It was during the darkest hours, those before the dawn that they stole up from the river. Silently encircling the village and stopping on the outside of the boma. The dogs, the villager’s normal clarions, died noiselessly after eating the poisoned meat, thrown over the thorn bush barrier, designed to keep the Hyenas and marauding leopards away from the livestock of goats and the few cattle they kept.
The heat of the hot sun had leached out of the dung bricks that formed the bases of the huts, to be replaced by the chill of the night. They slept on rough cots, covered in skins or blankets given by the missionaries, oblivious of their impending fate.
The signal, a short yip, woke Aneesha. Her ears, attuned to the noises of the bush, recognized the sound as being different, not belonging. Her senses, alert to the sudden quiet, were already too late. The strung cowrie shell beads, that hung over the doorway of their hut to deter flies, drew apart, swept side ways by an arm and the dark bulk of a man filled the doorway. His machete gleamed dully in the wane moonlight.
“Run Aneesha, run.” Her mother hissed from the other side of the hut. It was all she needed to galvanize her into motion.
She felt, rather than saw, her mother race across the packed earth, her own weapon raised. She had the advantage of surprise over the intruder and was able to stab at him, slashing his arm. He cried out while stepping back, his voice, loud in the silence of the night, alerted the rest of the villagers. His stepping back was all the space Victoria needed. Like an eel, she slipped through the gap between the doorway and the strangers legs while the din of fighting rose behind her.
Aneesha heard her mother scream, it was the last time she would hear her mother and, as she wriggled through the opening of the boma, was the last time she would see her village again.
She paused on the outside of the enclosure, trying to decide which way to go. The bush perhaps, with all the night time prowlers, many of which would eat her, or the river? The crocodiles were fearsome creatures, but the hippos were a worse prospect, especially at night when they would be out on the banks. On the whole, the river was the safer of the two options. It was the wrong one, but she wasn’t to know that. Aneesha ran, her bare feet slapping on the well worn path, towards the landing beach they called their own. Towards the dugouts she knew would be waiting. Perhaps, if she could launch one, she might get away.
Torch light glowed on the beach, glittering between the tree trunks. She stopped her headlong dash just in time and crouched behind a thorn bush. Three men stood facing the village, each holding a blazing torch of twisted, pitch covered, grasses. She watched them and saw ten large canoes pulled up alongside the dugouts of her people. She couldn’t get to them, couldn’t get past the men. She hunkered down to wait to see what opportunity to escape she might have.
The smell of smoke came first followed by a deep orange glow from behind her. The village was in flames, the rush and leaf roofs burned fiercely, sending sparks high into the air and lighting everything around as if the sun had made an early appearance.
Pretty soon, her people were being led to the canoes in single file, tied to each other with a heavy rope, looped around their necks. Aneesha looked to see if her mother was there, but no, she wasn’t part of the shambling snake. Only a few of the mothers had survived, just the younger ones. The snake was made up of her friends, children and teenagers, roped together and pushed along by the machete wielding strangers.
They seemed taller than her people, with a blackness enhanced by sweat and oils. Tribal markings had left scars on their faces and what words they spoke, were completely incomprehensible to her. Three white men seemed to be running the raid. They directed the black hunters, yelling orders and pushing their captives with long sticks. Aneesha had never seen a white man before and wondered at the amount of clothing they had on.
The canoes began to fill with her people, who had seemed to have given up hope, such was their shambling gait. Even the younger ones walked desultorily with their heads bowed, soundless, apart from shuffling of feet on the sand of the beach.
Suddenly, a huge hand gripped her by the back of her neck and yanked her off of her feet. The thorns of the bush grazed and cut her as she sailed into the air. Aneesha didn’t notice the pains of the scratches. She was knocked unconscious and knew no more.
She woke some time later to find herself in the bilges of a barque. Filthy water swilled around her ankles as the ship rolled. The smell of the hold was foetid and stank of rotten flesh and despair. In the dimness of the ships belly, she saw what was left of her villagers and probably fifty more strangers sitting on benches around the sides. They each stared lifelessly, hopelessly into the bilge water. And then, as if by an unseen signal, they howled and wailed and prayed to the gods to save them, but it was all to no avail. After a few hours, just after sunrise, they landed on different shores. The Ivory Coast, with its slave holding pens, marked the beginning of Aneesha’s travels to distant lands. She would never see Africa again, but it would never leave her heart.
“What’s happening?” She asked one of the women who tried to protect the youngest children by holding them together in an embrace while they cried, frightened and bewildered and torn from their mothers.
“Slavers!” It was a single word that struck terror into her heart. A single word, that spoke volumes of horrors and terrible tales. Tales that related of whipping, torture, rape, mass-murder and the disappearance of so many people the slavers evinced as they scoured her native lands in their flesh trade.
They had been plundering the villages nearer the coast for several years, but this was the first time in living memory that they had travelled so far up the river. Stories of their brutality were rife and probably not that much embellished in the telling. Fear struck Aneesha like a hammer blow, quickly followed by the realisation that her mother and father would be dead now and left for the carrion eaters. The fear she felt was eventually overcome by a desperation and realisation of her plight. The reputation of the Slavers had been passed from one to another, they never left anyone behind. Aneesha’s heart broke at that point. Her spirit left her to be replaced by an acceptance of her fate like a cold stone in place of her heart. Hope was all gone and the vitality of life dimmed from her eyes.
