hand, a free one from a generous man near the bar. She gave him a wink, which pleased him enormously and turned back her attentions to Porka. "I thought it was just because you're flat-chested, but now I know it's also because you hide yourself."
"I'm not hiding," Porka muttered. "And I'm not flat-chested."
Kuran smirked, giving a pointed look at Porka's chest. "Whatever you say."
Somewhere near the centre of the room, one of the slaves, Ayashi, had just gotten herself a new master, for the price of five hundred. Porka had always hated her, and when Ayashi turned to deliver a smug look, Porka hissed in fury.
"Hmm," Kuran murmured. "Five hundred. Not bad."
Porka snorted. "At least she'll be out of my face from now on. I hope her master works her to death."
"Nah," Kuran shook the notion away. "You know Ayashi sets outrageous boundaries between her and her master. I think he's up for a bad time."
"He's the stupid one for buying her," Porka shrugged.
Suddenly, somebody in the room called out for Kuran. In response, Kuran stood up with a flirty smile and cooed: "I'm Kuran. Who's interested in buying me?" She located her potential new master, and squeezed Porka. "Gosh, he's cute. Bye now. I have business to attend to."
For reasons she didn't know, Porka stared at Kuran's back sourly and with not a little jealousy. Looking down at her nonexistent assets on her chest, she fervently wished she were as busty as Kuran at the very least. Then she would be able to rake in a higher price for herself. For the moment, the highest amount offered for her had been three hundred – and three hundred seemed insultingly little to the five hundred Ayashi had gotten.
"O chest, when wilt thou grow?" she sighed to herself, pouring in another glass of wine. "I hate Master Inando, and I want to go." She took a deep gulp, slammed the glass down and stared at the entrance wistfully, her brain conjuring imaginary pictures of herself with a chest big enough to rival Ayashi's.
Then the flap of the entrance swung open and a tall, young man stepped in. Porka shamelessly stared at him, appreciating the view. His hairstyle was slightly peculiar, standing up high over his head like a crown. His face was finely angled, his nose sharp and shapely and his lips inviting. His eyes, however, were furious and searching, his blue corneas darting here and there across the room.
He was, simply put, very attractive, and Porka was thankful for the distraction.
His eyes met hers and held for a moment. Porka distinctively heard her lungs screaming for oxygen as she stopped breathing. But after the brief moment passed, his eyes darted away again, uninterested and unaffected by emotions like she was.
Porka felt a little insulted by that.
Then his eyes narrowed sharply and he strode through the room, the crowd parting a way for him at the look on his face. He stopped in front of a visibly pale adolescent who looked amazingly like him, only more boyishly.
Brothers, Porka concluded.
The older one didn't speak, only stood straight like a soldier, staring at his younger brother with hard, agate eyes. The boy, trying to face his brother's wrath manfully, stuck out his chin. He was shaking terribly, however.
Porka guessed that the boy was fourteen and happened to be in a place that he wasn't supposed to be in. And his brother had come to fix that.
"Stables," the older one said dangerously. "Two months."
The boy winced. "It's my birthday!" he yelled out defensively. "You said I could do whatever I wanted!"
"I didn't say you could drink yourself to insensibility."
The man handling the bar let out a loud chuckle. "Calm yourself down, Sendoh," he chortled. "I served Aki there nothing but plain tea."
Aki looked startled. "You said it was ale!"
The man shrugged. "Do I look stupid enough to give you ale and have your brother after my head?? Sorry, boy." He laughed again when Aki sulked. "He's desperate to be a man, Sendoh."
Sendoh's eyes softened a bit, and he seemed to have trouble maintaining the stern pose. He managed one last bit of scolding, though. "If you ever do this again, Aki, I'll make sure you won't live long enough to become a man."
Aki sulked all the more. "My life is so boring!"
The bar man sent him an amused look. "That's not our fault, boy. Hey, Sendoh, the man, Inando, here got some slaves for sale. You needing one?"
Porka's ears perked up at that. Her excitement quickly dissolved when Sendoh shook his head. "No, I don't." He looked at Aki, and in a gesture that was meant to be a peace offering, he ruffled his brother's hair. Aki frowned at the childish gesture, and snapped: "I'm not a baby! Don't touch my hair!"
The entire tavern burst into laughter. "He sounds just like you, Sendoh!"
Aki looked even more furious as his brother, now in good humour, laughed along with the others. Everybody was always laughing at him. It wasn't fair! "I want a slave!" he declared rebelliously.
Sendoh raised an eyebrow. "Whatever for? You've already got three."
"Well, I want another one! The ones at home are old. I want young ones."
"And what," Sendoh asked calmly, "do you intend to do with them?"
"I want to sleep with them!"
There was a shocked silence, and once again, the place rocked with laughter. One man laughed really loud and yelled across the room, "He must've gotten that from you, Sendoh! He's learning fast!"
Sendoh ignored that and looked at his brother with twinkling eyes. "And I suppose you know how to do that?"
Aki didn't understand what was so funny. He'd only said it because it was what mature men do. "I'll learn," he said lamely, his face contorting in fury as the crowd laughed even harder. "It shouldn't be all that hard."
Everybody was now pounding his or her fists on the table with mirth. Some were even rolling on the floor in laughter. Sendoh painfully kept a straight face. "Are you sure, Aki?" he asked gravely, even though his eyes were clearly dancing.
"Of course I'm sure!" Aki replied unthinkingly. "I'm always sure!"
Sendoh made a wry face. "I wish," he murmured, and then straightened. "All right. I'll get you one. Consider it a birthday present if you like."
Aki glowed in satisfaction. There! At last, his brother had listened and complied with his orders! He stood up and scanned the faces of the slaves who were looking eagerly at him.
Porka had been amused by the exchange between the siblings, and was genuinely surprised at the brimming hope that the brothers would buy her. It would be nice to be under the same roof with the elder one, she mused, although of course, the younger one, Aki, would be entertaining company. Aki was clearly a few years younger than she was, and she decided not to take his claim earlier on about sleeping with a slave seriously. For all she knew, the boy probably didn't even realise what 'sleeping' in that context suggests.
Aki was looking at her now, and naughtily, just for the fun of it, she winked at him. Aki blushed. He looked at his older brother who was helping himself to some cakes on the table. "That one."
Sendoh stopped his contemplation of reaching for a cake beckoning him on the table and turned to look. His eyebrows arched. "She's young," he said flatly. "She wouldn't be any help around the house. Besides, she's flat chested."
That term seemed to crop up rather often nowadays, Porka thought bitterly, controlling her temper and acting as if she hadn't heard anything.
Aki was sulking again. "But you said I could –"
Sendoh sighed. "Right, right." He looked at Porka. "What can you do?"
I can strangle people like you with amazing skill and poison your food in ways you can't even begin to think of. "I can play instruments and sing and dance. I can do most housework, I can brew nice wine and I can do heavy jobs like carrying buckets of water and such." They were mostly lies, but Porka thought he didn't have to know it. "And I can ride a horse as well as anybody."
Sendoh still looked dubious. However, a look from an enraged Aki changed that. "All right," he said, rather grudgingly with a slight twinge of helplessness. "Name me your price."
"Five hundred," Porka stated firmly. "And another hundred for calling me flat chested." She smiled sweetly.
Sendoh stared at her in disbelief. "But you are flat chested."
"That doesn't change anything. Six hundred, take it or leave it."
The look on his face was indescribable.