Chapter 4 – One in the Ranks
Chalchiuitl looked at the different people she saw, the priests, the warriors, the tradesman, the craftsmen, the peasants, and the people like hersel -no not like herself, she was now free, a peasant, no longer a slave.
The priests were the second-to-top class in the seven classes of her people. Topped only by the rulers and the other nobles. The rulers were the ones who ran the empire and made all the really important decisions, but you don't see them much.
The priests you see much more often because they perform sacrifices ten or more times daily on top of the pyramids. But they do other things as well, like run schools (even if they are only for boys ) and they are the most educated of everyone. They also get to tell warriors what to do.
Boys are lucky because they can go into battle ad earn the warrior class by fighting their best. After you are a warrior you fight in battle still, but now you can tie your cloak differently and you take your orders directly from the ruler or priests!
Chalchiuitl remembered the market place she had visited only the two days before. The sellers had been rich tradesmen, but most of their money goes to building a better empire so they don't stay rich long.
Chalchiuitl looked up from the street and her thoughts to see a tradesman go to a workplace door, most likely to buy new things to trade in the next city he went to. The craftsman had the mark of the jewel guild on his workplace door so her guess had to be true.
She was now on Crafter Street, the road lined with workplaces. Each workplace had a symbol telling what guild the crafter inside was; she passed one with a house builder guild symbol and another with stone symbol.
"Now please understand, Johnny, that this is not the exact translation. Most likely they did not have a name for streets, but I have modified the version so that you may understand it with the least of explanation." Rupert pushed his glasses up his nose and started to read once more.
She turned the corner and went out the walls to the peasant's fields, these were her people now, she could now vote for her ruler, and own land, and she could even participate in the important religious ceremonies. As a slave she was in the class of prisoners of war, criminals, or vile debtors.
She had not been treated badly, par say, and she always had the hope of buying freedom, which she eventually did. But still she hadn't been free, and that had always plagued her, she had seen mothers give birth to free children, though dirt poor, and envied them. She had heard tales of the master dying and the slave being freed and longed for it. Unfortunately she had also seen a slave run away and seen the master give gruesome chase, and the beating the slave got afterwards. And so she worked for her freedom till the last day.