Filthy Rich tossed and turned in the night. His back was unaccustomed to the rough ground, his coat was unaccustomed to the leafy bedding, but probably most importantly of all, his legs were unaccustomed to the aching burning sensation all night.
Stirring himself awake, he pulled himself up and noticed that it wasn’t just his legs. It was his shoulders, thighs, and back. He could not recall ever having a full body ache as bad as this.
Instead, he settled into sitting up instead of standing. Rotating his neck, he looked over the two others in his cell, watching them both get up and stretch in turn. Spoiled Rich rubbed her shoulders and groaned, while Dawn Crest still laid down, nudging the still uneaten fruit.
The clinking of armor echoed down the hallway, signaling the approach of the morning guards. More of the leafy gruel in wooden bowls was thrust through the bars, and Filthy Rich set himself to finishing it off. It might have been his imagination, but it didn’t seem quite as foul today.
When he finished his bowl, there was a loud wooden clattering, as the guard banged some kind of club on the bars. Looking over, Dawn was glaring at him with a pout. Her bowl was still full.
The guard kicked at the fruit dropped in the cage, knocking it around, and he shouted something in their language at Dawn, who winced, but didn’t break her glare. He leaned up close and hissed something quietly to her, his voice venomous. Her resolve wavered as she visibly swallowed, and he pointed again to the gruel she had not touched, taunting her in some way.
She remained silent, glaring, but leaned down and started to lap up the gruel, and the guard rose up with a sneer, spitting a single word, and stepping back, turning his attention to the other two denizens of the cell. He barked an order at them, and while the words were unclear, the intent to not stare was, and both Filthy and Spoiled Rich looked away.
After a few minutes of slurping, the guard looked satisfied, and called out something ahead of him, out of the large hall they were in, pulling a key from his ring and unlocking the cell. He barked more orders, ushering the three slaves out, leading them through the dark tunnels of the compound.
Filthy Rich’s legs were stiff and ached. They begged for him to take it easy, but he could not. He couldn’t explain it to his captors (not directly, anyway) and they wouldn’t let him stop anyway. But it was alright. He had been around the bend before. He pulled carts for his father, before he was running the store. He’s helped out on the Apples’ farm to get ‘toughened up’. Sure, he sorta hated it at the time, but now he looked back on it fondly.
He wondered if there was a way to look back at this day fondly… If there would be that opportunity anymore. He scowled, purging the negative thought from his mind. It was no time to get negative.
They were led through the series of rights and lefts to the working yard, where the morning workers had already awoken, and the cart from yesterday was unloaded, the hitches were laid by some of the lumber, ready to be transported. The mare from yesterday, a dark blue seapony, was standing by one of the hitches, and grinned a sadistic grin when she saw Filthy Rich come around the bend, motioning to the guard to bring him over to her.
Filthy Rich suppressed a scowl and walked over to her, and she promptly gestured for him to turn around and strapped a bridle and harness onto him. She was talking, but Filthy Rich couldn’t even really parse what she was saying. Maybe she was describing what they were going to do for the day?
After hitching him up, she slapped his back with a laugh, and he cringed under the sting of her hoof. She smirked at his wince, but left him be, and instead moved back behind him, sliding out a bundle of lumber and hooking it up to his harness.
Picking up the switch with her mouth, she said just one recognizable word: “March.”
And Filthy Rich marched. The harness pulled taught, and his legs burnt like the dickens, and the bundle of lumber started sliding forward slowly. Filthy Rich took a deeper breath, and planted one foot in front of the other, focusing on staying stable and pulling consistently. There was no way he would be able to get through this otherwise.
He plodded forward, his legs aching with the pressure, but staying stable, as he pulled the bundle of lumber along. He was aware of the mare in his peripheral vision, walking alongside him with the switch in her mouth, but he determinedly ignored her. No good will come from it.
Eventually he reached another cleared area, where the mare said, in the common language, “Stop.” She gestured him to turn back, and he looked across the lot at the stacks of lumber yet to be delivered. It was a lot of lumber, and the girls were being diverted to other tasks. He swallowed hard, and marched back over as instructed.
Three bundles later, his legs felt more like wet noodles. He knew they hurt, he could dimly feel it, but at this point they were more numb than anything else. He flopped down on the ground, trying to get some much-needed rest, but not even thirty seconds later his handler was yelling at him, brandishing the switch.
Oh he wanted to tell her to go stuff herself. He wanted to lash out, to yell and scream. But… it wouldn’t accomplish anything. It would just make it harder on himself to fight back. She had brandished the switch several times already today, but only to scare him, and he would rather keep it that way. So, cringing, he planted his hooves on the ground and forced himself up, his legs protesting the whole time.
He stumbled over onto the hitching ground, and turned himself around. His legs trembled underneath him, but he was determined to fight through it. He felt the hitches on, and heard the command from his handler, and started straining himself forward.
A hoofstep came, but the bundle refused to budge, he gave a look behind him. It wasn’t even a larger bundle than before or anything, so he should be able to pull... The mare barked an order and brandished her switch.
He reared back a little, dug his hooves into the ground and lurched forward with all his might. A lance of sharp pain launched up his left arm, and he buckled underneath it, his chest awkwardly slamming on the ground. Another bark of an order came from the mare, and the switch came down on his back.
Everything went white as he cried out from the pain. His hind legs gave up and he collapsed onto the ground, twisting one leg underneath his body. He opened his eyes, and saw nothing but brown and green patches, with a big blue blotch as the sky. A darker blue blotch moved across his vision, getting larger. He heard muffled words from above him, but they meant nothing to him.
He knew another strike was coming if he didn’t get up soon, so he got one hoof underneath himself, pushing up best he could, then moved over to get the hoof trapped under his body out, steadying it. Pressing it against the ground rewarded him with a sharp lance of pain in his wrist, as he collapsed down on the ground.
The dark blue blotch yelled something at him, and another sharp pain lanced through his back with the distant sound of a crack, and his eyes rolled up into his head, and everything went black.