She didn’t die. Fate had not finished with Aneesha. Hers was to be a long path. They left the Ivory Coast and began a journey of nightmare and blessed death for many of them.
The slaves didn’t fare well on the six week journey to America. The food was almost inedible, when it was sporadically passed down in a bucket on a rope through the hatch. There was never enough to eat and very little fresh water. Sea sickness accounted for several as did dysentery and disease. The bodies were left to rot where they fell. In all, less than half made it, but life was cheap and of course, there were plenty more to replace them, in the bush.
One day, after possibly two weeks aboard, the latticed cargo hold doors were suddenly thrown back with a sickening thud. The ship was becalmed. No wind came to cool them or take away the stench of the dead and dying. Black faces appeared over the sides of the hatchway, talking in excited voices, laughing and jeering at the poor hapless cargo they had. Fingers pointed and a small black boy was lowered on a rope, tied around his waist. He grinned around the edges of a knife clamped between his teeth and chittered like a small monkey while he descended.
The rope bonds around ankles and wrists were cut, freeing them from the benches and each other. Wringing hands pleaded for food, water and fresh air, but the only ones who left the hold were those selected by the grinning faces above. Another rope was lowered and tied around the waists of those chosen. These were hauled up by unseen hands until they vanished over the hatch wall, some six feet above their heads. Many would not return.
Aneesha was one of the last to be selected. A grinning face directed monkey boy, as she had now named him, until he stood in front of her pointing and nodding. She looked up at him disinterestedly, her mind numb from the many hours sat with the bilge water sloshing around her ankles, lack of food and dehydration in the heat of the hold and so many bodies crammed together.
The hemp rope was tied around her middle and went suddenly taught when she was yanked off of her feet, breath forced out of her lungs as she ascended towards the sunlight of the hatch opening.
The fresh air and sunlight hit her hard in its harshness making her unsighted and unsteady when she at last, stood on the deck. She gradually focused on the face before her, noticing in an abstract way, how his tribal markings swirled around his cheeks in ridges, as if something where under the skin. He seemed to be capering in his delight of choice, making unintelligible noises as he danced in front of her.
What clothing she had left had turned to rags. This was torn from her body, leaving her naked, standing on the deck. Aneesha didn’t attempt to cover herself, didn’t have the strength of will to command her arms.
“Are you a virgin?” She didn’t understand him, his Swahili was quite poor and, in her somnambulistic state, she was entirely unable to unscramble the words. He repeated the question, a little louder and more slowly and then in French, of which language she had no knowledge. But, still Aneesha stood, immobile and unresponsive.
And then he slapped her face, hard enough to twist her head, but not enough to knock her off her feet.
“Are you a virgin?” He shouted at her face. She felt his spittle hit her and smelled his rotten breath.
She nodded slowly, confirming her status as untouched.
She was supposed to be getting married this year, her suitor had been chosen from a neighbouring village, the deal struck between the respective fathers, over a cup of the lethally alcoholic root beer and a dowry of five goats. She had met him once and shyly looked at him from lowered eyes. He seemed to be suitable, wasn’t fat and looked as if he might be able to provide for her. In preparation for her marriage, Aneesha’s mother had begun the teaching of womanhood, how to take care of a child and cooking instructions, simple herbal remedies but more importantly, how to satisfy her husband at night. Those lessons had caused Aneesha to giggle and be embarrassed as she found out about her body and its pleasure zones and those of a man. A well worn root, vaguely phallic in shape, acted as her future husband’s penis. Aneesha knew now, what sex was, what it was for and that it could be the bringer of much pleasure or it could be the source of much pain if not given due consideration.
Aneesha was a virgin still, but had the knowledge implanted, ready for use.
He reached out and grasped her left breast, all the while grinning, showing missing teeth, his tongue protruding like a pink worm from his mouth. He cupped it as if weighing and judging its flexibility, then did the same to her right side. He licked his lips and pinched her nipple, hard. The sharp pain made her wince and gasp. His grin grew wider as her nipple hardened and grew wider still when he began to pinch both nipples at the same time.
Aneesha stood still, hoping that if she acted as if she didn’t care, he might stop and leave her alone. The tingle in her teats had passed beyond a mild feeling, to one of intense pain, but she set her jaw and wouldn’t allow her discomfort show on her face.
It didn’t work.
He became even more animated, hoping from one foot to another in a mad gambol, as he fondled her pointed breasts, alternately pinching and caressing her nipples that had grown hard under his treatment of them and then cupping her whole breast, feeling the hard nipple on his calloused palm. His grin grew manic, eyes darting in staccato jerks. His tongue flicking in and out like a lizard would, rapidly tasting the air.
