A small pickpocket slipped from shadow to shadow, a struggling woman sold her body, calling out to any man who looked like they could pay. The heat didn’t stop people crouching around a small crate gambling on some card game or even fighting out their differences. In a merchants house sat a woman, her hair red laid in knots around her feet, her eyes which used to hold the colour of polished green garnets now held an exhausted green. She wore a simple grey band around her chest and a simple pair short breaches, the women remembered when she used to do anything to wear something like this now she wanted nothing more than to cover up. To add to this the woman wore a large leather collar that had attached to it a large metal chain that was fastened to a stone brick wall.
Naomi watched the free world through a glass pane, she was always watching through that pane. Her slightly bruised fingers reached out towards the window, she knew she couldn’t reach the glass with just an extended arm; Naomi began to pull against the chain. The leather choker began to choke her just as her fingertip brushed against the window, falling back with a gasp, she began to pray, murmuring breathlessly to her goddess, Nikali.
“Oh beloved Nikali… goddess of Slavery, lust and addiction… I beg you to aid me, fill me… make this life as what I am, easier… allow me to feel the joy of helping people as I once did…”
Naomi’s voice trailed off as she heard the doors open quietly, slowly rolling her head to the side, she saw Farard, he was a mouse kelvic that had grown up here. Smiling sweetly Farard placed a tray down on the dusty floor.
“Come on… Star eyes… you need to eat”
Naomi laid with her hands placed randomly above her head, blinking she shook her head, turning her head back to the window, Naomi touched the collar around her neck… Star eyes… the ‘master’ had begun calling her that after her first day here, even though he had never heard her voice, he used to say ‘You must have a fire within you… I can’t wait to break it.’
Her eyes began to sting and before she could hold them back tears began to slide through the dirt leaving a small line of pale white skin. Oh how he broke it, clenching her fists in rage she remembered the punishment if she uttered a single word she would be chained in the slavers building for their free use… After her first night in this accursed place, that’s when she first began to worship Nikali, Naomi had heard, from men standing outside her window watching her write down her prays, that only those with no hope left in this world prayed to her, maybe she didn’t have hope or a choice anymore, maybe that’s why she began to pray.
As the last of the tears dried on her face Naomi began to listen to the sounds of laughter, the flirting… She considered this the worst punishment, to hear the outside, to see the outside but never to touch it, to feel it or smell it. As she sat in silence, she often thought she could hear the opinionated neighs of her sider Fire Runner in the wind, or hear the laughs of her twin, her father. She often saw the faces of her past in her troubled sleep, it was either that or her much awaited death. The day she would be free of this terrible place…
Naomi had stopped dreaming she would be free along while ago, however as the mouse slowly walked up and pulled four more links of chain through the lope before tying it back she began to wonder what it would be like again, to run out of the chaotic city and into the wilderness to where she was sure her strider had followed, to ride away into the distance. Looking up at the fellow slave, her eyes began to sting as she began to cry again.
“So that’s where the stars went”
With that Farard left, watching as the door clicked shut, Naomi hastily sat back up with her arm outstretched reaching for the window, with a few shuffles forward she placed her palm on the glass… Feeling one step closer to the outside world as she did so.
