CAPTURED AND ENSLAVED.

Chapter: 4.

*****

 

The smell of blood mixed with sweat, filled Andreios's nostrils making him snap his eyes open to a very strong blinding darkness.

Or was he dead?

His head was in a jumbled mess. Too many emotions rushed through him, making his head spin. Andreios's head throbbed with his racing heart. He had no memory at all of where he was, what had happened, or why he felt a burning pain all over. A flash of light passed through him so fast that he thought he had imagined it. In his confused state, Andrieos noticed that whatever it is that he was in, was actually moving. He could also feel a presence and somehow he knew he wasn't alone. Even in the blinding darkness, Andreios could feel eyes filled with despair staring at him. Like they knew who he was or why he was there. While he was trying desperately to remember.

His memories flitting. 

Somehow Andreios could feel their heavy breathing like it was being forced right out of their bodies. 

They were sad.

Andreios had no idea if he really was with anyone or if he had just imagined it all in his head so he didn't freak out more. 

But one thing was certain. Eyes are staring at him.

A strand of warm sweat ran down his forehead and he tried to swat it off, but for the first time since he had opened his eyes, Andreios realized that his hands were bundled together above his head and joined with his feet. He tried shaking his hands off but the grip of the chains was so strong that Andreios winced in pain. 

Andreios stopped struggling as sharp pains jabbed through his entire body. It felt as if he had just been laid out on a slaughtering table while sharp knives were stabbed into every part of his body. 

The pain was excruciating.

His heart running a mile a second and his head throbbed uncontrollably as his eyes watered from it.

Andreios felt as if he was burning from the inside out. Just when he thought he couldn't take it anymore, memory's started flying back in a fast painful rush, so intense that he shuddered from it. 

His wife and children. 

Their death played in his inner mind repeatedly. His breathings became rugged and he wailed bitterly. Every physical pain he felt was completely gone, giving Way to an emotional pain that was threatening to tear his heart into shreds. 

For a brief second there Andreios had actually wanted that, he had looked down to his chest to be sure he wouldn't find his innards spilling from within him along with a pool of his blood. 

Andreios choked on a sob. 

Gouria was his name. Andreios had thought the man had killed him. Why leave him to suffer this way? Not without his family. Andreios thought he heard a strangled cry, but soon realized he had made the sound. His eyes tearing up so bad that he wished for nothing more than for death to come to claim him. 

Give him peace of mind and his family.

*********

"We thought you had died." A soft voice spoke from around. Andreios turned his head to the right to see if he could get a glimpse of who it was that had spoken, but the darkness was strong, so much that Andreios felt as if he was blind.

Maybe he was blind. 

Maybe Gouria had blinded him.

How can a place be this dark?

Andreios wondered and waited for the voice to speak again, but nothing happened. A forced smile split his lips painfully. 

Maybe he's gone mad.

There is no one with him.

"You had so much blood on your head and you have been sleeping for days." 

This time Andreios was sure it was another who has spoken, an older voice. He blinked in the darkness. How were they able to see him? When he himself could see nothing.

"Do you feel alright?" Another asked. This time the voice belonged to a male.

How many people were there? 

Where are they taking them?

"Who are you, people?" Andreios asked, his voice sounding strange even to his own hearing.

He waited to see if they'd reply.

He waited but none came.

This isn't real, there is no one else here. 

Andreios was going to accept his fate that he had finally gone mad or maybe even dead somewhere in hell and his mind playing tricks on him.

"We are slaves." Another voiced and hesitated, more like they were pondering their next word. "Well, most of us." He concluded.

"I am not a slave! I'm a free man. My family was--," Andreios's voice broke off into a silent sob at the information he was about to let slip out from his mouth.

"We know." A lady answered. Her voice is very close to him. Andreios felt something brush against his arm and he turned to find the lady beside him. He had no idea what she looked like due to the darkness.

"Can you see me?" He had to ask, to be sure he wasn't blind.

"No, I can't. But when the carriage stops and the doors open either to throw water at us or drop crumbs of bread for whoever could reach with their feet or hands to eat and sometimes they take out the dead bodies amongst us, so this horrid smell wouldn't kill us all. Then would we be able to look around us and know where everyone is and what they looked like, we never communicate one with another once the doors are opened, those men can be very mean."

"That's a lot of information you just laid out for me." Andreios smiled despite himself.

"Well, if we are going to be slave partners working together then I might as well let you in on everything." The lady nudged him by the arm and Andreios forced a smile.

"I'm Andreios." 

"Elena, what happened to you? You looked terrible when I last saw you, all bloody. We seriously thought you'd died." 

"My village got attacked and--." Andreios couldn't bring himself to continue.

"It's OK, you don't have to talk about it." Elena sounded concerned.

"Thanks." Andreios blinked tears off his eyes.

"Any other thing you wish to know?" 

"About where we are going?" Andreios asked.

"Well, we have no idea. Not until we get there anyway." 

"What happens after?" Andreios had never been a slave before. He had no idea how any of these things worked. 

"We either get sold or left at someplace as farmers or as sex slaves or even worst, killed or deformed." A feeling of apprehensiveness lingered in Elena's words.

"Killed. Deformed. Why?" Fear struck Andreios as a knife and he bit his swollen lips.

"If you're neither bought nor sold and perhaps too weak to work, then I'm afraid there is no other purpose for you." Elena's voice cracked as she spoke.

"That is wickedness!" Andreios immediately regretted saying that the moment a harsh pain stabbed him square in the heart and he cringed from it.

"What's wrong?" Elena asked and the voice sounded so loud that it hurt his hearing. "Andreios..." She whispered this time.

"I'm fine, just a little pain." Andreios breathed out with difficulty.

"Try and get some sleep. I promise I'll wake you up once the carriage stops so you can see everyone that has spoken to you earlier, and me...too." She smiled.

Andreios smiled and prodded her gently with his foot. "Thanks, Elena." He whispered appreciatively. He wouldn't want to appear hostile even if he wasn't in the right mind for jokes and laughter but she has been nice and answered his questions. Once she had replied with a “welcome” sleep soon claimed him. He knew now what Gouria had done. The man had knocked him unconscious and then left him to either bleed to his death or be captured by slavers, which was what happened eventually.

Andreios made a promise to find and kill every single one of them, even if it's the last thing he does.

A slow painful death would be the reward of all those who had taken part in the rape of his wife and death of his children and of course the one who hadn't killed him but had left him as a slave.