The day started out like any other with Nico awaking with the rising of the sun. He got dressed to begin the days chores while his parents slept for a little longer. While he tended to the animals, his parents begun to stir a half hour later with Nicole starting breakfast as Coster helped her. After an hour their son returned covered in dirt carrying a basket of egg and a bucket of fresh milk.
“Morning, mamma.” Nico said joyfully while kissing her on the cheek.
“Look at you, your covered in dirt now go wash up before you eat.” Nicole joked, lightly tapping his shirt hitting some of the dirt lose in the air.
“Aw ma.” he groaned.
“Don’t aw ma me, now go.” she laughed taking the eggs and milk from him. “Boys”
“Morning, father.” Nico smiled as he took off his shirt going into his room to change.
“Morning, son.” Coster replied back, setting the table. “How are the new calves doing.”
“They’re doing great father, getting stronger each day. It’s just too bad that their mom rejected them. I think they will make it okay.” he explained as he walked out of his room doing up his shirt.
“That’s good, son.” his father said while sitting down at the table already exhausted. While Nico helped his mother bring the food over to the table then they all sat down to eat their breakfast.
“Are you feeling any better today? Father. Are you getting any of your strength back?” Nico asked. For these were the two questions he asked every morning for the last two years.
“I feel like I’m getting my strength back a little at a time.” he replied grabbing some eggs and porridge.
“Good, hopefully you can get well enough to go hunting again, Papa.” Nico sighed for he missed hunting with his father.
“I love it when you call me papa. Son.” his father laughed along with his mother.
“So, son, did you get all the morning chores done.” she asked.
“Yes momma. I am all yours till the afternoon.”
Nicole looked at Coster who just looked back and smiled. They enjoyed their meal and talked till nearly nine in the morning. After they finished his parents retired to the living area where they sat down on the lounge. Both were old and tired, nearing the age of sixty-one. Nico cleared the table before joining Nicole in a game of cards as Coster did some reading. His father felt something coming as if someone walked over their graves.
“Nico, I need you to listen to me, son.” Coster spoke seriously breaking the relaxing atmosphere.
“What’s wrong, papa?” Nico asked worriedly while placing the cards down.
“Nothing, I think. I just want you to know that should anything happen to us. You should look under our bed there will be a wooden box. What is inside the box is for you, my son.”
“Father.......” Nico replied nervous yet curious as to his father’s words.
“Cost... are you alright.” Nicole asked concerned for her husband.
“I’m alright. I swear to the both of you I am really okay.” he gave a slight laugh trying to reassure them, but it did not.
As they tried to let the moment passed none could predict that only in a few minutes their life will be changed forever. The four southern men and at least fifteen of the villagers were approaching their farm on horseback. The group had chains, whips and nooses all ready for the violence and hatred they felt toward these people. By the time the Gages heard anything it was too late as the men were on their doorstop ready to kick the door in. The youngest of the four men kicked in the door with just force that it came off the hinges. He was no older than twenty-five but time and the stress of killing made a few changes to his appearance as he looked to be older. The door landed on the kitchen floor and the Gages unprepared the men took them with ease. Nico tried to fight back to protect his parents but one of the men blindsided him striking him hard across the right side of his face. He was struck by a black leather whip that was used many times before leaving a deep laceration over his right eye. They knocked him clean out before his parent’s eyes. The men dragged all three of them to the waiting villagers. The villagers were holding pitchforks and guns shouting profanities, the three were thrown before the crowds’ feet. Nicole managed to crawl the short way to her unconscious son cradling his head.
“What kind of monsters would do this to a beautiful boy.” Nicole spoke motherly to Nico before shouting at everyone. “What the fuck do you want from us? We have never done anything to you.”
“Shut up!! Slave! Taking a white child is the worst thing any of your kind can do.” an older southern man said before slapping her hard across the face.
“Don’t you dare touch my wife or son again. We are freed by our master twenty years ago. My son we did not steal, your kind abandoned him to die all alone because he was small. We found him, raised him and gave him the love you race denied him!!!!” Coster shouted back defending his small family. “Now get the fuck off my land!!”
“Is what they say true?” a female voice spoke from the crowd.
“It doesn’t matter! They turned that boy against his own kind.” another from the crowd shouted. This time it was a male who spoke. Which the crowd shouted in agreement with some of them setting up the nooses on the branch of the tree next to the Gages home.
Nicole and Coster watched in horror as Nico came around in his mother’s arms.
“What happened?” he asked groggily and dazed as blood flowed from his wound.
“They mean to kill us son.” his father said coldly but honestly. “We always knew about their hate, son but I thought that there were good honorable people here. I was wrong. Don’t worry son we will be okay. In the eyes of god, we are just and righteous where they are not. They will not kill you, my son, because you have the same skin color. Just remember all that we have taught you never bring yourself to their level. You are better than they are, my son. You always will be the best son we could have ever wished for... I need to ask one thing of you, son.” Coster spoke as the men begun to tie his and Nicole’s hands behind their backs. Not really paying any attention to what Coster was saying.
“Mamma, Papa.” Nico said while tears begin to fall from his eyes as they chained his wrists then attached the chain to the posts that were placed in the ground.
“Nico do not weep for us. Remember our love and hold it in your heart. Never let it go. Our love makes even the gods envious as it is a true love. It was made years before either myself or Coster was born. I love you, my son.” Nicole spoke breaking her bonds so that she could hold and kiss him one last time. “Be brave my son.”
