Song for this chapter are:

Make it Right - BTS

I'm good - Tedashii

The tower - Alisa (Carole and Tuesday)

Everything I wanted - Billie Eilish

****

"My name is Dan. I'm sorry if I startled you. I can't say much, but I need to get you out of this field right now so you can get something to eat," he answered my question quickly.

He no longer wrapped his arms around my waist, but we both were still seated on the ground. Ironically, I was now thankful for the length of the weeds because it served as a natural barrier, and no one could see us.

But just in case, I peeped a little above the weeds, as long as my neck could stretch, and I was able to see the backs of the other slaves spread out across the field, engaging in thorough labor. I looked back at this stranger behind me, who seemed to be around my elder sister Demi's age but probably a little younger. My sister was eighteen years old. He looked fifteen.

He stared back at me. There was now a look of apprehension on his face, and he kept glancing sideways very often, cautious as to take note of the slightest unusual thing asides from what we were doing.

"Who are you? And how do you know that I've not had food to eat?" I asked.

"I'm a slave here as well. I just don't wear the same kind of clothing as the other slaves because I serve the loan shark himself and tend to his personal needs and dealings. Hence I'm a Chief slave. Just like that woman who took you to the dressing room. If you look closely at what she wore today, you will figure that she was wearing the same kind of clothing as I am."

He was right. They both dressed like medical assistants – a plain blue shirt on straight blue trousers. He paused and gave me a moment to recall, and when he got the hint in my expression that I seemed a little convinced, he swallowed and continued.

"So I was promoted by the loan shark as I was once a regular slave, basically; hence why I'm a Chief slave now. I tend to the affairs of the other slaves. I noticed you had not gotten any food to eat because I was the one who distributed the meals to the other slaves this afternoon."

"If it's that irritating piece of meat you gave others that you want to give me, then I don't want." I shook my head vehemently.

"It's not," he replied with an almost unnoticeable eye roll.

"But wait, If you're a Chief Slave, aren't you supposed to be aware that I shouldn't eat anything at all for the next four days? Because the other woman knows and she decided not to give me anything to eat since it's an order from the loan shark himself and also, the title of a Chief slave seems like a title for a grown-up person but you look like a teenager. How old are you?"

He bit his lip in what looked like impatience. He closed his eyes for a full minute and opened them right after he had taken a deep breath.

"I get why you want to know everything. It's okay to ask these questions and want to know everything, but now is not the time. See, I'm fourteen years old and take this as me favoring you because I choose to.

Please don't ask me why I'm choosing to favor you. Take it as it is. If you desperately need to eat, please quietly follow me. We have to run away from here before anyone sees us, " Dan breathed out.

Moments after, he broke the chains holding my legs together in a swift time-lapse, which made me gasp, momentarily terrified by his bizarre strength, but he gave me an awkward, stupid smile, assuring me that it was alright.

I wondered how someone could be so comfortable with calling themselves a slave, like it was a title to be earned or something to be proud of or, instead, the unimaginable kind of tragedy that must have been behind compulsorily having to conform to that saddening identity. I wanted to ask him all of these questions, but I had to keep quiet since I badly needed to eat.

***

We were at the storehouse. Dan carried me on his back and was on his heels all through the journey, and since the speed of his stride had spiked up a sudden nauseous feeling in me, I had decided to keep my eyes closed all through.

The storehouse was narrow, and the only window present brought in hot air, which didn't do much for us in terms of breathing.

The storehouse was filled with plenty of bags of grains, legumes and I spotted a few tuber stockings; yams, potatoes, cocoyam.

There were other kinds of foodstuff too, but I couldn't decipher what they were since they were pretty much uncountable, but it made my heart drop seeing that there was so much food, yet these monsters had chosen to give the slaves a meal that a domestic dog couldn't eat.

He dipped his hands into a sack close to where the stockings of tubers were and brought out a plastic food pack. It contained rice, but I could not see the condiments on top of it till he handed it to me, and I pulled off the lid.
My stomach churned painfully as the aroma of chicken stew wafted into my nostrils. Who knew there would come a time when I would appreciate the presence of food so much?

