***
His whole body was numb, something was pressing hard on his ribs, and he woke up from the pain in his side and from the cold. He was terribly thirsty and needed to use the toilet. After drinking some water that had collected in the natural hollows of the cave and relieving himself near a deep crevice in the corner, Cassius noticed that he was still clutching a translucent, cloudy pebble in his hand, but it no longer felt warm. Making his way out into the main cave, he arrived just in time for the distribution of another portion of food.
This time, the magician with the staff who had told them how they had arrived there came down into the cave again. His dissatisfied expression was angry and intense.
"Meat!" he barked suddenly. "You're not working hard enough. Thirty people, and you've found so few stones in all these days. You're just eating and lazing around, so you'll be punished," he said with a smirk. "Who hasn't brought a single stone?" he turned to the overseers.
"These two, this one and the three by the wall, they're completely useless," shrugged the guy in khaki.
Cassius tried to blend in with the crowd, sensing something was wrong. The man with the stick raised his hand and pointed it at one of the chosen victims.
"Crucio," he said with obvious pleasure.
The boy who was hit by the spell screamed in terror, fell to the stones and began to convulse, not even noticing that his chaotic movements were causing him more and more injuries. The mage continued to hold the spell, clearly enjoying what was happening. Stopping his torture of the teenager, who was still twitching in agony, the mage looked at the others with a heavy gaze.
"And now, watch what happens to those who don't work well, meat," the mage grinned and pointed his wand at the lying body:
"Avada Kedavra."
It became quiet, everyone stared in horror at the motionless teenager.
"You two," he pointed at the two boys standing at the edge, "throw the body into a hole. If anyone fails to bring the magic stones again, the punishment will be the same... A painful death!" said the magician contemptuously, putting his foot in the rope noose, and the rope pulled him up.
"What are you standing there for?" the overseers began to fuss. "Grab the hammers and chisels and get going, look for stones. Did you hear what the boss said?"
Cassius, along with the other teenagers, grabbed a hammer and moved deeper into the caves. Now he felt surprisingly better than before, even his head had almost stopped hurting. Unfortunately, his memory had no intention of returning. He had the impression that when the mage uttered those terrible phrases, which first tormented and then killed the unfortunate man, a kind of mist detached itself from the victim's body and rose upwards. But part of this mist was absorbed by the mage with the wand and, strangely enough, by Cassius himself. This clearly benefited the teenager's body; at least, he felt much better now than he had in the morning. Squeezing into a new corner, Cassius struggled to turn around and drag the hammer behind him.
Suddenly, he felt the warmth of the rock right in front of his nose. Carefully feeling the ordinary-looking stone in front of him, he located the spot where he felt the warmth with his fingertips and began to tap the chisel with the hammer, chipping away pieces of rock. An hour later, luck smiled on him, and in another fragment, he noticed a stone just like the one from before, only slightly larger. Taking it in his hand, Cassius felt that same warmth. Suddenly, a wild pain shot through his head, and the boy crouched down with a groan, clutching his head.
Before his mind's eye appeared the face of a blonde woman who seemed to be smiling at him and saying something. Then the face of a haughty, proud blond man flashed by, whose gaze, however, was also somehow familiar. Then everything stopped, and Cassius felt drops of hot sweat running down his forehead. Attempts to remember anything more only led to a worsening headache. Cassius banged his fist against the wall in anger: "Maybe my memory is starting to come back?" he thought.
Today, he brought the overseers the first pebble he had found yesterday and received his portion of gruel. Huddled on the floor, in a pile of equally exhausted boys, he thought that he had to get out of this cave, if only he could remember who he was. The morning brought nothing new: the same food, the same orders to look for stones, and to hurry up. At least no one was tortured today. Perhaps the murder of the unfortunate teenager had such an effect on the others, but some results began to appear.
Cassius crawled into a rather large cave and was surprised to see three teenagers standing near the wall, looking at a whole cluster of stones sticking out of it. Their joyful shouts attracted Cassius's attention to the cave. One of the boys saw Cassius and pushed the others away. The boys turned around, trying to block the cluster, and glared at Cassius.
"Get out of here," one of the boys said threateningly, clenching a hammer in his hand. "We found this."
"I'm not asking you to share," Cassius replied peacefully, "but maybe there are more stones like this here.
The teenagers exchanged glances.
"He'll give this place away to others, and they might not let us back up here like they promised," said a short boy with a slightly squinting right eye and nervous movements.
"I suggest we kill him and tell the guards that he fell into a crevice," said another boy who looked like a typical street urchin from the poor neighbourhoods. The third just shrugged:
"I'm like everyone else.
