Obsidian - Miranda Bridges Page 0,7
The madam shoos them away with a skeletal hand. “Leave. The auction will begin momentarily, and you have yet to prepare the last of my assets.”
“Yes, Madam Pim,” they answer before scurrying out from the room.
Despite the coldness in the madam’s gaze, I keep my head lifted and my gaze pinned on her. Even if I’m terrified deep down, I can’t let her know that.
She circles me slowly. “The Torags said you were unusual. I did not think they meant unusually bland. What is your name?” When I bite my tongue and don’t answer her, she peels her thin lips back into a snarl. “You are at least intelligent. From this moment on, you have no name. You are simply a number, my number, and you’re going to earn back what you cost me with interest. If you fail to do so…” She trails off, her eyes narrowed into lilac slits. “Let’s just say you better hope one of my clients takes an interest in your species.”
“And what happens if they don’t?” I regret the question as soon as I utter it.
In one fluid movement, the madam grabs my throat and pins me against the mirror. Her claws dig into my trachea, and I let out a strangled scream.
“You think this hurts, human? That this is pain? You don’t even know what I’ll do to you if you step out of line again.”
She releases me, and I collapse on the floor, gasping and choking.
“Now get up,” she hisses, dragging me onto my feet. “And get in that auction room. You better hope there’s a client out there who shows mercy on you, human, because I certainly won’t once this event is over. That I can assure you of.”
The doors open, and an alien in a black robe clicks his webbed fingers at me. Again, they’re treating me like I’m just a dog. But there’s nothing I can do about it. My legs tremble as I cross the length of the room. The doctor was right: the nausea has subsidized, but now it’s been replaced with a fear I haven’t felt since my parents died. It only intensifies when the male herds me into a line with four other creatures. I search them for a familiar face, and I should be relieved when I see none, but a part of me shrinks and dies.
I really am alone in all this.
We follow the male down a long, narrow passageway. The last girl walking behind me sniffles the entire way, and I don’t know why, but I reach out and offer her my hand. To my surprise, she accepts it, and we squeeze each other tightly, literally clinging to one another for dear life until the alien rips us apart and shoves us through another door.
My eyes adjust to a room shrouded in near darkness. A spotlight bleeds down from the ceiling and spills over a line of gilded cages. There are five of them in total, each positioned at the foot of a platform bathed in sapphire lights. They’re not just ordinary cages.
They’re birdcages. And I’m about to be imprisoned in one.
My heart thrashes with horrific possibilities of what’s to come. However, I don’t have long to dwell on my fate before I’m dragged into the second to last cage. It’s large enough to fit all the girls inside, but the bars are too narrow to escape through. Despite that I cannot see them, I know there are creatures out there, watching me from the shadows. I can hear their whispers and feel their eyes on me like spiders scuttling over my body.
Out of nowhere, a green hand reaches through the bars to grab me.
I shriek and jump back, but another hand grabs my hair and pulls me toward it, pressing my head to the bars. I scream and dig my nails into its slimy flesh, but the hands merely accumulate. I try to evade them. I even kick, punch, and scratch their hands and legs. But this only entices them further, and they grow more frantic to provoke me.
With no way out or escape from this gilded hell, I do the only thing I can to protect myself: I shut down. I move to the middle of the cage, pull my knees up, and wrap my arms around them. Instead of hiding from the monsters lurking in the dark, I look right at them, praying I’ll one day get my revenge.
Castien
As a Darkblood, blending in with the shadows has never presented