Slave's Nightmare [exclusive] Page

And the boy with my face was still there. Polishing. Smiling.

“I’m not him anymore,” I said.

In the corner stood a boy. No older than ten. He wore a linen shirt stained with tobacco juice and something darker. He was polishing the master’s boots. Over and over. The same motion. Left, right, left, right. His wrists were ringed in scars. slave's nightmare

I tried to wake. I always tried to wake. But the dream had teeth, and it would not let go. The boots in the boy’s hands became my hands. The lash on my back became my breath. The horn became the only music.

“Who is he?” I asked.

Because the nightmare was not the running. The nightmare was the waking.

When at last I did wake—gasping, sweating, the iron collar cold against my throat—the first thing I saw was the master’s boots, standing by the door. Polished. Waiting. And the boy with my face was still there

My chest burned. My back burned too, though I dared not touch it. I remembered the lash from waking life—how it had carved rivers into my skin. In the dream, those rivers were weeping. I felt blood trickle down my thighs, warm at first, then cold as the swamp air found it.