Instead, she was given expensive paper and lots of ink and told that if she couldn’t write, she should draw pictures instead. No one was upset that Jazgul couldn’t speak and didn’t know how to read or write. Someone with pure, white hair and who was the slightest bit plump. Instead, she found herself serving someone very, very lovely. She’d heard that its owner was a regular old pervert, but nothing could have been further from the truth. What a pleasure to have you here was the greeting with which she was received at that house. Thus when she had been brought to the large house, she’d been overjoyed, sure that she was about to become a concubine. A concubine, she’d heard, had just one man to please. It wasn’t like being a prostitute those had to work all the time, every day. Yes, being a concubine would make her happy. She wasn’t so bad looking, and if her nose was a little bit low, well, her overall appearance was charming enough to make up for it. Jazgul had been sure she would become a concubine. But her family had lacked the means to support her.

She could work, albeit perhaps not as hard as many people. She could hear, but for some reason, she’d had no voice since the day she was born. Then, finally, they had sold her as a slave. She came from a poor family her parents had given her nothing but her name and the most meager of meals each day. She had never dreamed she might ever ride on such a vessel. There were many people around who had come to see them off. Jazgul was going to spend many days on the boat, more days than she could count on the fingers of both hands (which was as high as Jazgul could count). The boat was going to go down the river, go out to the sea, and then travel to a neighboring country, or so she was told. Jazgul’s mouth hung open in amazement at the biggest boat she had ever seen in her life.

The apothecary diaries volume 3