A Slave to Freedom
The Bonds of Life
She was born to a loving family, cared for and loved for the first five years of her life by both parents in a small cottage. They lived by their means, a small garden and what her parents and older brother could hunt and gather. Her childhood was filled with lighter memories of laughter and youthful enjoyment. The day the slavers came, her world burned before her eyes. Her father was killed defending them and unspeakable things were done to her mother while Saoirse herself was put in chains made especially for a creature her size. The most heart shattering experience for the wee Sidhe however was the sight of her brother at the door, accepting payment for the sale of his family. The disappointment in his voice when he heard that he would not be paid for his father.
She screamed for hours after they took her, made such a fuss that one of the slavers gagged her and very curtly told the child that if she did not silence herself they would make sure she never made another sound again. The ominous threat meant so little to a child and for the entire trip, she whimpered beneath the rag they'd crammed into her mouth. When they arrived at the camp, the same man who'd threatened her approached with a small collar in hand, a ring of cold metal that he slipped around her throat and sealed before pulling the rag from her mouth. She tried to yell at him, a fierce little creature in her defiance of her captors but the sound that greeted her was more akin to silence. In truth, she found that for one reason or another, she could not speak and each time she tried, a searing pain assaulted her throat. Tears of anger, frustration and fear welled up in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. There was no pity to be found in the slavers around her. They let her cry, knowing full well that it would not be the last time with what she would endure in the coming years.
The next ten years of her life were spent in training and four years after that to polish what she'd been taught. The "Master" who trained her was a cruel woman with a lash who ought not have been given the charge of such a child. While the barb of the whip kept her from acting out in more wild ways, it also made her more clever in her disobedience and far more vengeful. Each night she could steal away, she disguised herself as a boy in a high collared shirt and stole her way out to the courtyard to train with the boys in sticks, knives and other tools of war. The lady of the house was especially vain and did not believe that she needed to keep the little slave girl on a tight leash while within her household, she'd trained many far more timid creatures and none of -them- had done anything even half so bold.

One late night, the master of arms caught a strange "boy" practicing in the courts when all the other children had run off home for dinner. He watched the child go through drills many times over before he interrupted, quietly correcting the child's position. It occurred to him who the youth was and what the high collared shirt hid but he made no comment, allowing her to continue through the drill properly before he stopped her again.

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"You do not belong out here and yet here we are. Do you truly think this is worth the beating you will surely receive?"

She looked up at him, the color of her eyes shifting to a stubborn dark green. She had no words for him, her voice long ago stolen by those who'd first placed the collar on her throat. All he received in reply was a very fierce nod.

"Very well then child. I will teach you how to do it right. On one condition. Each day you will continue your studies with the Madame. You will not only continue them, you will excel in them. If I hear even once that you have been disobedient beyond coming out here for lessons, I will cease. Do you understand?"

A much more hesitant nod was offered this time, the color of her eyes shifting to an uncertain dark yellow. While she had never seen the arms master as anything but an honorable man, it still bothered her a great deal that he was capable of living and working in a home where slavery was the norm. Still, she was in no position to refuse such a generous offer that gave her what she wanted without risking a beating for it.

She became the ideal student in the training house, meeting every lesson as though it were a challenge to be conquered. On her ninth year in the house, she was deemed ready for sale but Saoirse herself had other plans. The little lass had no intention of becoming a trophy in someone's house, a maid or a bed playmate.

Saoirse managed to convince the Madame's twelve year old son that he was in love with her and the boy truly believed that the only way he could be with her forever was to free her from her bonds and escape with her into the wilds. In truth, she cared nothing for the spoiled boy and the day he freed her of the collar, she dosed him with enough sedative from the slaver's rooms to keep him out for long after she left.

After shedding her collar, Saoirse took a small pack of items she'd stolen and collected over time, including some food pilfered from the kitchens and fled the estate. The house itself was not long from the wilds and she soon lost herself within them. It had been her dearest wish to find her home but soon enough, she found herself wholly lost in lands she knew very little about. Even with the map she'd acquired, everything was far larger and more frightening then she'd expected. She was unable to find her way back home though it took her weeks of travel and sleeping in hollow trees or holes in the ground to accept this. She traveled deeper into the wilds and eventually, began to make a home there.

For nine years, she lived in the wilds, finding out quickly that she could not trust anyone she came across or who dared to approach her. The tattoos on her frame that she'd received early on in her training marked her for what she was and those associated with the slave trade were all too eager to drag her back and sell her. She killed those who tried, though it was very rare that anyone happened upon her as far into the wilds as she'd gone. She'd long ago memorized the trails in and out of the wilds but did not until very recently discover that a city of sorts skirting the forest that she'd never dared approach before. Quietly she observed from dark corners and found soon that there did not appear to be a slave market in -this- city... it was -almost- enough to make her want a better look.