Vervilk Cascus

"Life is just like a river my boy, sometimes the currents sweep you and all you can do is try not to drown."

## The Life And Trials Of A Slave Boy

Vervilk's life began in a ditch, in one of Katapesh's largest cities as most homeless urchins are born, and it remained his own for a short amount of time before being sold or perhaps being pressed into Slavery from his parents. Either way, the earliest memory he can remember is his thin digits working on a cotton shirt, threading it through with a pinprick needle in a crowded sullied room tainted by grime and filth.

Sporadically the environments and nature of the work they did would change, not by much, children had little to offer when it came to labor but occasionally they made sandals, not shirts and sometimes they were taught things, very basic things. How to count, communicating more effectively, basic words in other languages so they could understand more potential masters. It wasn't like any normal school and their tutors were criminals down to their core most of the time but among the tireless work they were put under. This was the closest they had to a break next to their restless sleeping hours.

He didn't really get any time to bond with anyone, his tongue tended to twist into itself and while many of his owners commented on his young handsomeness despite the squalor they were living in and how high it would bump his price not a lot of them talked. And he never approached any with a conversation topic, not just because he feared them but because he couldn't think of anything to talk about. All he knew was the claustrophobic insides of sweatshops and the lurid desert outside that rained glass onto their bodies and filled their lungs.

The other children for their part did strike up some conversations when they were absolutely sure nobody was looking, but they were more depressing than relieving and Vervilks whip marking occasionally ached when they got away with talking for too long so he cut most chattering himself.

Children were treated a bit better than adults, while the deserted pelted and caused immense pain in the working laborers old enough to truly work at twelve all the way up to fifty or so. The children were placed in wagons usually, very rarely did they have to walk on foot but even a wagon seemed despairful when it was barely lit and filled to the brim with children going shoulder to shoulder with each other. A few injured or sick adults were also put in with them if they weren't deemed incapable of going forward of course.

His identity was fractured hard by these experiences, everything changed but stayed the same in theme, he couldn't create a bond with anybody or anything, except perhaps the desert itself which he hated. Even if he did begin creating a bond, often they would switch masters, not owners since they weren't for sale yet but slave trainers that taught and put them to work. A harsh experience and the only reason he wasn't put down due to his strange lack of physical force was his beauty, and a tiny bit of his intellect, both of which were impressive among the scores of other freedomless youth.

But he aged, indeed he did, and as he did it was only natural for his innate human will to resist and seek freedom to come out. A bit too late as it remained buried underneath slave markings and trauma for a long time yet but it did give him enough will to continue soldiering forth despite the pain. Under hope that perhaps there was indeed a light at the end of the tunnel. As he grew he began to gain more opinions instead of being a blank slate that did its job, hatred towards a group of priests that constantly supported their masters, wearing their golden keys with pride. Many escape attempts had been brutally suppressed by their divine-granted power and he cursed their god every night in secret, he might not have been a part of those escape attempts, but it felt like their failure was his.

Alas, he wouldn't get a true escape attempt. Not from those masters anyhow, instead of as he got old enough to work as a true slave, old enough to be sold at a luxurious price. The entire group moved to Katapesh, the capital, the crown jewel of a country based on slavery. It was an annual trip, although he had never gone to it before and as he finally stepped onto the gallows which they were actioned off on his breath tightened and so did his shoulders.

He waited, among his much stronger peers with far better physical quality while praying that his appearance if nothing else caught the eye of a potential master and indeed something