Free Spirit of a Mountain Wolf by Rosanne Hawke Page B

close against him. How good it was to smell her freshly washed hair and feel her vibrancy. Amina laid her hand on his back, and he dropped his head to her shoulder and let out a sob.
    “It was bad?” she whispered.
    He lifted his head and gave them both a watery smile. “I have brought someone to stay with us.” His voice broke, but he carried on. “She is the only relative I could find alive.”
    Amina’s eyes filled and then she saw her aunt behind him. “Auntie Latifa?” She enveloped her aunt in a hug, then looked back at Javaid, a question on her face.
    “There was no one else,” he said. “Her brother hadn’t come. Perhaps he couldn’t—he lives in Azad Kashmir. They were hit worse than Kala Dhaka. And it’s getting cold up there.”
    “My uncle? Their sons? Feeba?”
    Javaid shook his head. “All of the children were in the madrasah . . .” He choked back another sob and glanced at Latifa, but she seemed unperturbed.
    Sakina stared intently at his face. She put a finger to his eye. “Abu is sad.”
    He was loathe to put her down, so he kept her in one arm as he brought in his bag and Latifa’s few things.
    Latifa was talking to Amina inside the house. “My son will send me money soon, so do not worry. It is very kind of you to have me.”
    Amina frowned at Javaid. He put Sakina near Latifa to say salaam and took Amina into the second room.
    “She speaks of Razaq,” he told her. “He is still alive, and she thinks he is her son. It is the grief. She cannot bear the burden of it so I humor her. But I have to find Razaq and bring him here.”
    He searched her face, and she nodded.
    “We will have a houseful,” she said.
    “It is our way.” He smiled. “The best way to live. When Razaq gets married, we can build another room.”
    “Where is he?”
    Javaid sank onto the charpoy. “Auntie Latifa says a man took him for a job here in Rawalpindi.”
    “But he could have been anyone.” Amina glanced out at her aunt. “No one gives a job for nothing.”
    “She didn’t know what she was doing. But I fear for Razaq.” Javaid glanced at Amina before he said the next sentence. “The man may have been a slaver.”
    Amina laid a hand on Javaid’s. “Then Razaq could be anywhere by now. How will you find him?”
    Javaid closed his eyes a moment. When he opened them he said quietly, “I don’t know.”

    During his lunch break the first day back at Fazal Clothing Emporium, Javaid sat at the computer and keyed in the words “slave trade.” He was appalled at what he found. Hundreds of thousands of children were sold each year, and it was even happening in Pakistan. Many were sold into domestic positions or carpet or brick factories. Some were even forced into prostitution. The given cause for this one? Segregation of the sexes. He swore under his breath. This was a Muslim country. Any decent man wouldn’t hurt a child surely?
    He searched government sites. Trafficking was illegal, Programs were in place to help, even a government bureau to help eradicate child beggary and to rescue trafficked children. There were nigeban, government-run shelters, for kidnapped or lost boys. He would check those, and the bus terminals heading north. Nongovernment organizations were also set up to rehabilitate children. He took down the details in a small notebook and popped it in his qameez pocket.
    Winter would set in soon. He hoped Razaq was still in the city and hadn’t been sent to the Gulf States, though he was too old to be a camel jockey. Javaid had read how some boys were sent there and even to Europe. He would have to search quickly for he had no finance for overseas travel.
    First stop: the bus adda where the bus most likely to have brought Razaq down from Kala Dhaka would have terminated. Was it too obvious? Would he have been taken elsewhere? The information Javaid had read showed the bus terminals were rife with crime. He logged off. He would start searching the biggest bus adda that night.

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