The carts started moving and stopped in a place where a big crowd of people was gathered around. People stared at the slaves in the cages.

  “Take out all the slaves and line them,” said the leader. All the raiders took out the slaves and lined the women and children in different lines on a wooden platform.

  The leader climbed up on the platform and stood in front of the lined women. “I present you with these beautiful slaves, which will serve you as you want. You can see how beautiful they are, and many of you will be impatient to buy them, so let’s start the bidding for each of them.”

  The bidding started, and all the women got sold out. “Now I present to you these children whom you can use in any of your works, and you have to pay just half the price as you have paid for the women. As you can see how good the deal is, you better look out that someone else doesn’t rob you of this opportunity. Let’s start bidding.”

  After the bidding, four children got left out, including Ivaan and one little older kid.

  “So, what should we do with them?” asked one raider to the leader.

  “They will work at our mine,” said the leader, “we wanted some workers and we got them for free. Put them in the cage and take them to our mines”.

  Ivaan was crying as he had never witnessed such horrible things in his life. The older kid saw Ivaan and asked, “What’s with you?”

  But Ivaan continued to weep. “Who was your father? And where do you live?” the older kid asked again. Ivaan didn’t answer, there was a bracelet in his hand with a sacred symbol which only the priest of the temple used to wear.

  “So, you are the priest’s son, that’s why you have his bracelet,” said the older kid.

  Ivaan looked towards him and then turned away.

  “They would have killed your family too,” said the older kid, “don’t worry, when we get the opportunity, we will escape from them, together”.

  The cart reached a house which was near the mine, the raiders took them out of the cage and put them in a single dark room in the house. Ivaan was holding his leg, which caught the attention of the older kid. The older kid moved Ivaan towards him, there was a big cut on his leg, and he was continuously bleeding.

  “How did that happen to you?” asked the older kid, but he didn’t answer him again.

  Older kid tore some cloth from his vest and wrapped it around his wound, “Don’t remove it, it will stop the bleeding,” he said, and sat beside him. At dawn, the door was flung open, and a raider entered the room holding a whip in his hand,

  “Get to work, you lazy scoundrels,” he said and started kicking them.

  All of them got up out of fear, but Ivaan was not able to get up because of the injury in his leg.

  The raider approached him, “Do you want to get beaten up? Get up!” he shouted.

  Older kid interrupted, “he cannot work, his leg is injured”.

  “You will go to work,” said the raider and hit Ivaan with the whip. “You better get up or else I will rip your skin out,” said the raider, followed by another lash.

  “Stop hitting him,” said the older kid, and came in between. Raider stared at him with wide eyes and hit the older kid and kept whipping him, and then stopped.

  “You should better know your place, you little shit,” said the raider and landed another strike on Ivaan, “didn’t you hear what I said. Ivaan tried to get up, but he started shaking because he lacked the strength in the injured leg. Raider picked him up by holding his vest by the shoulder and dragged him towards the door.

  While the other children were frightened and weren’t moving from their places, the raider turned his face towards them, “What did I say? Come with me,” he shouted.

  All the children followed him towards the cart. As he was dragging Ivaan towards the cart, all the children got into the cage by themselves, and the raider threw Ivaan in the cage.

  “Remember, all of you, you are slaves and you will do what we say or else you know what I will do to you,” said the raider and hit the cage with the whip, “don’t forget that,” and he took them to mine.

  All three children got out of the cart, but Ivaan wasn’t able to move before the raider could see that the older kid climbed and helped him to get off the cart.

  “Don’t help him or else he will beat you,” said one other kid. The older kid glared at him, and he went silent. The raider showed them the way while going into the mine as Ivaan was being carried by the older kid.

  “Thank you,” said Ivaan with a shaking voice.

  “Thank god you spoke something, I thought you were a mute,” said the older kid. He was able to feel that Ivaan’s body was trembling in fear, “We will soon find a way out of this place”.

  The raider stopped in the middle of the mine. There were no workers in that place.

  “You will mine here,” said the raider. He gave them shovels, “start digging!! And remember if you stop then…” he hit the whip on the ground and all of them started digging with shovels while Ivaan wasn’t able to hold the shovel properly.

  The older kid was trying to cover him from the raider, but the raider saw that Ivaan wasn’t digging. He came from behind and landed another strike on Ivaan’s back, and he fell to the ground,

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  “What did I say, you little pig, keep working,” he shouted, and Ivaan started crying while lying on the ground. The raider struck him again, harder than before followed by his scream.

  “Looks like you are not going to understand,” said the raider and hit him again.

  “Please stop!” the older kid cried, but the whipping continued, and Ivaan fell unconscious.

  When he woke up, he found himself in the room where they were kept before, but this time he was all alone. He tried to get up but his whole body was shivering because of pain, his vest was torn off by the hits of the whip, he moved his hand behind to touch his back and found blood on his fingers.

  His back was bleeding because of the beating.

  Why is all of this happening!!, I need my father and mother!!, Father and mother, please come back! God, please help me, please return my father and mother to me, I can’t live without them.

  He wasn’t able to bear the pain, and he kept sobbing while lying down. In the evening, the other three kids were taken back to the house and kept in the same room. When the raider went outside the room, the older kid rushed towards Ivaan, who was lying down on the floor.

  He was unconscious, so the older kid lifted his body, he started shaking his body, and patted his face. Ivaan opened his eyes,

  “Thank god,” said the older kid, “don’t worry, we are going to get food in a few minutes, I heard the raiders talking. After eating food, you’ll be okay.”