The young jackals turned on Cassius and, without a word, rushed at him, swinging their hammers. Cassius realised that he would not be able to get out of the cave in time, that he would get stuck, and that these young beasts would beat him with hammers as he crawled through the crevice and would not let up until they had killed him. When the first, strongest teenager reached him, Cassius ducked under the hammer that whizzed over his head and stabbed him in the throat with a chisel. The blunt chisel did not even pierce the teenager's skin, but it clearly hurt him, because Cassius put all his strength into it.
The hammer flew over his head, hit the rock and slipped out of the teenager's hands. Waving his other hand, which was clenched around the chisel, the boy managed to hit Cassius on the arm, and the boy felt it go numb. Immediately, he was struck from the other side by the second teenager, and his mouth instantly filled with blood mixed with broken teeth. Strangely, this gave him new strength, and Cassius, with unexpected agility, charged at his attacker with the hammer, aiming for his knee. The boy cried out and began to fall backwards. Cassius swallowed the blood that had flowed into his mouth from his broken jaw.
To his surprise, despite his closed eyes, he could still see the attackers and the strange creatures swirling around them. "Loa," a distant thought popped into his head. "Loa can be asked to do what you need. You just have to pay." The teenager he had stabbed in the throat with a chisel coughed violently, clutching his throat with his hands, while the second, with a broken leg, lay on the rocks, red liquid oozing from the back of his head.
The last of the attackers, a slightly cross-eyed boy, seeing that Cassius's face was covered in blood and that he was staring at the dying teenager lying on the ground, tried to quietly approach from the side to hit his opponent on the head with a hammer. But when he was almost within striking distance, the boy, who had been staring blankly into space, turned his black, lifeless eyes towards his attacker, reached out his hand towards the squinty-eyed boy and clenched his bloodied fist. The head of the smallest of the attackers immediately burst, as if some giant had pressed down on it from both sides.
Cassius watched as life drained from the body of the teenager with the broken leg and mentally called out to the Loa flying around him: "Help me kill the third one." One of the creatures immediately separated from the pack and flew into Cassius' chest. He felt his head turn towards the attacker, and some grey tendrils shot out of his hand and wrapped around the teenager's head. A single thought-movement and the head burst like an overripe watermelon. A tickling sensation arose in his mind with a questioning intonation: "Payment?" Cassius replied mentally. "His life!"
No sooner had he said this than a grey entity flew out of his body and the whole crowd immediately pounced on the headless body. Cassius saw the aura of the teenager, who had been alive just a moment ago, disintegrate and be devoured by the creatures covering the body. Cassius turned to the spirits again in his mind: "Is there a healer among you? I need help. I can't even speak, my face is probably shattered, and I have obvious memory problems. I don't remember who I am or where I came from."
When the body of the murdered teenager seemed to be completely drained of energy, all the spirits flew towards Cassius at once. A foreign thought appeared in his head again: "We can help you, mage, but the price must be worthy." The boy turned his head towards the last attacker, who was already sitting on the rocks, gasping for breath. His face was blue, tears were streaming from his eyes, but there were no other injuries. He glanced fearfully at Cassius, who was standing again, staring into space.
"Take his strength," Cassius said silently.
"To do that, you have to kill him," the voices echoed in his head again.
Cassius picked up the fallen hammer and silently moved towards the seated boy. The hapless "kulunas" tried to crawl back, but Cassius was faster. Despite the teenager's hands raised in a defensive gesture, he quickly and accurately brought the hammer down on his skull. There was a disgusting crunch and blood spurted out. The boy fell on his back, and Cassius, unable to hold on, dropped the hammer from his bloodied hand. He felt sick, but found the strength to mentally summon the spirits to the feast. A minute later, several transparent shadows flew towards Cassius and entered his body. He felt his broken jaw bones fall back into place, his knocked-out teeth quickly reappear, and the bleeding wounds on his body rapidly disappear. A few minutes later, there was not even a trace of the terrible blow on his face, and the rest of his body also felt fresh and rested. The familiar pain began to build in his head, and then it was as if a bass string had snapped, and Cassius realised his true identity. The Loa leapt out of his body, and a foreign thought flashed through his mind again: "If you need help, call the little magician."
Cassius finally felt the magic in his body and remembered how the house spirit who had been summoned to protect him had been killed in the market.
"I have to figure out how to get out of here," he decided. "I think I can do it without any problems using telekinesis and blood magic."