“I will, mamma. I love you so much.” Nico cried into her hands that caressed his face.
“I love you, too.” Nicole smiled trying to reassure him before they snatched her from him, dragging her to one of the nooses.
“Nico, I ask you this as your father... Kill them all that stands here this day. Don’t do it from hate but vengeance. I ask you this not for me but you mother she deserves to have vengeance for her needless death. I will see you again, my son. I love you Nico. Never forget where you came and never forget who you are. You are our son for all time, Nico.” Coster spoke to him gently and kindly while his hands were bound. Yet all of the people around them seemed not to hear his and Nicole’s words just Nico. They were only meant for him and no one else. “Promise me, Nico.”
“I promise, father. I love you, papa.” Nico cried as they dragged him away setting him upon a horse placing a noose around his neck, alongside his wife who sat on a black horse with a noose around her neck.
As they sat on the horses, the fifteen townspeople gathered around them and Nico who was kneeling on the ground. Before his parents chained at the wrists with his arms stretched out as the blood flowed from the wound upon his eye. The wound stretched down from above his eyebrow to the middle of his cheek. A wound that will be there forever. Nico knelt before his parents never taking his eyes off of them while they did the same. As he was looking at his parents, two men ripped off his shirt in order to expose his back. One stood behind with the whip in his hand. He could tell by the fear in his parent’s eyes what was about to happen. Looking out at the crowd he saw on many of their faces a sense of enjoyment and eagerness of what was about to happen.
“This is what we do to those who betray their own race. To those that would defile our children by raising them to hate their own.” the man with whip spoke to the crowd and to the Gages.
“Be brave, Nico. Be strong.” Coster shouted before being gagged.
“This is for betraying your own.” the youngest of the southern men spoke before spitting on him.
“Wait ...what if we can turn him back.” the same female who spoke earlier shouted again.
“Look at him, woman. He thinks these two are his parents. Look at his body it is not one of the white man’s but that of a slave. He is not one of us not since the day it was found. It is one of them and as such he will pay the same price that any other would for striking a white man and running away.” the man with the whip shouted out to the crowd. “I, Jeremiah Morgan and my three brothers Liam, Jackson, and Nicolas say that these three are to be put to death. The two eldest shall hang until dead while this one will receive twenty lashes after which he will be left to die chained to the ground. If any of you wish to contest my orders than you can join them in hell and death.” Jeremiah shouted as he readied his whip. None of the crowd contest his order so he struck Nico hard with the first of his twenty lashes.
“Argh.” Nico shouted in pain as the whip grazed his back leaving a four-inch-long gash across his back. His parents tried to break their bonds to save him, but they were too tight. They watched in horror as more and more lashes went across his back.
By the time the sixth lash struck his back he started to lapse into unconsciousness but this they would not let happen. For each time he began to fall one of the brothers would throw a bucket of cold water in his face. To reawaken him as it was not fun to whip an unconscious man. This would continue until the last few lashes as he could no longer hold his own weight despite the cold water. This combined with the amount of blood loss flowing from the gashes across his back. Many of the gashes were so deep that where it was once white was now covered in blood. His mother watched in horror as he fell to the ground not even five feet away from her. She could see the pain in his eyes and the wanting it all to end even if it meant his death. When the last two lashes fell across his back, they left him to lay in his own blood and urine. The pain caused him to urinate on himself but there was no shame in it. The four men walked over to Nicole and Coster checking to see if the nooses were tight enough.
“Any last words?” Liam asked very sarcastically toward Coster and Nicole.
“Nico, I love you, my son. Never forget that I will see you again. I will love you forever and I will be forever in your heart.” Nicole shouted loud enough for him to hear as he was fading in and out of unconsciousness. He did hear her words as he would always hear his mother’s voice. Liam looked at Coster if trying to tell him to speak.
“Nico, son, remember your promise to me and what I told you. Blood for blood, life for a life. Kill them all to the last one. I love you son.” Coster shouted at Nico. As he spoke Nicole looked at him but not with disgust but rather in shared sentiment.
“He won’t live long enough. Slave!” Jeremiah shouted at Coster slapping him hard across the face with his gloves.
“Goodbye. Nico.” they both shouted as Jackson and Nicolas slapped the backside of the two horses causing them to bolt right passed Nico.
Their bodies swung ferociously with the force of the horses running away. Their nooses tightened around their necks, but they did not break. Nico shouted through all the pain and agony as he watched his parents struggle to breathe and twitch over and over again, until their life force began to fade away. Soon they hung from the tree - dead, with both seemingly stopped at the same time almost like they left to go to the heavens together. The sight of his parents swinging in the air would be forever burned into his eyes, his memory and his heart - which was now filled with hate and sorrow. All those who watched begun to cheer and shout more profanities at the hanging bodies of Coster and Nicole. Enjoying their pointless and petty murders, it didn’t take long for them to leave to farm. The farm they let stand choosing instead of burning it they would turn it into a way station. None of them offered to remove the bodies so they let them hang there for the animals to eat. The villagers didn’t want to dirty their hands even though their hands are already dirty.
The villagers walked past the chained and unconscious Nico who fell unconscious from the shock of seeing his parents murdered and from the blood loss. As each of the villager walked past him, they would spit on him or kicked him. Adding more injures to those that were already there. For none of the villager considered him a man but an animal.
Comments (0)
See all