  The voice of footsteps was coming closer towards the room. “Get up and sit, or else you will not get food”. He made him sit, and he sat beside Ivaan by supporting his body on his shoulder so that he could sit. The raider came into the room and placed big leaves in front of them and put three breads in everyone’s leaf.

  “Now eat,” said the raider, and all the kids started eating. When Ivaan picked up the bread to eat, the raider grabbed his hand.

  “You will not eat,” said the raider, “no work, no food”.

  He kicked the food, and it fell on the ground. Older kid glared at him, but as the raider turned, he started eating again.

  “Can I get one more bread, please!” said the older kid

  The raider glared at him, “Please!” he said by squinting his eyes.

  The raider dropped another bread on his leaf, the older kid started eating again, and he slowly dropped two breads in his vest by hiding them from the raider’s eye. When all the kids ate, the raider went outside the room and locked it.

  The older kid slowly took out the two pieces of bread from his vest.

  “Don’t do this, if they catch you, then we all will be beaten again,” said the other kid by holding his hand.

  “Shut up and leave, or else you will be beaten by me,” said the older kid. The other kid removed his hand. He lifted Ivaan’s body and fed him the bread. He carefully put him down and lay beside him.

  The next day, a similar thing happened; they didn’t give food to Ivaan because he wasn’t able to work, but the older kid managed to get him food both times in a day by hiding it from the raider.

  On the fourth day, the older kid did the same thing, he dropped two breads while eating, but this time the raider noticed and rushed towards him.

  “So, you are the one who is giving food to the injured kid,” said the raider, “I was wondering that why he is not having any trouble without eating food, and now I know why”.

  “No, I didn’t,” said the older kid.

  “Don’t take me for a fool,” said the raider, “I know you did this, but don’t worry, you will get the award for your deed fair and square.” The older kid stared at him without blinking his eye.

  “Oh, looks like it is not enough,” the raider said, “let’s get you a company in this, ah, how it will be that injured kid?”.

  “No, he doesn’t have any part in this; it was my will, not his,” said the older kid

  “But he did eat the food that you gave while I ordered him not to eat anything until he worked and defied me, so he will get punished,” Raider said.

  Outside the city, there was a thick forest, and in the depths of the forest, there was a pit. It was a pit, but it had a ground above it, and the way inside the pit was through a round, slanting slope covered with bushes.

  Inside that pit, a witch was sitting on a wooden chair, she had curly hairs, and was wearing an old, weary cloak. She was reading an old scripture, and different types of stuff were lying around her.

  “Found it,” witch said while reading the book, “this ingredient was missing after adding this ingredient to magic dust, I have to sprinkle this dust on the firefly and then the firefly will help me to reach the powerful magical source which is described in this scripture”.

  She quickly took out a bottle from the cupboard and put some drops in the magical dust in a jar placed on the table. Then there was a closed jar on the table filled with fireflies. She dropped dust into the closed jar from a small opening, and all the fireflies that were green in color turned blue.

  “It worked,” the witch said with a grin.

  It was evening when the raider brought the older kid and Ivaan into the mine.

  “Now start working,” said the raider while looking at him.

  “He can’t, he’s injured,” said the older kid

  “Shut up or else I will rip your tongue out,” said the raider while strangling him.

  “You stop, this friend of yours will die,” said the rider and took out a whip from his back, which had nails attached to it. He started whipping the older kid and each blow ripped his skin off, “Work or he dies,” the raider shouted.

  Ivaan walked with a limp, crying and started mining, he wasn’t able to balance himself, and his whole body was shaking while mining. His wound started bleeding again because of the strain on his leg, but he kept working.

  While working, he fell to his knees. The raider hit the whip on the back of the older kid, and the whip ripped his skin from the part where it was struck.

  “Keep working!!” shouted the raider, “or else I will keep hitting him”.

  He dragged himself back to work, “You’ve eaten a lot for free for so many days, now it’s your turn to repay,” said the raider. Ivaan looked at him and continued.

  After a while, a strong pain shot through his leg, and he started floundering. When the raider saw that, he started whipping him relentlessly, the skin on his back started ripping apart, and the pieces of his skin started falling all over the place but the older kid clenched his jaw and didn’t let a scream out to make Ivaan believe that he can easily bear it.

  “Continue or I will keep hitting him,” shouted the raider while whipping the older kid.

  He tried to keep mining, but his body was too weak to do any further work, and because of too much strain on his body, he fell to the ground.

  “So, you are not going to do any work?” asked Raider. “Okay, tonight you will sleep in this mine, and I’m taking away your friend, and I promise I will rip apart his skin and flesh till the bones”.

  Ivaan fell unconscious, and the raider took away the older kid. The witch was following the firefly after she released it from the jar,

  How far I have to go, it’s already been a mile. I think I shouldn’t doubt it, after all, it was written in the scripture, and as it is said that all good things take time. Wait, did I say good, hahahaha, well it is good for me so it is good.

  She kept following the firefly, and after a while, she reached the surface.

  Ah, it is a mine, and what else can be a better place for such a thing to exist, but what if it has already been mined before? All my struggle for that source will go in vain. Whatever happens, that source will be mine only, and no one else can take it away from me.

  As she reached the entrance of the mine, she lit the lamp which was she carrying in her hand from all the way through. She entered the mine and started looking all around like a hawk to find the magical source, but she only found stones, tools, and belongings of some workers.

  Why is it taking me so long to find it? I’m not able to wait any longer. I want that powerful source in my hands, and only then I will be able to breathe.

  The firefly started glowing more brightly.

  This is it, I am near the source.

  As she progressed in the mine, the front pathway started illuminating from the light of the lamp, and then a kid appeared lying on the ground.

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