(POV: No name)
"Hurry the fuck up elf."
Deep pain spreads through my stomach as the slaver kicks and insults me to get in pace with the rest of the line. Staggering, I get back in line.
Every single one of us is a kid, marching through the land for who knows how long.
I have gone too long without water, the skin inside my mouth is starting to peel off and I start to tremble each time I pick my nose. A pathetic sight, truly.
Placing one foot in front of the other is all I have to do.
I can hear the dry thumps of bodies hitting the floor behind me, followed by some slavers yelling at each other.
On foot, in front of the other.
Probably a couple of hours had gone by now. I'm starting to feel like the only thing that made me move me is the whip that somehow manages to urge for another push.
I can feel the air all the way to my throat.
Even blinking has started to become annoying, my dry eyelids rub like sandpaper against my eyeball.
. . .in front of the other.
"Name?"
I lift my head. Is someone talking to me?
"Your bloody name, elf. I don't have all day and we are only halfway through."
Only then I could I appreciate what is in front of me. The mountains. We were really here We finally arrived. A big wooden fence guarded a fortress that placed itself between two hills and a feeling of death crawling up my spine was being replaced by something else. Hope?
*Slap*
"Wake the fuck up! Your name!"
Nah, it was resignation.
"I. . .dont have a name."
"The fuck you mean you don't have a name?"
I bite my lower lip so hard it hurts, hoping the pain would alleviate the grief of past events.
"I was taken before I could enter the baptism, a celebration where we are granted our name."
"Damn leaf ears and their traditions. Welp, your name from now on is Jack, since you got jack shit. "
The man in front of me puts a label in my clothing that reads "JACK"
"Now get."
My feet no longer get up, they drag instead. Little distance from that first man, a second one grabs me by the shoulder
"Take this" He pushes a canteen, a full one at that against my chest "You look like a raisin. If you don't wanna die, drink"
With shaky hands I unplug the canteen, water falls from the mouth of the bottle to my mouth, wetting my shirt until it reached my lips.
Is this what it feels to be alive, I wonder? To be near death only to come back.
After drinking for so long I gasped for air, the world was a different colour. It was no longer the muddy grey it was before. It was still shit, but I can feel the blood flowing through me once again.
"Your tent is the one at the far end of the camp, the one in the corner to your right. Go"
If meat could feel something when it is being chopped, would it feel like this?
Looking around me, it wouldn't be any different than meat being processed. To my left, there are two lines of kids, one for girls and the other for boys, with each one being inspected by some uncle.
To my right is line of tents, each one big enough to fit eight of us children. and in the center lies a stone- walled building where big adults go in and out without end like ants in a mound. Some are dressed normally and others carry carbines strapped to their shoulders.
The tent at the end, huh?
I stand in front of it, waiting for someone to pull me out of this horrible dream.
No one comes.
My hand brushes aside the curtain covering the entrance and little holes on the roof filter rays of light that shower the tent, like if it was hope penetrating the darkness, and in the middle of it is a single boy
He had long blond hair, holding a book with both hands, so concentrated on the yellowish pages that he hasn't noticed me yet. My gaze rests on him and my mouth couldn't keep itself shut.
He looks like a saint on one of those stories Mother used to tell me before bed.
I try to approach him as quietly as I could
But then, my left foot kicks a rock that topples a metal bucket on its trajectory.
The boy snaps his head up and finally notices me.
He closes the book on his hand, shuts his eyes and smiles.
He slowly gets up, dusts himself off, opens his eyes and starts walking towards the paralysed me.
I am still thunderstruck by the time he raises his arm and opens his hand "My name is Bolwen, Bolwen Fayes. What's yours?"
He closes his eyes and smiles. snaps close the book on his head and slowly gets up.
He opens his eyes and begins walking towards the paralyzed me.
"Nice to meet you, my name is Bolwen, Bolwen Fayes"