And then he stilled, his concentration centred on her hair covered sex, her breasts forgotten, as was his marionette dance. Gingerly, he reached for her mound with a solitary finger of an upturned hand. The tip of his finger touched her pubis and swirled around as if trying to knot her hair. The tongue extended between his cracked lips and his brow furrowed in concentration. Agonisingly slowly, his finger gradually travelled downwards, deeper between her legs until it brushed over her clitoris and then on to her lips, taking advantage of the small gap between her upper thighs.
Aneesha couldn’t help her gasp as a sharp breath whistled in. Only her mother had touched her there and that seemed to be a very long time ago. Even Aneesha had not experimented with this part of her body very much, preferring to wait until she was a married woman, saving the pleasure for her husband. She feared that this grinning ape would hook his finger and enter her body. She feared that she would be violated and not worth her dowry because of it. Then she realised that it didn’t matter any more, she was unlikely to see Adeshina, her betrothed, again. It was unlikely he would want her now, violated or not.
Thinking that she may as well accept her fate and try to make it just a little less unpleasant, she parted her legs, helping him to feel her sex that much easier.
His finger tip explored her lips, running along the crease with a light pressure. It was a far more delicate touch than she would have accredited him with. Her wetness exuded, slicking his finger tip. Her body, not knowing the difference between consensual and non consensual sex, was preparing for acceptance of a male organ by lubricating the walls of her vagina. He either didn’t notice or was not interested because the finger passed beyond her opening and found the puckered hole of her anus.
He pushed, not quite in the right place, adjusted and pushed again until he had passed the tight ring of muscle and hooked his finger so that it was lodged inside her. They stood, motionless for a few moments, face to face and swapping breath in their closeness, both breathing rapidly, he from excitement, Aneesha in pain and confusion. She hadn’t expected this at all and didn’t realise, until then, that it was even possible to enter that particular hole.
Then he began to work his finger, wriggling it inside her, but she was too dry for him to gain much purchase. He pulled his finger out again, spat on it and then reinserted it. He finger fucked her, not too hard that it would tear her, but firmly enough to make her bowel relax from the foreign intrusion.
Judging her to be ready, he pulled his finger out, pulled his loincloth to one side, spat in his palm and worked the saliva over his rigid cock, turned her around and bent her over the gunwale. None too gently, he fed his head into the worked passage of her ass, separating her buttocks to ease things along.
Aneesha stared at the gently rippling water of the becalmed sea, trying to disassociate what was happening, from the burning sensation of her ass, as his head passed her sphincter and was then quickly followed by his whole member.
He fucked into her. Using his powerful thighs as a fulcrum, he fucked into her, almost lifting her off of her splayed feet. The rough wood of the gunwale grated on her breasts, leaving tiny splinters, as they rubbed over the rail in reaction to the thrusting from behind. She cried, silently, her tears splashing into the salt water below, daring not to move in case he made it even deeper into her body and got stuck. Such was her fear. The violation was just something she would put up with, but having him stuck inside her left her mortally afraid.
Suddenly, his body stiffened and a strangulated cry came from his throat. He sprayed her insides with his spend in several spurts. Aneesha felt each of them as his cock throbbed from the ejaculation. It was over, for now, it was over and she thanked God that she had survived.
“Virgins is worth twice as much money, but there’s nothing to stop me using any other hole.” He whispered into her ear from behind as he withdrew his spent cock from her, giving her the information is if it were a pearl of wisdom. His Swahili was, indeed bad, but she understood every word and knew that the voyage to where ever it was they were going to was going to be filled with times just like this.
“What’s your name girl?”
Aneesha found her voice.
“Aneesha.” She answered.
“What does that mean?” He asked, his head cocking to one side.
“It means companion.” She looked at her feet, noticing how filthy they were, even though they were constantly washed by bilge water.
“From now on, you are Victoria. Understand? Victoria. You forget your old name. You forget where you came from. It is the only way.”
Looking for something positive, in the ever optimistic way the human race will do when faced with adversity, she thought. At least it is a break from the confines of that dank and foetid hold. She wouldn’t be one of the lifeless bodies now floating gentle away from the barque, waiting to sink or become food for the sharks that had learned to follow the slave ships across the Atlantic. What matter she had a new name? What matter the violation of her body, it was all worthless now.
The ships captain looked on dispassionately from his vantage point at the helm. For him, this was the second leg of his trip from England in a round trip that would take many months. He had sailed from Southampton to the Ivory Coast, through the Bay of Biscay and its turbulence, to pick up slaves from the Ivory Coast, and then sail across to St Dominique in the Caribbean. Sell the cargo of slaves at the best price possible, before sailing for home with a cargo of tobacco and sugar. It was the final cargo that was most valuable. The slaves were merely a bi-product of the trade and something he wasn’t too interested with. Dealing in human flesh wasn’t something he was entirely comfortable with. So, their fate didn’t faze him and was a luxury he tried not to allow to concern him, overly much.
The price realized for a slave was the crew’s wage above the standard rate for a seaman. He allowed them to choose one to be their personal sale in the markets. By doing that, he ensured that at least some of them would make it. The rest would either die or be sold as a lot, to go to the plantations. He usually managed to bring over around one hundred and fifty out of the original bulwark busting three hundred. Natural wastage and the rigours of the passage accounted for a large proportion.