Chapter 23

 

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Julia heard the woman's shrill scream echo through the slave quarters as it had for the last several hours. It was a chilling sound, more the howl of a hopeless, pain wracked animal than a cry from human lips.

Julia shuddered, but kept walking. It would not do to keep the master and his guests waiting for their drinks, she thought. She cringed subconsciously at the pitiable weeping between the screams, and dreaded being around when a new white slave was being broken. The horrible rhythm of coercion and training was familiar to every slave in the villa, and served as a warning. There were the screams- the bone chilling shrills, following with absolute regularity and grim meter the sharp, terrifying snap of the cane on bare flesh. Between lashes, there was the gasping, the wailing and the abject, desperate pleading. It was the cadence of agony and slow inexorable capitulation into submission- the torture and death of a proud, free soul- the birth of a new life of slavery.

"Please! Oh god please I've told you everything! Please no more!" begged a hoarse female voice. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Julia padded from the hallway and entered the room, bearing the tray of refreshments for the Imam and the others, the official interrogators. She placed the tray on table beside the men and knelt quietly in a corner, remaining as she had been instructed, in case they should want something else.

From where she was, Julia could see the hapless victim before her. Though quite lovely, she was not a member of the Imam's household, as Julia had never seen her before. She was tall and well built, and her skin was very fair and clear. Her long, dark brown hair hung dank and disheveled from her sagging head, at times hiding her face. She was dangling limply from a hook and chain in the ceiling, wrists bound together, her feet just touching the floor. And she was naked, unless the thin rivulets of blood running from the stripes on her back and buttocks could be called a covering. Long, ugly bruises, deepening in color every minute ascended like a ladder up the back of her form from her calves to her shoulders. They were perfectly spaced and horizontal, applied by an expert in the art. On the tiled floor beneath her, the puddle of dark amber urine further attested to the duration and rigors of the woman's ordeal. She had resisted for some time.

A very small black man, perhaps from a Pygmy tribe, stood behind her. His diminutive size belied the strength of his upper body as he expertly wielded the instrument of her torment: a thin flexible cane, polished and gleaming along its length. Julia startled as she saw it flash through the air with a motion of his arm, and heard the impact once more.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIEEEHHHHHHUUUUHHHHHHGGGG!" screamed the pale woman. "Plleeaassseee! There's one... one more family in the church with unregistered daughters!"

"How many and what ages?" asked a uniformed black woman who calmly sat at the table running a laptop.

"UUUggghhh... thr... three of the... them..." sobbed the white woman. "A... ages fourteen, fifteen, and... and seventeen... and they have a boy. I think he's eleven..."

"Last name and location of the family's residence?" asked the recorder flatly.

"Cheering Lane... outside Carlisle..." wailed the white woman. "In the farming district... to the north... oh god, forgive me! The... the mother and father pretend to be childless... the children live in a barn on the property... and hide when the... when the Levy inspectors come around..."

"Family name?" asked the black woman.

"The Coddingtons... Please, don't hurt them! They are... such a good family... so selfless and devout... please... I've told you everything now! Oh please! No more!"

"You will receive the remaining three lashes," said Imam Mustafa, firmly. "Then we will verify what you have told us. You will be taken down, and my slaves will tend your wounds. If you've given us the truth, you will take your place among the slaves of my house. If you are lying or withholding information, you will receive another ten strokes."

"Oh please no... please I'll die, I'LL DIE!" wailed the white woman.

"You won't die, bitch cauc," said the Imam. "You will simply suffer. You have a long way to go before succumbing to the pain and trauma, and there are ways to keep you conscious the whole time. You will only long for death, beg for it- in vain. Until you tell us everything you know."

Once again, Julia flinched as she saw the flash of the cane, and heard its meaningful whisper as it moved through the air.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEUUUHHHHHH! HHHHUU HHHUU HUUU... please... I've told you... I've told you... about every... family in the church! I swear it... I SWEAR!"

The Imam rose from his seat. He walked over to the hanging woman, turning her body to face the interrogators. Now Julia could clearly see her anguished face, delicate and noble, but presently red and contorted with shame and torment. Spittle dripped from her chin and her jaw was slack. Her mouth hung open with the continuous exertion of her cries.

The Imam reached up to move the sweat dampened hair from her eyes, slapping her lightly on the cheek to gain her full attention. "You suffer so needlessly, cauc bitch," he said to her, gently. "Africa is superior, and African ways always triumph. You have experienced the simple power of the Ashanti cane. It never kills. Its victims always live- and always submit. For centuries, it has broken new slaves. No one has ever resisted the scourge of the Ashanti, not even strong Adamic men- how much less a she cauc?"

The woman hung her head, sobbing with misery. Though she had tried valiantly to protect the precious young families in her district, she had broken physically and emotionally, and had told them everything. It was all unraveling now: the network of passive resistance, the secret movement fostered by loyalists and clergy in Britain. Several weeks before the administrators of the Levy had discovered the widespread underground organization operating to help British Christian families remain anonymous and avoid Levy selection. Totally illegal of course, the network nonetheless had the covert support of many local police and magistrates. Every white in Britain hated the Levy, but there were even some black Britons assisting the scofflaws.

When the report had come of organized Levy dodging, the Empire's Council had been enraged at the news. They had voted, with the Prophet's approval, to assign the chief Imam as official investigator. His background dealing with whites was well known, and as a member of the Council he had demanded to conduct some of the interrogations in person, in the proper facilities of his own home.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Julia watched as the woman's legs scissored and kicked wildly. The latest blow had been applied to the base of her buttocks, inducing what was colloquially known as the "cauc folk dance"- the demeaning reflex which caused a suspended victim's legs to flail about with undignified vigor. After a few seconds of this spectacle, the spasms subsided, and she hung inert and exhausted. Julia shed a tear of pity as the woman sobbed quietly, swinging slowly at the end of her chain. Once more, the pungent yellow liquid trickled down her legs, and her toes traced little circles on the drenched tiles as she twitched and moaned. "Huuuugghh... hhhuuuuuggghh... please... uuuuhhhhh..."

"Your back is scarred for life," whispered the Imam into the woman's ear. "We are not cruel, and I do not want to destroy your beauty. But next, we will start on the front of your body; your breasts, nipples, belly, perhaps even your face. They will be marred as well and the pain will be indescribable. And all for nothing, she-cauc. You will tell us everything anyway."