But now, I had gone beyond hungry and was in severe pains, and I wasn't even sure I would be able to enjoy this meal like I ought to.

"I'm sorry, but you'll have to eat the food here." His voice broke my reverie, and my eyes rose to meet his. There was a faint smile on his face, and I could tell that the smile had come from watching me all along.

With minimal stamina left, my hands shook as I scooped a spoonful of rice, causing some grains to drop. I was that weak.

I felt the sudden urge to cry. I couldn't believe I went without food for this long, but I tried to keep eating as more rice grains kept falling to the ground. I was getting weaker. I didn't know If I was going to be able to work on the fields today. I just really needed sleep.

"Do you want me to feed you?" he asked me. He was closer to me now as he went on his knees, keeping a fair balance.

I looked at him. I was confused. But he was looking at me with an expectant expression.

"Oh...I hope you're not getting any wrong ideas? Or...no, I know you can't. You're just nine. Just see me as your big brother, okay?" he stuttered in embarrassment.

What was he even thinking?

I nodded in agreement to his request, and he collected the spoon from my hands gently and began to feed me. I ate in silence until the need I had felt to cry earlier began to submerge. My stomach was still hurting like there was a large sore on its inner walls.

"Oh, my! why are you crying, little one?" He put the spoon back in the plastic plate and wiped my tears away with his thumb. His expression was so compassionate; eyebrows furrowed in unison, eyes laden with worry.

"My stomach hurts, and I feel fragile, but I know I won't be able to sleep because I have to go back to uprooting the weeds in the fields. I'm so tired," I confessed, sobbing hard as I struggled to swallow the morsel of food left in my mouth.

I think I was more downcast by the fact that I wouldn't be able to rest even when I needed it badly. It was hell. The fact that I had to work under the scorching sun when I desperately wanted to sleep under a cozy blanket was a painful reality.

"Aww. Don't worry about that, Cutie. You'll get the sleep you want."

Hearing him call me cutie made me cringe. I didn't like anyone calling me that, but since I was more interested in how he would provide a means for me to sleep, I let it slide.

"How? Doesn't the loan shark keep an eye on every slave?"

"He does, but not for every single hour of the day. Even if he's keeping an eye on us right now, don't worry. I'm the one who is promising you all of these things, and it'll be fine. I'll take you back to the dungeon now, and You'll sleep for two hours. Once it's six o'clock, I'll come back to wake you so you can go back to the fields.

By then, you'll feel a lot better, and the sun would have left the sky. Besides, you won't have much to do any longer because I would have completed most of the work on your portion of the land. I'll uproot the weeds for you and leave just a little for you to uproot.

I'd have loved to do everything for you, but that would cause trouble because the loan shark himself would come around to inspect the slaves by six-fifteen to see how far the slaves have gotten with their work. So he'd need to see you working there and not me. Do you understand?"

"Is it not dangerous that you're going to help me with my work right now?"

"Don't worry. I'll disguise myself as the other slaves. I'll take you back to the dungeon now and bring a few pillows for you so you can sleep. No one will visit the dungeon during these hours, so you make sure you get adequate sleep. Okay?"

"Okay," I agreed.

True to his words, the dungeon was empty.
The other slaves still worked rigorously on the fields, patches of sweat turning their light brown uniforms into a darker shade.

The sight of their cleanly shaved heads, glistening in the sun, took me back several hours when the strange woman had hacked thick, dark hair off my head. The loan shark made every slave shave their heads, and the strange woman had done mine with a sharp razor under the menacing eyes of her master.

I cried so much, but the loan shark hit my back repeatedly with a horsewhip, commanding me to keep quiet till the last strands of my hair were gone, and I had become bald. I was taken back to the dungeon where I'd remained all morning till the woman came back to get us marching onto the fields with chained feet.

I didn't know anything about the en-routes of this prominent place. Hence it was very confusing when I tried to wonder what path led to the dungeon from the storage room and every other pathway around the palace, but it wasn't my trouble to worry about since this strange guy seemed to be very reliable.

