After a few days, Darius threw some items away, including the axe. He put the dagger in the sack surrounded by a blanket to save the effort. In case of need, Darius could use a dagger for many things, but the axe was too heavy to carry around for the whole trip, and after he had entered the open grass fields, there were no threes in sight.

Darius walked further away from his old life for two weeks with daily tedium. He read and reread what was left of two books, but he didn’t throw the pages away anymore since the subjects were harder and he might be wrong about something. Darius could assume particles to be something of energy or small objects of magic but could not know more based on his books. Alchemy was easier because he had some tools of forest witch, and he could learn the basics of these instruments from the tattered alchemy book. Darius wished to test these items, but there were just not enough herbs and materials to do anything. It also seemed that those rocks Darius had left in the cellar were needed catalysts for alchemy.

After regretting his decision not to take a risk with the stones, Darius assumed that at least magic tools would be costly, and he could later use them or sell them for money. Every night Darius meditated, and his wounds started to heal completely. His vigour returned despite he ate less food every day to make it last. There was barely anything else than wind and rocky ground with occasional patches of grass. He had already covered a large portion of the trip or at least hoped that that would be the case. The monotonous sea of grass and rocks without anything else in sight for weeks. Not even a hill or one three, just nothing. Sometimes he could see animals far away, larger eagles eating their prey.

On one occasion, Darius had tried to get the bird with a thrown rock, but his semi-clumsy movements didn’t help him. The eagle flew away, only leaving half of the rotten rat behind. In some evenings, Darius could have hunted rats, but there was nothing that could have been used for the fire. Therefore, his only option was to make meat cuttings and attach them to his travel sack to keep them drying in the sun while he walked during the days. At least in two weeks or more, he would have something to eat when all the other food would end.

It happened on a sunny day when he could see far away. Humans. Darius could see tiny black dots on the horizon. He started yelling and waving his hands immediately, and after a while, he saw that, oddly, some of the people left the group with fast horses and started to come close in a very wide formation. When Darius figured it out, he was already trapped inside an encirclement. His saviours were not what he had wished for. They were no merchants, and as Darius could feel from their greedy gazes and shouting, they were thugs at best or even worse. Dirty and armoured in all manner of cheap and patchy items and poor-looking rusty weapons, they closed the circle. One man with a black hood deep enough that Darius could not see his face stated coldly,

“Hey boy, you look to be in trouble. Do you mind coming with us to our caravan?”

Darius knew from the lack of emotion and suspended gazes from men used to violence that he did not have any other option.

“Gladly, I have been travelling for weeks already.” Darius retorted.

Some men laughed at his words, but some were worryingly displeased with him not giving a fight. It seemed that some of them wanted more activity in these boring grass fields. He walked inside the encirclement back to their caravan to not give them any chance. When he could see closer, there were three wagons with cages. Inside were people of all ages, men, women, and children. Everybody seemed to be starving and quietly lying inside and leaning on the rusted iron bars trapping them inside. Darius was freed from all his possessions. They even took his linen shirt and gave him a rough potato sack with three holes as a shirt. While laughing at how he looked, they secured him neatly in a less occupied cage.

The whole transaction was smooth and professional. No yelling, no hitting, no empty threats. Despite their appearances, these people were professional slavers. Despite five other people being in the cage, nobody spoke anything to Darius, and after looking at everyone, he didn’t talk either. Inside the cage was a yellow-haired, stronger build man without teeth, snoring with sunken cheeks at the back of the cage. Next to him were two females with empty looks in their eyes, not recognizing anything. They were all dressed in rags and potato sacks. In the middle, Darius saw a presumably shared toilet that was a pot with a lid on it. The lid, however, did not cover the petrifying smell underneath. Only one kid smirked to his face when he saw the toilet pot, but after, the kid huddled himself into the arms of an older man with long steel grey hair. He seemed to be ill. His face was almost as white as linen could be, and he was hunched on the left corner of the cage with the red-haired nosy small kid.

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Darius sat on the not-as-favourable position in the middle of the long bench. Regrettably, he was almost next to the pot. He leaned on the cage bars and closed his eyes to hide that he would not sleep but meditate.

He was only disturbed by sudden yelling. The sun was already setting, and the caravan had stopped. It seemed that there was a campfire with better food than what had been offered to captured people.

“Hey boy, yes you, come out chief wants to talk to you.”

Darius nodded, and he was delivered to the largest tent occupying one side of the encampment. Inside the tent, he saw a large table with decent chairs around it and a fat, bald man sitting behind the table. The man commanded others out of the tent with a highly shimming voice. After staring at Darius for a while, and Darius was looking down not to cause trouble, the man in the black robe started questioning him.

“Where have you gotten these items, boy? Did you run away from home?”

As Darius looked at the table first time, he noticed some of his belongings there, the dry meat and alchemical apparatuses. All the letters were laid open. In his hands, the man kept the deed for the land lot of the witch.

“Answer me now. Who are you.” The man sneered at him.

“No sir, my village was destroyed, and here I am.”

“Yes, here you are with the alchemical tools, some questionable letters, the goddamn deed for a land lot and some meat that even I don’t recognize. There are a lot of questions about you and your items.”

First, Darius tried to think of fast excuses, but he just told the truth and the end of the village. He explained that some of the papers might be important, so he had kept them and other items to survive. Some of the things seemed expensive, so he took them.

“Well, you are not wrong either. Now my next question is can you read boy?” The bald man barked suddenly.

Darius saw his chance and hurriedly denied knowing how to read. After all, he was just a farm boy cutting firewood for the village. As he had given the whole story of the village, the bald man didn’t suspect him of lying about this small detail.

“Okay, since you told me everything, you can eat this suspicious meat. That will be your meal for today.” Said the man with blatant greed in his blue eyes. Darius was led back to the cage, only to find that two females were not there anymore. He looked questioningly at the man at the back and received only a dark knowing look back. After gulping, Darius sat on the bench. Then he started eating the rat meat strips but was interrupted by the man.

“Boy, what meat is that?”

“Sun-dried rat meat, sir, not the best but can’t be picky. They only gave me this to eat today.”

“Well, don’t get ill, boy. We are already in enough trouble.”

After saying that, one slaver yelled from outside, “NO SPEAKING!” and they quieted themselves. After eating, Darius meditated the whole night and for several days, only waking up when the meal was served. The meal was always the same watered-down oath meal with big chunks of jelly-like glibs.

One month went past, and the environment changed. Now slaver caravan travelled on busy roads, and the cages were covered not to let other people see the circumstances of the slaves. It made the air damp inside, and the toilet pot smelling it did not improve the mood for concentration. The old man had died a week ago, and the kid had been put into a different wagon. The wagon air smelled of piss, diarrhea, sweat, and glooming poor misery. But it only took about two weeks until they were at the city gates. The city gates seemed very large, and Darius assumed that the long travel of three months had led them to a bigger city to increase slave profits. After a coin purse changed its owner at the gate caravan continued into the city. Now Darius would have to wait for any chance to escape and disappear into the city. Or be a slave for his whole life. With these thoughts, Darius looked at the gate disappearing after a turn into narrow streets.