The Freedom Broker (Thea Paris #1)(67)

She double-checked the chain on the door, then sank back onto the mattress. It comforted her that Rif was in the adjoining room if she needed him.

Curiosity overrode her fatigue, and she started reading.



LAND MINE LINE

We played Oba’s favorite game called Land Mine Line every week. We all got scores each week for how well we did shooting targets, completing chores, or performing combat drills. Oba hid one land mine in the field beside the camp, and the six boys who got the lowest scores had to hold hands and walk in a line across the field, trying not to step on the mine. If anyone let go, the whole game started over again.

Some weeks, everyone got across okay. Other times, a boy would be like a rocket shooting into the sky, all blood and body parts everywhere. Oba and Kofi would laugh and say the dead boy would have made a bad soldier if he couldn’t even find a mine. My scores were always high. I worked really hard because I was too scared to play the game.

If any of the boys refused to walk across the field, me and Blado had to stand with our rifles pointed at them and make them do it. If they didn’t play, we would have to shoot them, so I showed them I meant business, even though I felt bad inside.

The AK-47 was my new best friend, and I held it tight, my skinny arms getting stronger every day. The sun burned the back of my head, even though it was still morning. The rains were long gone, and now it was just plain old hot.

Blado shoved two bright pills he called candies into my hand and waited until I put them into my mouth. He jammed the barrel of his rifle into my gut. “You Mzungu, but I the boss.”

I was tired of being called White Boy, but that was my name now. Blado said it looked like someone had erased my color, making me invisible. That’s how I felt. Invisible. No one had rescued me, and after sixty-five days, I had given up counting. Papa wasn’t coming.

I tucked the pills into the side of my mouth until I could spit them out. Whatever they were, I didn’t want them. I’d seen what happened the last time Blado made the boys take them. They’d danced around, shooting their guns into the air like maniacs, screaming for blood.

After everyone took the pills, we marched in single file toward the field. I went to the back of the line, spit the pills into my hand, and stuffed them into my pocket. I ran to catch up to the others.

Red dirt covered my old boots and olive uniform. Just the thought of seeing Oba made me sweat—he’d been away the last week raiding villages to get new recruits, and it’d been quiet in the camp. That was about to end. The devil had returned to hell.

We stood at attention. We’d seen what happened to those who didn’t, including that poor little kid Nobo.

“God has spoken to me.” Oba raised a fist into the air. “You are the chosen ones, the soldiers who must eliminate the unbelievers.” He paced up and down the line, inspecting our uniforms and studying our faces. My chest tightened. The pills made the other boys’ fingers dance along their weapons, while their knees twitched. I copied what they did to fit in.

“Prepare yourselves for the holy war.” Oba had told us lots of stories about the power of God and how important it was to defend his Christian beliefs. It seemed different than what they talked about at the Greek Orthodox church my family went to on Sundays, even though some things were the same.

Oba held a razor blade in his hand. One by one he sliced one temple on each boy, and then Kofi rubbed white powder into the cut. “You will now become men.” I couldn’t think of a way to avoid this poison, whatever it was. Waiting my turn, I didn’t have to fake the wildness that was on the other boy’s faces. My heart pounded against my ribs.

Blood from the cuts dripped down the boys’ faces and mixed with their sweat. Oba moved down the line. My turn. A burning feeling hit me as the razor blade sliced my skin.

“I hear you’re a good shooter,” Oba said.

I stared straight ahead, scared to say anything. With Oba, there was no right answer.

“I heard you’re very good.”

I nodded and looked straight ahead. Every day, the guards took us to the garbage dump to practice shooting. I hit the bull’s-eye most times.

“Keep practicing, and you can join my hunting team.” Oba moved to the next boy.

Blood from my cut dripped onto my arm. Kofi rubbed the white powder in. I hated the skinny man. The General might have been a bully, but I’d been safe with him. These men were like rabid animals.

The powder didn’t seem to work. Nothing happened. But then, all of a sudden, I felt hot. I saw things better, my brain spun faster, and my muscles flexed. Kofi’s laugh sounded louder, echoing inside my head. The powder was magic. It made me feel like a god.

“Bring out the prisoners,” Oba told Kofi.

Two dirty men with leg chains shuffled in front of the low stone wall at the end of the field. They had been so badly beaten, they barely looked human. One man wore all black with a white collar, and the other wore a uniform with the red, black, and green Kanzi flag stitched on the shoulder. My chest puffed out, and my muscles flexed.

“We need to punish our enemies.” Oba stood at the end of the line, commanding us, his troops.

My mind raced. These men, what had they done to deserve being killed?

“Right shoulder arms . . . Present arms.”

Obediently I swung my AK-47 into the firing position, jamming the butt of the rifle into my shoulder. It would be just like shooting targets, but now the targets were men. But wait. How could I think that way? Was it the magic powder? Had being here in this crazy camp stripped me of everything Papa had taught me about being good and honorable?