Slave Monologue

When your mother decides to sell you at the Slave Market, there's not much you can do but comply. Especially when you're a naïve five-year-old still dumbfounded over her father's death. A slave's first auction is nerve-wracking. It's all insensitive, whirling crowds, and harsh noise, under the sweltering light of the summer sun.
There's career slavers, frowning down their purposeful, aquiline noses at the young child about to be sold. It's not unheard of, but unusual for this region of Moria. Usually parents who are considering selling their children wait until the children in question are older.
There's jeering onlookers who couldn't possibly know better, adding spiteful slurs to the disagreeable clamor, expressing their amused confusion
But my mother would never take me back. “Two hundred one!” yelled a joking voice, from the farthest crevices of the crowd. In the near chaos, I could not identify the voice with any person. I hoped they weren't possibly serious. I could only watch as the ugly scene erupted into horrific, mirthful laughter. The crab was now gone, not even a trace of its narrow shadow disappearing over the worn turn of the road. It had probably come across a delighted cat, and made a fine meal. I felt a needle-like point of grief prick my numbed senses. There was also the faint, but optimistic chance that it had done away with the odds, and found freedom.
“She's five,” droned on the splintering voice of the Auctioneer over the tumult,”You can teach her to work early, and never have to doubt her when she's older. Isn't that what we want in a slave?” I could hear the merciless crowd reconsidering, people beginning to swarm closer to me, studying the ashy, stick-brown shade of my hair, and my eyes, which were a strange greenish shade of hazel. I hated this sudden interest. Potential buyers were frowning in concentration, evaluating their own needs and concerns. “Three hundred,” another, lower voice said slowly, as if still