“Come here, Slave!”

        The ten year old looked up, but he continued scrubbing his section of the Grand Hall’s floor vigorously. Lord William never called his slaves by their names, if they had a name because some of them didn’t. Instead, he just called all of them “Slave”. Therefore, Felix had to look up to see whether or not if it was him being called or another of the multiple slaves in the room with him, cleaning their own section of the floor. Because of the uncertainty whether or not it was him or a different slave being called, Felix continued his task. He didn’t want to be lashed for stopping his work without being ordered to stop. He noticed that all the other slaves did the smart thing as well. He could see them from the edges of his vision while he stared directly at Lord William, and in turn, his master’s dreadful eyes glared back at him.

        “Yes, you,” Lord William said, pointing a scrawny finger at Felix. “Come here.” Lord William pointed to the floor right in front of him as if commanding a dog to come.

        Felix scurried to his feet, not bothering to pick up his cleaning materials. He slipped across the wet floor, avoiding all the other slaves who bowed their heads back down and continued their work. As Felix approached with quick steps, he saw one of the castle guards standing beside Lord William. Felix knew all too well that wasn’t a good sign. Usually it meant punishment, but he had done nothing wrong. He was doing all his tasks on time and he had done all of them just the way his master wanted them to be done. So, why did Lord William need the guard? Was Felix being blamed for something he didn’t do? He wanted to throw himself down on his hands and knees before his master’s feet and beg mercy because he was innocent of any wrong doing. But Felix controlled himself, because taking such an action would only encourage the back hand of Lord William or, if Felix was lucky, a kick to the face.

        As soon as Felix reached Lord William, Felix bowed his head to avoid Lord William’s eyes, but now Felix was seeing the ring on Lord William’s right hand. Felix’s cheek stung just looking at it. Felix looked down at Lord William’s shoes instead.

        “I have a new permanent guest and it is now your responsibility to bring it its meals. This does not lessen any of your other responsibilities. You will still have to finish all of your tasks as well as feed our guest. Do you understand, Slave?”

        “Yes,” Felix said.

        Lord William’s fingers gripped Felix under his chin and forced his head upwards. “Look at me when I’m speaking to you, Slave! Do you understand your new task or not?”

        “Y-yes. I understand.”

        “Good.” Lord William let go and looked up at the guard. “Take this slave out of my sight. I have other matters to attend to.” With that, Lord William let and Felix followed close behind the guard. He hoped that this wouldn’t take too long. He really needed to get back to his other tasks. He already had too many responsibilities; he didn’t need another.

        Felix followed the guard through the castle, passing by other slave going about their duties. But Felix walked with his head bowed and didn’t look at the hopeless faces that filled the castle’s halls. A voice filled with an unfamiliar tone to Felix said, “How old are you?”

        Felix looked up from the ground and saw the guard he was following had his head turned to the side. He was the one that spoke to Felix.

        “What?”

        “Your age, what is it?”

        “Ten… I think.”

        “You think? You mean you don’t know?”

        Felix sensed shock in the guard’s voice, but a different kind of shock that he was used to hearing. This was not an angry kind. Felix didn’t know what to think of this strange man. He had seen nothing like this man in the castle. “We don’t celebrate birthdays regularly.”

        The guard nodded and asked yet another question, “How long have you been here?”

        “Five years.”

        The man sighed and shook his head. This time, anger escaped with the breath, but it didn’t seem to be directed at Felix. “Do you have a name?”

        Felix hesitated and thought about it.

        “Felix,” he finally answered after several seconds. Have I been here that long? Have I been simply called Slave for so long that I nearly forgot my own name? But even after answering the question he still wasn’t all too sure about Felix being his name, and he added in a mutter, “I think.”

        They walked into the kitchen where the cook hacked the meat with a cleaver. The cook’s helpers were helping prepare the rest of Lord William’s lunch.

        “Sloane!” the guard called out.

        Sloane drove the cleaver into the meat and let it stick there before he turned his attention to the guard.

        “Is our guest’s meal ready?”

        “Over there.” Sloane pointed to a cart filled with meat. “Lord William ordered me to give his guest scraps until the guest behaves.”

        Scraps? These people consider this scraps? Felix couldn’t believe it. This was the most meat he had ever seen. He would have done anything to have just a little of that meat-

        “Don’t even think about poking you dirty fingers in there, if you know what’s good for you, boy!” Sloane said.

        “This is Felix. He’ll be the one taking the meals to Lord William’s guest.”

        “I see. So he’ll be coming in regularly. Well, as long as he’s still alive that is.” Sloane turned his attention back to the slave. “You better not take any of that meat for yourself. I’ve made sure to portion it at just the right amount for our guest, meaning that all the food will be needed. You will not want to still be around if our guest is still hungry.” Sloane turned back around, took the cleaver in hand, and continued preparing lunch.

        The guard left and Felix followed behind, pushing the cart of meat. The cart was heavy with the meat and the large bowl of water it carried, but thanks to the five years of slavery, he was used to the hard work. Who needs all this food? There were questions about Lord William’s guest, but Felix knew better than to speak his mind, especially when around such a strange castle guard. It was a slave’s job to do what’s asked of them, not to ask the questions.

        The guard turned down a corridor Felix didn’t expect to go down. He stopped, confused by the guard’s course. No longer hearing the cart’s wheels clatter against the stone, the guard stopped in the middle of the corridor and turned around. “This way,” the guard said waving his hand towards him.

        “The guest rooms are the other way. That leads to the dungeons,” Felix spoke out the first time in years.

        “Lord William’s guest isn’t really a guest. Now come on.”

        This food is for a prisoner! Felix realized as he turned the cart and followed the guard down the incline that lead to the dungeons deep under the castle. It was a long silent trip, giving Felix the time to think about this odd task and what people were saying about this task. What worried him most was what Sloane had said. He warned Felix about not eating the food, and that he would not want to be around the guest was still hungry. What did that mean? Why did this task seem so dangerous?

        The corridors grew darker and the halls became more cave-like. The halls grew larger and almost gave just as much space as the Grand Hall. Metal doors stretched across the walls on either side, but they were rarely ever used and all of them would never be used all at once. There were just too many. The only time Felix ever heard of the dungeons in use were when Lord William felt that chaining slaves up in the lightless cells for days were the best punishment for the most extreme of cases.

        Felix pushed the cart till he reached the only other life in the dimly light hall. Four guards were posted at a single cell, but the set of double doors to that cell were wooden and bigger than trees, putting the castle’s entrance to shame. What was just beyond those doors? In one of those massive doors, a human-sized door was carved into it. This was the door Felix would have to go through because there was no way that he and the five men would be able to open the entirety of those large doors.

        “So, this is the slave that gets to feed Lord William’s pet?” one of the guards asked.

        “That boy’s going to be swallowed whole sooner or later, if he’s not careful,” another guard added and the four posted outside the cell laughed.

        “Just open the door for him,” the guard Felix followed ordered.

        The guard nearest to the door frowned. He fiddled with the keys and turned to the human-sized door. The guard Felix followed whispered to Felix, “Just don’t cross the line and you’ll be out of its reach.”

        Felix nodded and the door opened. Felix pushed the cart through the doorway with wobbly legs. The door closed behind Felix. The guard that Felix followed shook his head and sighed. “The poor kid.”

        “It’s just a stupid slave. It’s not like they’re people,” the guard by the door commented.