The only thing that worried him was how many magicians controlled this mine, how many were up there, and how strong they were. Judging by how skilfully that mage wielded his wand, he was clearly not a weakling, but nevertheless he was far from being the leader of their organisation. The fact that this was an organisation and not a single mage became immediately clear from his speech. And then it hit him like an avalanche, the realisation that he had just killed three people. Yes, he had already been in real combat, but there everything had just flashed before his eyes, and Cassius didn't know who had been affected by his telekinesis. Then he saw his mentor slitting the throats of the captured Zuavas, but the lives of those with whom he had spent several weeks and managed to befriend were at stake.
"And here?" He was overcome with rage: "If I hadn't defended myself, what would they have done to me? I doubt they would have let me out of this cave. No, I could be lying under those stones right now, and they would be picking the flesh off my bones."
Cassius looked at his bloodied hands with broken nails, now completely unlike the hands of an aristocratic mage, and clenched his fists. The main thing was that they were no longer shaking, not at all.
Lifting the bodies of the dead with telekinesis, Cassius transported them to the cave wall and carefully covered them with stones. Then he approached the crystal cluster that had caused all this and stroked it with his hand. The body was immediately shot through with lightning, but it did not burn the nerve endings, just cooled them slightly. Moreover, Cassius felt the source of magic in his body simply bubble, exchanging energy with the crystals. Surprised, the young man carefully chipped away at the rock around the crystals with a chisel, and soon he had the entire cluster in his hand, about the size of an adult's fist, with transparent crystals and a yellowish stone in the centre. Cassius wrapped it in a cloth and tucked it deep into his bosom. Looking around, he sensed more crystals nearby and began to carefully pick one out. He had no intention of making a plan to collect diamonds for the guards, but he was hoping for a portion of food and did not want to stand out from the other slaves.
After extracting a small magic stone from the cave wall, Cassius headed back. An hour later, after climbing through the underground passages, he made his way back to the main cave and approached the overseer. The latter silently took the stone and handed him a token, waving his hand towards the others. Cassius moved away to the wall and quietly sat down on a stone. There was still about an hour left before dinner, and the slaves were just returning to the cave, bringing the diamonds they had mined. Handing the stones to the overseers, the teenagers sat down wearily on the floor by the wall, waiting for their evening meal. About an hour later, the thermos was brought down again and everyone who had distinguished themselves was fed. If anyone noticed the absence of three slaves, they did not attach any importance to it. In the light of the headlamps, it was difficult to tell how many teenagers were sleeping on the floor, huddled together in a heap.
The next day, Cassius decided how to proceed. By a strange coincidence, as soon as he pried his friend out of the wall, the Loa disappeared from the cave, and he did not notice them in these caves, even though he tried to look for them. This meant that he could not count on the help of the spirits down here. On the other hand, remembering the book he had read about blood magic and the knowledge he had gained from it, he was able to free himself from his shackles, or more precisely, break the chain that bound them and the bolts that fixed them to his legs. Biting his left finger, Cassius smeared the blood on his lips and whispered a spell from the book: "Sanguinem excedunt metallum," and the blood immediately began to corrode the metal of the shackles. In a matter of seconds, one ring in the chain of shackles was destroyed, and the shackles themselves fell apart into two halves. Tying everything together with pieces of cloth, which could be torn apart with a wide step if necessary, the boy was satisfied. Now, in the event of a fight, the shackles on his legs would not be able to hinder him much.
Yesterday, four teenagers were unable to find the crystals, which meant that tomorrow they would have to wait for the return of the wizard with his staff for another punishment. Today, Cassius spent the whole day meditating in one of the alcoves, diligently restoring his magical powers and mentally rehearsing his plan for the upcoming battle. This time, he had no doubts about killing the intelligent ones, because the boy really wanted to get out of this mess alive, and if he thought about and felt sorry for those who had made him a slave, they would simply kill him. In the evening, after giving away the last of the stones he had found and receiving his portion of gruel, Cassius rinsed his hands by simply rubbing them against the wet wall and settled down to sleep. This time, he couldn't fall asleep for a long time, his body shaking with nervousness, because tomorrow could be the last day of his life. Finally, warmed slightly by the bodies lying next to him, he dozed off. His occult studies helped him gather his scattered thoughts.
In the morning, as soon as he heard the sound of someone descending on a rope, Cassius tensed and began to prepare. The wizard, finding himself below, looked down at the sleeping teenagers with a smirk, raised his wand and said, "Aqua eructo duo." A stream of water began to gush out of his wand like a fire hose, and with this stream he quickly woke up the sleeping teenagers. Cassius, who had also jumped up in the crowd awakened by the water and cold, quietly pulled on the chain, and his shackles fell to the stones.