When we got to my cell, he lowered me gently to the floor. The food had restored some of my stamina, but I was still too weak to stand upright. My legs shook, and I had to lean against the iron bars to stop myself from falling. I watched, with heavy eyes, as he made a makeshift bed from the straw mat, blankets, and pillow he'd gotten from the storage room and had hidden beneath his uniform on our way here.

He laid me on the mat, covered me up, and stroke my forehead. His touch spiked up a feeling of uncertainty. I wanted to yank his hands off my forehead, though I didn't have the strength for that, and at the same time, I wanted him to continue caring for me because it reminded me of my brothers. Dan was the closest thing to home in this dangerous, horrid place.

" I'll bring another set of handcuffs when I come back by six o'clock. No one must know that you're not bound in chains right now. That would cause trouble, but since you need to sleep now, you need the freedom of movement while sleeping.

You should move your limbs and not sleep in a stiff position hence why I broke those chains. Sleep tight, and don't worry about a thing, okay?" Dan said and then removed his palm from my head. The warmth disappeared.

How could I not worry when he'd just, though unintentionally, reminded me that I was a slave? And that irrespective of the comfort I received, it didn't evade the fact that I was in captivity?

He stood, walked out quietly, padlocked the bars, and put out the lights. He was gone in a swift moment

He stood and walked out quietly as he locked the bars with a padlock without looking back. He put out the lights and was gone in a swift moment.

I stared at the little dimensional square of a window through which the sun peeped in, glaring at me. The images of my dad flashed through my mind, and tears trickled down my cheeks as I imagined the pain he must be going through, knowing, by now, that his daughter wasn't anywhere close.

"Daddy, I'm here. Will you ever find me?" I whispered, hoping that somehow, the wind would carry my voice out through the window, past the sunny fields, the peaky roads, the glistening waters, and onto the hibiscus garden where my dad mostly spent the days.

**
Dan came for me by six o'clock, true to his words, and took me back to the fields to uproot the rest of the weeds, which was just a tiny portion. Although I still lacked strength and had woken up with a throbbing ache in my head, I felt like I could gear myself on to do the work. The slaves were still there, pulling out the weeds in a tireless motion. It didn't seem like they had taken a moment to rest at all.

I was all alone now as the boy had to go back to the palace to continue his duties. By six-fifteen, the loan shark came around to inspect just like the boy had told me. I was thankful for the beads of sweat that gathered on my forehead; it made me seem like I'd been working all day, like the other slaves.

He used a chain whip on the woman, which looked very painful. The thought of being hit with that made me yell without making a noise. I knew if I screamed out, he would kill me too. So instead, I acted like the other slaves and continued to pull out the weed as nothing happened at all.

"If I come back by seven o'clock and find out that any one of you hasn't finished their work, I'll kill you just like I killed this woman," the loan shark bellowed, pointing his chain whip at the eerily still woman. "I'm sure you all know why I killed her. This woman was lazy and didn't complete even a quarter of her work. You all must be done by seven o'clock. Is that clear?" His voice bellowed thunderously.

"Yes, Sir!" All the slaves yelled in unison, and I couldn't tell if I'd joined them or not.

Then he left.

I began to sob again. I would never get used to this. It was horrible to imagine that it would be my turn to die one day; sleeping with the thought of death every day was a situation I never expected to come to existence in my life.

**

Months passed by, and Dan kept coming through for me. These months were still unbearable as I spent them in this scary place, but Dan was always there to help me in various ways. The loan shark didn't get any nicer to any of us, and there were times when he made a scapegoat of the other slaves.

The loan shark whipped me very often with the horsewhip on days when I didn't clean the library thoroughly. The loan shark beat me so much that the slaves would wince to the point of tears, but I had gotten used to the horsewhip, and I didn't cry any longer.

Then he began to use the chain whip, and I sustained deep wounds. He'd order that I get no food for the next three days or the next week, depending on how angry he was.

On nights like that, Dan came through. He would get me food, bandages, and medical solutions to help disinfect my wounds. If he couldn't come, he would send help through a slave named Krystal.

Krystal was Japanese, which made me wonder why she was a slave in a place like this, but she barely answered any of my questions. Nevertheless, she was kind to me and would deliver whatever Dan had to give me. Sometimes, we shared the meals, and she helped me treat my wounds on other days too.

