"Well, what is this thing…it's so small. Is it a dwarf or child, Yuqin?" Master Leifae Arkson asked.
"Master, its a child."
"What needs do I have for a child?" Master Leifae Arkson retorted with annoyance.
"Servants learn best from a young age, Master."
"You don't say? Well, at least you got it for cheap." Master Leifae chuckled. Then he turns to Yuqin, "you did get it for cheap, did you not?"
"Fifty shillings, master."
"Fifty SHILLINGS?!?" the master yells. " You bought this little nothingness for fifty shillings?!?" His face turned a red as a tomato, irate and appalled.
"Yes, master. I saw it as a great investment."
"Investment??" Master Leifae Arkson is panting back and forth. " All those other slave you brought me cost me less the three shillings each and you bought this one for fifty?" He went on berating Yuqin.
"Master has trusted me in my purchase. I believe it still holds true. Master, I'll leave you to retire in your room and I shall take the little one to start his training right away."
*
Yuqin showed me around the ship, all the ins and out of its entirety. How it was layered from wealthy to poor, based on the floor that you were on. He told me I would be sharing quarters with other thralls and how we are to be in uniform, to differentiated us apart from the rest of the thralls on the ship.
I tried my best to pay attention, but my eyes kept wondering for mother. I kept thinking about how she will make her way to me this time.
After a hot dinner of corn, potato soup, and a dipping bread, we all left for our quarters to retire for the night.
I immediately hopped into bed and pretended to sleep. My hope was to get the others to sleep too, so I can wait on mother. But after a long exhausting day, I too fell asleep.
I woke up to my mother's voice. It was still dark and the other thralls were still snoring.
"Mother?" I mumbled.
"Shh, my sweet love. You don't want to wake the others. I will speak and you will listen. Understood?"
I nod my head, yes.
"I will be watching you from afar. I will always be with you but there are too many eyes watching you now. I can't idle by every night, but just know I'm always here. Do you understand me?"
I nod.
"Now, this new master will take us to where we need to go. We have to find safety, away from the plague. Away from people who will use and abuse you. I will keep you safe, where we are going. I promise. I love you, my sweet love."
"I love you too, mother."
"I hear voices." the night guard said from outside our room and quickly opened our door. Mother vanishes out our window, just in time. The three thralls jumped awake by the sudden invasion.
The guards ran up to the window and studied the outside for intruders. "I swear I heard a female voice." one of the guards said.
"You're probably tired and just hearing things. Let's hurry it up so we can catch a snooze."
After they left the room and the others went back to bed, I ran up to the window and peered down. There was only one way up or one way straight down into the cold sea waters. I hope my mother is okay.
I tossed and turned all night. Dreamed about tall pine trees and bright yellow eyes glaring at me. I saw a man, unsheathing a dagger and stabbing me. I woke up in a cold sweat trying to catch my breath.
Night after night, the same dream came, depriving of sleep. Mother hasn't visited in a few days. I wonder if she is still on the ship.
Yuqin barged in through the door. "Bathing time. Follow me."
We all followed Yuqin into a room full of men and women, naked and sponge bathing with buckets of soddy water.
"In here, everyone is equal. You shall learn the ways of the Thralls and act accordingly. Now bath. I will come back for you four, in a half hour."
I take off my clothes and poured a bucket of cold water over me, when suddenly, I felt a tug of my wrist and see Yuqin grabbed as he quickly covered my body with a towel.
"On second thought, I will come back for you three in an hour." He takes me out of the bathing room, preventing others from seeing me.
"You!" He said in a loud whisper, " you are NOT a boy. Why haven't you mentioned this to me? This changes everything, do you understand?"
He brought me to his quarters, "There is where you will bathe from now on and you can keep this quarter for yourself. I will find another. We will have to figure out a brand new agenda for you. You can not utilize that bathing room with the other thralls. Men are cruel to little girls here, but will never bet an eye on an old fat women. I will figure something out for you tomorrow. For now, stay out of sight. Let's hope no one else has seen you. Do you understand?"
I nod as I am reminded of my mother's voice ringing in my ear, "Do you understand?"
After my bath mother came by again. She knocked on my door and I let her in the room. We talked all night about all the amazing things we are seeing on this ship. She sang to me and for the first time in a week, I slept soundly.