"Well, meat," the magician began mockingly, "are you forcing me to punish you again? Which of you did not bring the diamonds?" He turned to the overseers.
They looked into the crowd and pointed to yesterday's losers. The magician pointed his wand at the crowd and ordered the offenders to step forward. The crowd began to move aside in fear, leaving the offenders standing alone in front of the magician. Cassius took up a position slightly to the side, at the edge of the main mass of teenagers. On the ground near one of the walls lay several stones prepared in advance, each of which he had inscribed with a spell from the same book in blood. "Sanguinem occidere eum" promised a lot of trouble to anyone who was hit by a stone with this spell.
Cassius waited until the mage finished his pompous speech and began torturing the unfortunate teenagers, then with a wave of his hand sent the stones flying at high speed straight towards their target. Two guards simply collapsed, spurting small fountains of blood from their bodies, and a bright blue glow flashed around the magician. Without thinking, Cassius grabbed a few more prepared stones and threw them at the magician again. A medallion flashed and fell from the bandit's neck, and despite his attempts to cast a spell, charged stones struck him from all sides, piercing his body and even tearing pieces of flesh from it. The "protego" cast by the mage at the last moment was only able to stop one stone, the rest did their job.
The teenagers rushed away in a crowd, trying to leave the cave as quickly as possible through the passages in the walls, and in just a few seconds, Cassius was left alone. No one above noticed the noise in the mine. Cassius picked up a few stones from the floor and, biting his finger again, wrote the same spell that had proven so effective in the recent battle. Despite the rising nausea, he tried to search the bodies of the dead, but found nothing and only got covered in blood.
Rinsing his hands in a puddle, Cassius cautiously approached the rope and looked up. Far above, a bright patch of sky was visible. Grabbing the rope, Cassius pulled it as the mage had done and put his foot in the loop, but the rope remained hanging, and no one seemed to be pulling it up. Then Cassius braced his feet against the walls, grabbed the rope, and began to carefully crawl upward, occasionally helping himself with telekinesis. The higher he climbed, the lighter it became, and his eyes, accustomed to the darkness of the caves, began to sting immediately. Having smeared blood on his eyelids in advance, he uttered "sanguinem tracta," and the stinging disappeared at once.
Ten minutes later, drenched in sweat, Cassius reached the top and carefully raised his head above the edge of the shaft. Many slaves were bustling about the mining site, carrying ore, while overseers stood watching both the shafts and those who were washing the rock in the river. A little further away, several trucks and a couple of jeeps were parked near a wooden building with a thatched roof. That was probably where the management of the enterprise was meeting. The young man didn't notice anything unusual about the guards. They were carrying ordinary automatic rifles. It was clear that the guards felt relaxed, because some were sitting in the shade under a canopy, some were smoking, and only two or three were carefully scanning the area. Cassius crawled out of the well and immediately rolled to the side.
Lying on the ground, he feverishly thought about what to do next. It turned out that getting out of the caves did not mean freedom; he could not fly like a bird and fly away, at least far away from this place. This meant that he would have to break through the armed guards, and there was no telling how many more mages were here. Cassius didn't know what to do with the mages, since, in essence, only surprise and blood magic, which was clearly not taught in modern magic schools, had helped him defeat that mage. Crawling a few metres away from the hole, Cassius climbed into a crack between two boulders and hid. So dirty that you couldn't even make out the features of his gaunt face, the teenager didn't stand out much against the background of the rocks, and it was quite difficult for the guards to spot him.
Chibuzo Inu was in his mansion when the search amulet he had made earlier emitted a melodious sound and vibrated. Jumping up, the mage rushed to the armoury to arm himself. An experienced dark mage, he tried never to rush into dangerous adventures with only a wand. He had no doubt that his apprentice was in trouble. After strapping on a bunch of magical amulets and a holster with a spare wand to his leg, the mage cast a map spell and stared at the flashing dot representing his apprentice.
"So, southern Kivu, near Kamitugi. He's gone far, to the other side of the country," thought Chibuzo. "Never mind, I have portals to all cities," he continued to get ready, sorting through a rope with plates of portals to the African continent.
Two minutes later, the mage appeared on the outskirts of the town and looked at the amulet again, creating a map right in the air in front of him. Having marked the next point of apparition, Chibuzo appeared at the edge of a huge quarry, where a crowd of people was milling about. With a wave of his hand, he cast a spell to search for magical creatures in the vicinity and discovered several mages standing near a small house and another one approximately in the centre of the quarry. Determining by the taste of magic that his apprentice was in the centre of the quarry, Chibuzo first decided to deal with those who had settled in the house. Judging by his student's emotional state, he was just resting, so Chibuzo Inu decided not to rush.
