The interior of the orphanage was bare, save for a few donated blankets that were laid haphazardly on the floor, offering meager warmth to the children who slept there at night. The air was damp and musty, with a pervasive odor of decay and neglect, hanging in the air.
The children trooped in one after the other, following their seniors to find out how their adventure went. A sure sign that they were hungry and needed food. None of them had eaten throughout the day.
Jerome listened for movement inside the dilapidated building. Ms. Tara and Moss must have left to find them something to eat. Old Wen’s snores were the only sound that greeted him upon entry. Jerome sighed. He hoped their caretakers could get them something to eat tonight. They hadn’t gone out to find anything when they left to attack the blind man this morning. If only they were allowed to leave the slums. It could increase their chances of finding food. But there were always guards waiting for them when they tried to leave. He wondered what the city would look like.
“...Jerome?” one of the kids called to him. “I’m hungwie.” the others that came in with him also began to sob.
Jerome came out of his musings. Looking down, he saw the child pulling on the hem of his tattered robe, crying. It pained him to see such a little child hungry for food. He held him close and caressed his hair to soothe him and assure him that he would eat tonight. Ash pulled another to her and Doti and Dreamer got the remaining.
The children’s unhealthy frame stood unsteadily as they shook from their sobs. They had no names. Ms. Tara had once said that they as caretakers were responsible for naming the kids. They gave nicknames that expressed character, or the circumstance in which the children were brought to the orphanage. Giving a real name backed by meaning to a natural entity evoked a price: the namer lost vitality and essence.
Doti was named Doti because of his proclivity to play in the gutter when he was younger. However, that was because Moss, the second caretaker, didn’t do a good job of keeping him close by whenever he was in charge of watching the kids. Dreamer always had a distant look on his face. Whisper spoke as silently as he possibly could — but this was because of hunger. And Ash? Ash was dropped outside the orphanage covered in ash. Her origins were the most mysterious among all the kids. The other kids hadn’t been given nicknames yet.
But he had a name. A real name. His mother had named him before her death. Kaia. Her name sounded far away in his mind. Her features, blurring every waking moment. And even now he could only vaguely remember her face.
“She poured her soul into naming you,” the blind Rihal would always say whenever they were alone.
Jerome never got tired of listening to the story of how his mother named him. Even though he’d heard it many times before, he still found it touching. However, Rihal never provided any additional details beyond those words, no matter how often Jerome asked him to elaborate.
The last of the children entered the orphanage and shut the door. It was still midday and the heat of the sun was scorching hot. The interior of the orphanage was cool, however, and provided the much-needed temperature to help the children relax. This was how their daily routine went.
They spread out, taking different spots on the floor in the small hall they used as a dorm. Tiny holes in the roof and walls let in small amounts of sunlight and air so they weren’t plunged into total darkness, or suffocated from the lack of ventilation. Everyone lay on the floor to get ready for their midday nap. They had to conserve energy since they hadn’t eaten all day.
“Should we go try our luck later?” Jerome asked in a whisper. “Maybe when the sun has moved west a little?” that should be in a few hours. Oh, what he’d give to be able to tell time accurately. The kingdom of Vorthe was still archaic in that regard. According to Rihal they still used sundials. He shook his head when he remembered the look of incredulity when he asked the blind Rihal what the time was.
His friends all understood that he was talking about scavenging for food. Maybe that would be in the slums — even if the chances of that were pretty slim these days — or maybe it’s to chance leaving the slums to go into the other parts of the city. The chances of that…well, they’d never had the chance to leave the slums, so zero.
They were all too tired and hungry to talk about it so they just hummed their assent and lay their heads on the floor, falling asleep almost immediately.
~~~
“So these be the lil’ rats who be sniffing ‘round the border o’ the slums, eh?” an officer of the guard said as he walked toward them, his heavy steps evident in the thumping sounds of his boots.
Jerome looked up from the boots, his gaze lifting as he checked out the brown leather amour. The crest on the chest area showed the symbol of the Royal Family — a golden sun with an open eye in its center. He raised his head some more to see a face framed in bushy beards and short hair, cut almost to the scalp. Black eyes watched him like a hawk. Just him. As if he knew that he was the leader of the group. He crawled forward on his knees with his hands tied behind him and made muffled sounds to indicate that he wanted to talk.
The officer sneered at him and gestured to the other guard beside him to remove Jerome’s gag. “What have ye got to say?”
“We just wanted food, is all. Please we have hungry siblings waiting for us at the orphanage!”
The guard bellowed in laughter, his powerful voice assaulting their young ears. “Well, for a slum rat, ye speak ver’ fluently.”
“A blind soldier taught me—”
“Shut it, rat. I don’t care! Food ain’t for free.” He squatted down and jabbed his index finger at Jerome’s forehead which hurt like hell. “And ye have no money…” his voice trailed off and he seemed to grow distant, far away, somehow, like his mind was elsewhere.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Jerome tried to rub his forehead with a shoulder since his hands were tied behind his back. Talk about impossible. It felt like a rock was used to jab at his forehead, instead of a finger. But now he didn’t know what to make of the situation. The other guard just stood there as if this was a normal occurrence.
He and his friends had had to trek for over three miles when they left to go scavenge for food. The slums stretched on for miles in front of them with no end in sight. They began to notice the scarcity of people on the dirt track after a while and that was when they were jumped by the guard. Now kneeling in front of the guard with his heart beating a mile away, he wondered if they were ever going to be able to leave the slums. Was the whole of the city a slum? Even now, the sight was still the same — rows and rows of shacks clustered around.