I was just a nine-year-old with a small height, so I never understood how the loan shark would expect me to thoroughly clean a library with high walls and pillars just by mounting a ladder. The library was too spacious, and some older slaves could do the job better, but he purposely always picked me to clean it.

I had often slipped off the ladder and had nearly broken my head, but Dan always caught me just in time. I didn't know how he did it, but he was always on time to save me.

Whenever Dan caught me like that, he'd put me to sit on one of the wooden chairs and would help me clean the walls. But he didn't stay for long for fear of being caught by the loan shark.

Whenever he was about to leave, Krystal would come in to help me with the rest of the work, and then I'd clean the shelves where my heights could reach.

He continued to give me more dangerous tasks. He once asked me to clean the chandeliers hanging from the living room's high ceilings and had tried forcing me to kill a king cobra he spotted on a fence on another day.

The Cobra was about to spit its venom, which would have landed in my eyes when Dan appeared from nowhere and blocked my eyes with his hands. We toppled over each other and fell to the grass, but that didn't matter.

What mattered was that Dan came on time and saved me from going blind, and I was extremely thankful to him.

I wondered what made The Loan Shark so mean to everyone and why everyone was a slave, including myself. Thinking about that had me trying to guess what my mum had done to warrant me being here and why and it made me cry very often on realizing that my mum didn't love me at all.

I often missed home and prayed to God every day for a sign. A sign that my family was making conscious efforts to find me or a sign to show that they were close by and would see me very soon.

On one sunny day, while I was working tediously on the fields, I heard the clanging of metal. I don't know what made me want to know what it was, but I was curious anyway. I wiped the massive beads of sweat off my face and dusted the sandy particles from my hands, only for me to glance at the ground and find a kobo.

I was so delighted. I picked it up immediately and studied it. It was a hundred kobo.
I was so delighted. I picked it up immediately and studied it. It was a hundred Kobo. My dad used to keep coins in his pockets, and I loved to ask what the coins were about because the faces engraved on them fascinated me.

"This is Nigerian Naira, subdivided into kobo. It's a coin, but it's called kobo because that is the Nigerian currency. Don't worry, my love. I will buy you a beautiful Barbie doll with these coins!" He smiled brightly at me when I giggled.

"Wow! So you can buy whatever you want in the world with these coins?!" I asked, intrigued.

"Yes, baby girl."

" Will you buy me a mansion with these coins?"

"Yes, baby girl."

"How about the ocean?" I asked, now jumping with joy.

"Most definitely, my love! I could buy you the whole world with millions of these coins!!" He said, smiling ever so radiantly at me, and then scooped me up in his arms and placed a kiss on my cheek.

Tears gathered in my eyes as I stared at the kobo, memories of my dad smiling at me playing in my mind. I took the coin as a sign. A beautiful, significant indication and I thanked God for answering my prayer.

"I know you'll find me, daddy. I will wait for you," I said in my mind as I dipped the coin into my pocket and resumed work on the fields with an ethereal kind of strength.

But I kept waiting and waiting, and life got harder and harder. The loan shark became meaner and meaner. He increased our workload as the weeks passed.

In the mornings, we would plow the fields and plant several seeds and uproot the weeds till the early morning sun shone. At midday, after working hard on the grassland, we'd carry heavy bags of grains to the store. Of course, someone was watching us closely, and anyone who dared to steal food from the store paid for it dearly.

I could not blame them for trying to steal food though. I probably would have done the same, but for Dan, who always made arrangements to get food and counted myself lucky.

In the afternoon, we scrubbed the enormous outer walls of the supplies building. We'd wash for hours, yet the slimy, disgusting walls never got clean. Many slaves slumped from exhaustion, while a few died from extreme starvation, dehydration, and stress.

It was challenging, and I cried every day.

My dad was taking too much time to find me. I could barely hang on any longer. Besides, it was November already. My birthday was coming soon, and I would be ten years old. I could not believe I would be spending my birthday in captivity. It was the hardest pill for me to swallow ever since I became a slave.