Approaching the house, he entered unnoticed by the two simple-minded guards standing near the building with automatic weapons on their shoulders. They did not even notice the mosquito net fluttering, because they were busy watching the people working in the mine. Passing through a small corridor, Chibuzo found himself in a spacious room where several magicians were sitting at tables and another was standing by the window.
"Samuel isn't here yet," said the wizard standing by the window, addressing no one in particular. "He's probably got carried away torturing meat again.
"Oh, what could happen to him?" said another wizard with a red beard and a horse-like face, waving his hand dismissively. "He'll be here soon."
Suddenly, everything froze. Even the annoying fly that had been buzzing around the room froze in midair. In a leather chair standing against the wall, Chibuzo Inu, dressed all in black, began to appear. The wizards in the room could only roll their eyes furiously and speak. The spell cast on them prevented them from even breathing in the hot air.
"Who are you?" Chibuzo asked them angrily. "What are you doing here?"
When he received no answer from the silent mages, he grinned and pointed his wand at one of those sitting at the tables, saying:
"Sek!
The severed head had not yet hit the floor when he moved his wand to the next one:
"Are you going to keep quiet, or is there anyone among you who is sane?"
The mages began to glance at each other, but Chibuzo didn't want to wait. So he calmly pointed his wand at the one standing by the window and, casting "Silence" first so that the guards wouldn't come running from the street, cast "Cruciatus" on him. Unable even to fall, the mage silently opened his mouth wide in a silent scream. The other mages stared in horror at this terrible sight.
After holding him under torture for almost a minute, Chibuzo asked again:
"Who is ready to talk? I'm getting bored here with you, and I still have a student to save." The magicians exchanged doomed glances, and information poured out like water from a cornucopia.
Some shrewd guys from South Africa bought a mine in South Kivu province and recruited people from local villages, some voluntarily, some not. But the main profit came when magical diamonds were discovered in some of the mine's shafts, which were in high demand among serious businessmen. It turned out that children were the best at finding magical diamonds, so the magicians caught them wherever they could. The main criterion was the presence of any magical source. Of course, they tried not to go into big cities and looked for their victims in villages and provinces, but over time, more and more slaves were needed.
The business flourished, although child mortality in the mines was increasing. Not long ago, several mines collapsed and, naturally, no one even attempted to rescue the slaves, as this would have required too much investment. Therefore, they simply chose to forget about it and catch new ones. Here were the rank and file members of the syndicate, who simply controlled the collection and delivery of diamonds. The central office was located in Rwanda, where the syndicate bosses were based. Amazed, Chibuzo Inu decided to find out more from the captured mages later, but for now he simply turned them into figurines and put them in a bag he found nearby.
Moving to his student's location, Chibuzo encountered the serious gaze of exhausted grey eyes.
"Master, you found me," Cassius breathed with relief, trying to get up.
"Yes, Cassius, I'm glad you're alive," Chibuzo sighed, "now get some sleep.
After putting his student to sleep with magic, he also turned him into a statuette and put him in his pocket. After that, he did not linger in the quarry, but immediately apparated to the estate. There was a lot of work to be done. He had to deal with these guys who had brazenly stolen magical diamonds from the Congo, find and brutally kill the kidnappers of his student and other magically gifted children. The damage caused by the actions of these scoundrels was now difficult to estimate, as it was unknown how many magically gifted teenagers had disappeared as a result of this company's actions. Mentally wishing them a terrible afterlife, the magician descended into the dungeon, where he left the chained magicians until further investigation.
***
Cassius woke up because he no longer heard the familiar noise of the dungeons. Slowly opening his eyes, he saw that he was lying on his bed in Inu's mansion, and his clothes were hanging on a chair nearby. Sitting up abruptly, he tried to remember how he got there, but all he could remember was the moment when his teacher raised his hand and said, "Sleep."
"He must have put me to sleep and brought me home," thought the boy. "How good that it's all over."
At that moment, realizing that he was awake, the house spirit appeared in the room and, with his usual lamentations, suggested that Cassius get dressed and go to breakfast. When asked where his teacher was, the lemur-like little creature admitted that he had left the estate the night before and ordered Cassius to rest and recover his strength. After all, in a week he had to go back to school for his second year. Cassius laughed a little hysterically; after all these nightmarish events, he had completely forgotten about school, as if it were in some other, happier life.
"Yes, it's better to study at school than to mine diamonds," thought the teenager.
***
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