“Is he okay?” Jerome asked, but the second guard didn’t look his way. He was as tall as the bearded guard, though younger and more handsome. And he was the one who had caught them. He took the time to study their armor and noticed slight differences between them. The one who appeared to outrank the other had on a leather belt with small suns denoting his rank: three suns to be precise. The other guard had just one sun on his belt. So Captain Beard is two ranks above Stoic, he thought, giving them names.
Soon enough the officer came to. “Well, rat. Yer ain’t s’posed to be here. There be rules of engagement and slummers ain’t s’posed to come this side o’ the city,” he said and pulled out a whip from his back.
Jerome’s heart almost burst out of his ribcage. A whip? He had never been whipped before. Not in this life or his previous one. He scrambled backward pushing his friends back with him but still stood in front of them to protect them from the child abuser.
“Please don’t,” he begged, voice tight with tension. “We just want something to eat, is all. And we were going to work for it if we could.”
His friends were panicking already, their eyes bulging as the towering guard unfurled the whip. The officer raised his other hand and they all lost control of their bodies.
The whip descended. Jerome steeled himself as numbing pain stung his skin. He felt nothing but pain… pain that seemed to last an eternity. However, it couldn’t compare to the pain he felt throughout his previous life.
He had lived a grueling sixty years on earth. From the moment he was born, he was afflicted with a rare blood cancer that ravaged his body, leaving him fatigued and in constant pain. Polycythemia Vera was a cancerous blood disease that had no cure; compared to that this was child’s play.
The whip descended again, causing him to flinch in pain. If such a disease couldn’t break me, this never will, he thought in anger.
Thoughts of his previous life flitted through his mind. Jerome remembered his previous name — Isaac. His existence was a living nightmare. He had spent his days in and out of hospitals, enduring endless tests, treatments, and phlebotomy, all in a futile attempt to ease his suffering. Suffering, he so wished he could forget because of how weak he was back then.
And now his weakness was shoved in his face once again. This frail small body of his was no good to him for running away from an altercation, talk more defense. He needed strength. Strength to protect himself and those he cared for.
What use was being an adult in a child’s body? Of what use was all the knowledge he possessed to solve his problems if he didn’t have access to resources? He had nothing. Jerome ground his teeth as he took the whip, refusing to cry.
His friends sobbed around him, unable to hold back tears.
When the officer was done, he squatted down beside Jerome again. “I admire yer courage,” he said, his voice laced with respect. Jerome thought he heard wrong. “Ye stood up to speak for yerself. And ye also tried to protect yer friends. But next time, don’t come this way if ye be not expected.” He turned to the other guard. “Since the rats wanna eat, give ‘em work to do. The gutter be a good place to start.”
~~~
Dreamer tried not to look back at the guard following them to the gutter, but he couldn’t help himself. He felt the guard’s eyes on him, watching his every move. Every time he looked back he was caught by a piercing stare. He felt that any moment now, the guard would bring out a whip and start lashing. He stumbled.
“Faces forward!” the guard snapped.
He quickly turned away, and so did two other heads — Doti and Whisper. He looked at them, seeing the same fear he felt in their dark eyes. Jerome on the other hand did not look back at the guard. His face was set in a scowl and he marched on like an avenger. He wished he had Jerome’s courage. He wished he could display his anger as Jerome did. If he did, would he look braver? He wished he could have taken the whip as Jerome did — quietly, without making a sound. Dreamer sighed to himself. What meat could he eat to get such courage? He’d probably choke on it. Jerome was a lot stronger than him — than any of them. He could bear pain and hunger better than them.
But Jerome had also gotten them in trouble. He shouldn’t have suggested leaving the slums. The guards always found them, and so far, they’d been pitied. They didn’t succeed in playing the pity game this time around. All because of that…of that…hairy bastard! No, he should be angry at Jerome too for taking them there.
Dreamer balled up his fists, making up his mind to give Jerome a piece of his mind when they got home. For now, he would silently bear the stinging pain in his back.
~~~
They got to the sewer drain a few yards away from the orphanage. The drainage system was a long gutter that was exposed to the air. It stretched from one end of the slum to the other. Just one wide gutter that started from one end of the slum to another. Anyone could throw anything into it, so it had clogged up, and thickened with dirt, and shit.
“They couldn’t even be bordered to make more than one drain,” Jerome muttered in annoyance. The stench coming out of it would make a normal person gag, but he had lived around foul smells all his life.
“Say something, rat?” the guard asked, glaring at him.
Jerome harrumphed.
“Seems like you want more whipping, don’t you? Get to work…now!”
“We can’t work on empty stomachs!” Jerome shot back, and the guard raised a hand as if to smack him in the face. Jerome flinched, putting his hands in front of his face to block the incoming strike but the pain never came. He opened his eyes to see three large pieces of bread in the guard's hands. He wondered where he had pulled them out from, not seeing any pack with the guard. But the thought quickly escaped his mind, replaced by the thought of filling his tummy with food at long last.
Jerome restrained himself. He glanced at his friends and could see the hunger in their eyes. Their eyes never left the bread for a second, their mouths almost drooling. He cleared his throat, gaining their attention. With a slight shake of his head, they understood what he was trying to say. They had siblings waiting to be fed at home. They couldn’t eat while their younger ones were sitting at home, hungry, and waiting for them to bring food home.
“Have these,” the guard said, throwing them the bread, “and get to work.”
The moment they caught the bread, they bolted.