I could not believe that I would not take pictures with my family like the previous years, blow out candles from my birthday cake, make my girly wish, and wear my favorite dress. Instead, I would be spending my birthday cutting grasses, scrubbing high walls, or even battling wild animals.

My heart grew sore, and my head banged. It became harrowing to wait. God, please, I don't want to spend my birthday in this place. It's going to make me so sad. Please, bring my dad close to me so he can find me on time. It was my daily prayer as I held on to my treasure and the only thing I owned – the kobo.

But days passed by, and then it was just a week left for my birthday. And I was still in this place, suffering, sometimes starving, and getting weaker at my tender age. One evening, as Dan came, as usual, to bring a tiny share of food for me, I made a small decision.

"Can a 100 kobo buy me a birthday cake?" I asked him as he fed me gently with a spoonful of yam porridge. It was midnight, and all of the slaves were asleep. Krystal, who had become my inmate, slept at the far end of our cell. Dan sat on the cold floor with me like a big brother.

"Well...it can. Only that the cake would be small in size. Do you want to buy a cake? When is your birthday?" he asked, his eyes widening in curiosity.

"November the 20th."

"But how will you get the money to buy the cake?" he asked.

"I have a coin. It's a Nigerian currency, unlike the currency used here. I found it while on the fields one afternoon."

"Wow. That is a good omen, " Dan said, looking very impressed.

"What is an omen?"

"It's a sign. It could be good or bad."

Wow, so my dad was going to come for me, I thought. Dan's words renewed a hope that pain had initially quenched. Maybe I could still leave this place just before my birthday came. Hopefully though.

"Can you help me buy the cake?"

"Well...I'm a slave here too, remember?" he said, raising a brow.

"So you won't help me?" I could not believe that he was unable to help me this time around. I had too much faith in him.

"What makes you think I can this time around?"

"Because you have been helping me."

"Hmm." He looked at me with skepticism and a mix of sarcasm in his expression. "I can help you. I'll go to the bakery tomorrow and talk to them," he assured me. "I like that you trust me so much."

"Thank you." that was all I said with a wry smile on my face.

***

My birthday came, and I was still in the strange land, working hard, working in intense pain. During the week that led to my birthday, the loan shark got a new wife, which only worsened.

I'd always thought of women as people with soft hearts and the direct counterparts of their harsh and brusque husbands. That had been my mindset as I watched some of my neighbors and how they treated their children. The wives always seemed compassionate while the husbands, pretty much emotionless, so I thought that the arrival of this woman was going to at least make things a little better for the other slaves and me.

But this woman was as mean as her husband.

Every day, she requested that we prepare dishes of all kinds for her; salad and assorted beef, chicken and fish barbecue, rice rich in several ingredients, which took hours to prepare.

She only rejected the meals when served, saying that she'd lost her appetite and now craved sweet potatoes and sauce or some other dish. It was frustrating, and the worst part was no one was allowed to eat the rejected meal. If she caught anyone doing so, she'd hand them over to her husband, who would kill the culprit straight away.

It was so unbelievable how wicked she was towards us.

After preparing meals for her for half of the entire day, we would then go back to our nerve-wracking daily routine of scrubbing walls and uprooting the most stubborn sets of weeds I had ever seen.

Unfortunately, it was my turn to cook her meals on my birthday but thankfully, I had a good knowledge of making what she requested since I liked watching my brother, David, cook. I made her Spaghetti and meatballs in the best way I could, only for her to complain that I had taken too long and she wanted beans instead.

I didn't know how to go about cooking beans, so I wept, knowing I was in trouble.

Krystal, fortunately, had something to do in the kitchen, so she helped me with the beans.

"Happy birthday, Sandra," she said to me as she washed the beans after parboiling them. I wiped the tears off my eyes.

"Thank you," I answered sadly.

"What are you doing?" A gruff voice sounded from right behind us. Krystal and I flinched. Standing still, I knew who it was immediately.

"I'm helping her cook beans, " Krystal answered bravely as she turned to face the loan shark. I pinched Krystal slightly out of fear but Krystal refused to bow down or look at her feet as she replied the loan shark.

"And why are you helping her?"

