The boy's first memories consisted of one question, "why?"
"Why are you crying Mommy?"
"Why do we have to work so hard?"
"Why are we taking their food?"
"Why are you hurt Mommy?"
Even as he stood over the corpse of his mother who the guards tortured and killed the only question he had was, "Why did you have to go?"
The thick morning mist did nothing to obscure the abuse she suffered. Her clothes were torn from her trying to escape, or the guards did it on purpose. The latter was likely because she was gagged with her own sleeve. The bruises on the face, arms, and wrists were all he could bear to look at.
The mother and the boy came to the heart of the world, as they say, looking for safety and help from relatives. All they received was cruelty and slavery added to their poverty. The boy and the mother were to pull the thorns and thistles out everyday their hands bloodied and coarse each evening, and they were to prepare the materials for clothes even after the sunset. These were normal conditions to them if only they had gotten a portion of what they worked for, they received nothing.
So, they stole food whenever and wherever they could. However, the night before they slipped up, she made a noise and was caught, so they split up. After hiding for some time, he thought the coast was clear, so he had begun searching for her throughout the night, without a wink of sleep.
He fell to his knees next to her with his tears falling to the woman's face as he curled over her. The boy scratched away at the cloth gag with shaking hands. His voice cracked from exhaustion and shock, light headedness and numbness taking his limbs. The horror twisted his core until he wanted to vomit.
Only after his voice grew hoarse could he finally remove the gag, and he threw it as far as he could, but his tears couldn't stop. He was going to lean in more to kiss her forehead when suddenly he yanked into the air by a man no taller than 6 foot. The boy was swung over the man's shoulder, and the inside of the boy's elbow around him as the man barked,
"You just don't learn no matter how many times I tell you, brat! You are to be in the fields before the Sun rises, and now we're behind and stuck in the heat!"
The boy flailed helplessly unable to harm the man enough to be set free, but enough to aggravate him. As the enraged man finally reached the field, he threw the boy forward over his shoulder into the thorns and stormed off to plow. The boy twitched with every movement as thistles and barbs pierced his skin from all sides.
When the boy got to his shaking feet he saw what he always saw, thorny vines choking out and ensnaring all the crops as if had not worked the previous day to remove as much as he could. So, he Just stood there pondering,
"Why do I suffer like this?"