The carriage rolled through two more villages over the next three days, following the sa pattern each ti. Aldric would disappear for an hour or two, returning with one or two more children in tow. Each new addition looked as confused and nervous as Renard’s group had been initially.
Renard watched it happen twice more. First in a small farming village where Aldric ca back with a skinny boy who couldn’t stop looking over his shoulder. Then in a mountain settlent where he returned with twin girls who held each other’s hands so tight their knuckles were white.
The sa lies. The sa promises. The sa desperate hope in young eyes.
’They really think they’re going to learn magic,’ Renard thought as he watched the newest arrivals try to make sense of their situation.
By the fourth day, their comfortable carriage had beco crowded with seven children in total. The space that had seed roomy with just three now felt cramped. Everyone was tired, cranky, and starting to sll. The twins whispered to each other in a language Renard didn’t recognize. The skinny boy from the farming village spent most of his ti staring out the window like he was morizing the way back ho.
That’s when everything changed.
"We’ll be switching to more suitable transportation," Veil announced as they approached what looked like a trading post at the base of a mountain pass. "The path ahead is too narrow for the carriage."
The trading post was little more than a collection of weathered wooden buildings clustered around a central courtyard. But what caught Renard’s attention wasn’t the buildings—it was the large, iron-reinforced wagon waiting in the yard.
Unlike their elegant carriage, this vehicle was built for cargo transport. Heavy wooden sides rose high enough to block the view of anyone sitting inside, and iron bars had been welded across the small windows near the top. It looked more like a mobile prison than transportation.
"Line up here," Aldric called out, his earlier friendly deanor notably absent. "We need to organize seating arrangents."
Renard noticed how the man’s voice had changed. Three days ago, he’d been all smiles and gentle words. Now he sounded like what he really was—soone used to giving orders and having them followed without question.
’I wonder if any of the others can see it. Probably not. They’re still hoping this is all so kind of mistake.’
As they approached the wagon, Renard caught sight of movent through the barred windows. There were already people inside—children, from what he could tell. And they weren’t moving much.
’.....This is worse than I thought.’
Veil opened the heavy rear door of the wagon, and the sll hit them imdiately. Unwashed bodies, fear-sweat, and sothing else Renard couldn’t quite identify but made his stomach turn.
Inside, roughly a dozen children sat in cramped conditions. So were bound with rope around their wrists and ankles. Others slumped against the wagon walls, their eyes closed and breathing shallow—unconscious, but not sleeping. A few stared out with hollow, terrified expressions.
’How long have they been in there? Days? Weeks?’
Renard felt Zaena grab his arm. Her hand was shaking.
"Get in," Veil ordered, her staff glowing faintly as essence flowed through the beast core. "Quickly."
Zaena stepped back instinctively. "What... what’s wrong with them?"
"They’re resting," Aldric said, but his hand had moved to rest on his sword hilt. "So children get travel sickness. We’ve given them dicine to help."
’Tell better lies at least,’ Renard thought. Even a child could see through that garbage. The bound ones had bruises on their faces. The unconscious ones were too still, breathing too slowly. And the awake ones looked like they’d seen things that would give adults nightmares.
Kai looked between the wagon and the two adults, his face pale. "I don’t want to go in there."
"You don’t have a choice," Veil’s voice carried no warmth now, only cold authority. The pretense was over. "Get in the wagon, or we’ll put you in unconscious like the others."
Renard watched the exact mont when it hit the other children. When the comfortable lie they’d been living for three days cracked apart and showed them the truth underneath.
The twins started crying quietly. The skinny boy from the farming village began breathing too fast. One of the newer children, a girl about ten years old, started crying loudly.
"I want to go ho. Please, I want to go back to my mama."
Aldric sighed and nodded to Veil. She raised her staff, and the beast core pulsed with a sickly green light. The crying girl’s eyes rolled back, and she collapsed before Aldric caught her.
"Anyone else want to make this difficult?" he asked, tossing the unconscious girl into the wagon like a sack of grain.
The ssage was clear. Get in willingly, or be forced in unconscious.
Renard climbed into the wagon first, helping Zaena and Kai up behind him. The other children followed, so whimpering, others trying to appear brave. The space was cramped and dark, with only thin shafts of light filtering through the barred windows.
’Three days ago they were excited about learning magic. Now they’re prisoners being shipped like cattle.’
As his eyes adjusted, Renard got a better look at their fellow prisoners. Most appeared to be between eight and fourteen years old. The bound ones bore bruises and cuts—evidence of attempted escapes. The unconscious ones were positioned carefully to avoid suffocating, which ant their captors needed them alive.
Zaena squeezed herself between Renard and the wagon wall. "This isn’t right," she whispered. "This isn’t what they said would happen."
"I know," Renard whispered back. "Just stay calm and do what they say for now."
Kai was staring at one of the bound children, a boy about his own age with dried blood on his lip. "What do you think they did to him?"
’Probably tried to run. Or fight back. Or just asked too many questions.’
"Nothing good," Renard said quietly.
The door slamd shut with a heavy clang, followed by the sound of multiple locks engaging. Aldric’s voice ca through the iron bars.
"The journey from here will take a week. You’ll be fed twice daily and allowed out for necessary breaks. Any attempt to escape will result in restraints or sedation. I suggest you use this ti to prepare yourselves ntally for what’s ahead."
’A week in this box with twenty other terrified children....sigh’
The wagon lurched into motion, and they began climbing into the mountains.
As they rolled away from the trading post, Renard could hear so of the children starting to cry. Quiet, hopeless sounds that they tried to muffle so they wouldn’t end up like the girl who was now lying unconscious near the door.
Three days. That’s all it took to go from excited children to broken prisoners.
Three days ago, Zaena had been bouncing with excitent about learning magic. Kai had been asking a hundred questions about what the monastery would be like. The twins had been whispering about how proud their parents would be.
Now they sat in a prison wagon, too scared to speak above a whisper, watching other children who had already learned what happened to those who made too much noise.
Renard closed his eyes and tried to block out the sound of quiet sobbing around him. He needed to stay focused.
’Hold on,’ he told himself. ’Just hold on a little longer.’
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