The Tattoo (formerly Unbreakable)

Watching From the Shadows

The gardens were usually quiet, Meriddion was used to enjoying the silence as she walked through them.  That made the scene around the corner even more hypnotizing, she glanced back around the edge of the building.  She hadn't seen a slave struggle against the overseers before. Henry was fighting to keep the boy's arms behind his back while Gerald retrieved his whip.

Meriddion had seen his whip before, it had always scared her.  The thick leather base was intimidating, but the blood stained thin end even now made her feel like a child. Even at sixteen, it made her shudder.  She watched the boy hold his own against Henry, but the two slowly inched their way towards the pole in the center of the clearing.  This was where Meriddion had been forced to watch punishments for years as her father tried to teach her what the slaves were.  Instead of convincing her that they deserved the pain, cruelty and beatings her father only succeeded in making her pity the boy who was having his hands tied together around the pole. She knew Gerald, and she knew that age meant nothing to him.  The slave could not have been older than Mary herself.

When Henry removed his hands from the rope the slave started to tug against them.  It seemed as though he thought he would be able to use brute force to get himself off the pole.  This only made Henry laugh as Gerald began to yell as though the boy wouldn't be able to hear him otherwise.

"Get on your knees!"

Nothing happened, Meriddion could have sworn that she saw the slave smirk as Gerald got audibly frustrated.  He yelled again, this time annunciating every word.

"I said, get on your knees."

The slave was breathing heavily as he continued to tug on the ropes.  In a hoarse, tired voice he replied.

"Make me."

Shivers ran up Meriddion's spine. He was brave.  Her father had always told her that bravery was just a nice word for stupidity, especially when it came to slaves.

"Oh? What was that? You want me to make you?"

He motioned for Henry to approach the boy again. This time he carried a large stick that he used to strike the boy's knees.  The slave was forced down.

"Perhaps I should make it forty-five instead of forty.  You'll learn soon slave, defiance is punished."

Mary's hand went to cover her mouth, even ten lashes from Gerald's whip could put the fear of God into a slave, and that was when he went easy.  Something told her that he wouldn't be allowing this slave that mercy. Instead he was being given a punishment that was usually reserved for runaways, a punishment Meriddion had only seen a handful of times.  Her father's Georgia plantation was known for the obedience of the slaves that worked it.  He was praised for the fact that they could even be trusted to operate the heavy farming machinery, fix his car without cutting the brakes, and handle his important documents. That fact made Mary question why he would purchase a slave that had the potential to be such a bad influence on others.

The whip tore through the rough material of the boy's shirt and immediately his resolve was broken.  The blue fabric quickly darkened around the laceration. He stopped pulling on his ropes the moment a loud groan left his lips. Meriddion jumped a little when the whip cracked a second time, the boy broke down a little more. He slumped onto the pole, holding onto it for stability, the sound he made a little louder.

By ten he was screaming, by twenty he couldn't hold himself up any longer and slumped to the ground.  The rope around his wrists has caught on a rusty nail that protruded from the pole, causing the rough nylon fibers to cut into his skin. 

She watched him clutch at the ropes, trying desperately to stop the blood that was running down his arms between lashes. With each hit of the whip his hands shook and his back arched in pain, causing his head to press forward into the pole even more. It didn't take long before his dark hair hid his eyes from Meriddion's viewpoint. By the end his breath was loud and raspy, he couldn't manage more than a loud moan at forty-five.

Gerald wound the whip, the bloody end slowly snaking it's way back towards him.  He shook the red liquid onto the ground and turned.  Meriddion quickly hid behind the shed again, but to no avail.  He had seen her, and now made his way to where she was standing. He towered half a foot over her short height.

"If you don't want 'im to bleed out you'd better hurry," he scoffed. Immediately she darted out from beneath his shadow and ran to the kitchen, knowing that was where she would find Ellie.

-Photo: Ash