"Our master, your wife ordered her to prepare this meal but she has no idea how to cook it. She's just ten years old. It's ridiculous to expect that she would prepare such a meal without assistance."

My heart pounded loudly. Krystal was being too bold. Where did she get the balls to talk to the loan shark like that?! Did she have a death wish?

Oh yes, she had and Cassie couldn't blame her because death was better than having to suffer like this and the loan shark did grant it.

Then, I heard a gunshot, and the next thing I saw was Krystal lying on the marbled floor with blood oozing from her head as she lay motionless. The semi-soft bean pods were splattered on the floor as they poured out of the plastic bowl, and then I turned towards the entrance of the kitchen only for me to see the loan shark himself, fuming.

"No wonder the bitch was taking so much time to get my juice prepared," he growled.

I could not help it any longer. I cried so much, and I cried loudly. I didn't care if the man would shoot me as he did with Krystal. I expected it to happen but the reality of it happening right before my eyes broke my heart to a point of soreness.

Of course, he yelled at me to shut up. He grabbed me by the collar of my pinafore when I refused and threw a slap across my face, but that only made me wail louder and him angrier. He brought out his horsewhip and thrashed me with it, screaming at me to keep quiet.

I fell to the ground, screaming as his whip cut through my skin until I could take it no more, and utterly frail, and in severe pains, I succumbed to darkness and drifted away.

***

It was eleven o'clock when Dan woke me up in my cell. My body hurt terribly, and the light bulb above us burned brightly, stinging my bloodshot eyes, but it also provided me the warmth I needed.

The bowl of hot water by my feet and the damp towel in Dan's hand made me realize he had been with me for a while. He'd been giving my body a massage. Thankfully, it made me feel a little less sore when I sat up, and that's when my eyes darted towards my birthday cake.
It was beautiful and much more prominent, compared to what Dan had told me a 100kobo could buy.

"Happy birthday," he said softly.

"Did you buy this cake with the 100 kobos I gave you?"

"No, I could not. The bakers wouldn't accept any other currency, so I bought the cake with the few coins I had left," Dan said as he handed my coin back to me.

"Wow. Thank you."

"No problem. Are you going to blow the candles out now and make your wish? It's almost midnight," he said.

I nodded as I felt tears gather around my eyes.

It was a beautiful flowery cake with pink and white colors, but there was no inscription on it like you would see on an actual birthday cake. So there was no such thing as 'happy birthday Sandra,' but I could understand. Dan most likely didn't want anyone to know that he was buying the cake for a slave. It was implicating.

He brought the cake out of its fancy nylon package and placed it on the mat before me, then lit the candle standing on top of the cake.

"Now make your wish, little one," he said.

I looked over at the far end where Krystal would normally sleep. At times, I slept next to her just for the fun of it. On some nights, she would tell me about her country Japan and her favorite anime. She spoke about Naruto very often, and even when I could not understand what she said, I would listen anyway.

My hair had grown considerably well ever since the loan shark ordered that my hair be shaved, and she would leisurely braid it for me on Saturdays and loosen it afterward since it was against the rules. During these times, she would teach me Japanese songs, and I would sing along even when I mostly sang rubbish.

I couldn't believe that I would never get to see her again. On a day like this, she would have wished me Tanjōbiomedetō, a merry song which meant happy birthday in Japanese and would have blown out the candles with me, but she only got to wish me that briefly before she died.

Now, I was sobbing so much. I didn't know how loud I was until Dan tried to silence me, asking me why I was crying.

Then I stared back at my cake and went on to make my wish. Dan patted my back gently as I spoke:

"Daddy, I hate it in here, and I want to come home. Come for me and take me away from here. I cry every day in this place, and I'm making this wish with tears in my eyes. Please, take me home."

I blew out the light from the candle and watched as the greyish smoke wafted out the window.

Hopefully, my actual savior would come for me.

***********

Psalms 55:12-14 - "For it is not an enemy who reproaches me; then I could bear it. Nor is it one who hates me who has exalted himself against me; Then I could hide from him. But it was you, a man my equal, my companion, and my acquaintance. We took sweet counsel together and walked to the house of God in the throng."