I woke up to the beautiful sunshine beaming through the window. Mother was gone, but her scent of sweet spring lavender was left behind on my new bedsheet.
*
Yuqin eventually gave me the tasks of laundering Master Leifae Arkson's clothing and cleaning his personal quarters. Master Leifae Arkson was a tall man full of muscles. He and his men would travel the canals of the untreaded land to the west, and explore to extend their maps. As an explorer he had failed numerous times at finding new inhabitable lands for the King. He was the nephew of King Exoderus III, and next in line for the throne. However, he needed to find new land to earn his place and title before he turned forty, otherwise, by law he would forfeit his title and inheritance. He was now 33, unmarried and always planning the next adventure away from the throne.
For the next six years, I worked behind closed corridors with no one but Yuqin and my mother to keep me company every now and then.
My flower bloomed and I bled for the first time. Luckily, my mother kept me informed of this and when it came, and I was prepared. I am now sixteen year old and puberty is setting in. Most women are married by thirteen, but not I. I always knew my life was different from everyone else.
One night, as I was cleaning out Master Leifae Arkson's quarters, he jolted through the door angrily. I tried to grab what I could and leave, but he was pacing back and forth, talking to himself at the entrance.
"You're thirty-nine! You are going nowhere with your life. No new discoveries. No woman wedded. No children. No kins. You are worthless. That is what everyone is saying about you, Leifae Arkson. YOU ARE NOTHING!! Well, I will show you nothing!! Banish. Banish me they say!! Take away my title and inheritance! Well, I never wanted that stupid throne aways. Banished. How dare they. Those people sitting on their royal arses, never leaving their place, yet they tell me I've made no new discovery for them. Well, you can just go fuck yourself with your tiny little d…"
He finally notices me. My eyes glued to the floor.
"Oi. I know you, right?"
I nod.
"Don't you know how to speak when spoken to?"
I drop the laundry in my hands and fall to my knees, bowing for forgiveness.
"Fecking Thrall doesn't even want to talk to me." he said to himself. He reached down for my collar and pulled me up to look at my face.
"Being a smartass, eh. Let's see how smart you are after this." He pushes me towards his window and lifts me over until my upper body stuck out of the window.
"Not a peep, eh! Still being a smartass, I see. You think you're so much better than me, little boy?"
My body is dangling out the window, ready to drop into the sea if he decides to release me. Just then I heard my mother scream and all the light in Master Leifae Arkson's quarters blew out. Darkness was upon us.
"What was that?" The master pulled me back in and I saw my mother. Cold frost settles into the room and the temperature drops.
She stood in the corner, " How dare you put your hands on my child! You will feel my wrath!" Mother floated to Master Leifae Arkson and placed her hands on his throat.
He drops onto his knees and begins to tugs at his neck. Mother inserts her face into his face.
Then everything began to make sense for me... with mother... she has been dead since London. My mind searched for answers and I began to remember.
She had caught the bubonic plague, so to keep me safe she locked herself in her bedchambers. I picked a bunch of lavender flowers and placed them at the foot of her door, to disguise the smell. It was then that she had died.
Yet, she kept her promise to protect me and she led me all this way to save me.
"Mother! Please stop!" I yelled. Mother turned to face me towards me.
"My sweet love, he will use you. He will cause you pain."
"Mother, please. If you kill him, I will be in a really bad place. Who knows what they will do to me."
Mother released master Leifae Arkson's throat. "So be it. I will let you decide your fate with destiny. Only you can shape who you need to become."
I started to cry. "Mother, you've been dead this whole time? Why didn't you tell me?"
"My sweet sweet love. I didn't need to tell you because you've always known. You had to stop the denial to believe. You have always had the special abilities to see those who have passed on. At times you get glimpse of the future. You knew I was dying and you brought me flowers. You saw the doctor who died from the plague in the corridors of London. You have abilities others will take advantage of." She floated towards me. "Love, since your eyes are now opened, you've chosen your destiny, I can no longer intervene with your choice. I will always love you and I will always be watching you. Goodbye, my sweet love."
"What?" I nearly said before mother's soul dissipates in thin air and I cry, wailing my pain away with her.
Yuqin comes crashing through the door fully armed with machetes. "Master!!What has she done to you?"
Master Leifae Arkson is coughing and trying to regain his strength. "She? The boy is a girl?"
"That is what I said, Master. Are you alright. Did she do something to you?"