My mind spins as I try to decide what I should say and shouldn’t. As long as they don’t know I’ve been outside before, then I see no reason to tell them. I have no qualms about telling them what happened inside. “I do not know about a boat from the sky,” I lie. “There was an explosion below ground,” I say. “It damaged the tower. We call it the dome,” I explain. “It made the ground cave in and destroyed my home. It also cracked the glass, and that’s how the smoke got out.”
“There are ah-more like ye?” Wulf asks. “With the ah-eyes?”
“Just the two men who are with me,” I lie once more. “We are all that survived.”
“Why were ye sent ah-out?”
I shrug. “Does it matter? The leaders inside wanted to get rid of us.”
Wulf sits back in his chair where before he’d been leaning forward, gleaning every bit of information he could from our conversation. He looks at me for a moment and then he laughs. “There was not even a trade fer ye,” he says. “They must hate ye inside. So why did he not ah kill ye like he has with the ah-others?”
I shake my head. “I was in a cell. Then I was brought outside to a place I was told did not exist except for flames. I do not know what they think or why they do the things they do. I just know my home was destroyed, and now I am here.”
He smiles and it does not reach his eyes. Then, before I can blink, he slams his fists on the table in front of me, rattling my plate. “Ye lie.” He sweeps my plate down the table as I shrink back from his anger.
“Out,” he spits at Ragnor and Janna, who have remained quiet throughout the meal. Ragnor opens his mouth to protest and Janna touches his arm. They exchange a look and then they both rise and go.
The guards leave also, and the women leave the room, moving back behind the bed. I can only assume there is a door there. I cannot see, and I am too scared to move.
The thought that I may not get to go back to my friends fills me as Wulf takes another long draught from his cup. I smell the same bitter smell that surrounded my grandfather when he drank. Alcohol and anger are a bad mix, and I fear I may bear the brunt of it.
I know that is the least of my worries. Wulf’s earlier friendliness is gone. Why I thought I could handle this situation I will never know. He wraps his large hand in my hair and drags me from the table. Chairs fall over and he ignores them. I have no choice but to go, even though I would willingly let him pull every hair from my head to escape him. My hair just will not let go and neither does he. I am swung around as if I am nothing more than a rag doll and thrown through the curtains onto the bed.
I am so scared that I tremble violently as I try to escape him but it is useless. He grabs my ankles and twists them. I scream out in pain as he drags me back to him.
Why is it that men use the fear of rape to dominate women? It isn’t fair that they hold this over us. This has happened to me twice before, and I escaped it. Once by my own measures, once by Levi’s. Both resulted in the death of my attacker.
I know there is no escape for me now. I am battered and bruised, and my head is still woozy from the blow to my temple. I am tired and I am weak and I am so frightened that I can’t think. All I can do is react, and I do, screaming and kicking and fighting, but it is like battering the dome. There is no give in the glass or in this man who holds me down. I exhaust myself waiting for the inevitable.
Yet it does not happen. He stares down at me as he holds me in place with his hands. “If I ah-take ye now Ragnor will protest as ye are his until the morrow. But ye ah-will be mine. I ah-have yet to decide if ye are ah-worth killing over.”
It takes a moment for my mind to comprehend what he says. He releases his hold on me, but I am still afraid to move. He goes back to the table, picks up his mug and fills it from the pitcher that miraculously still sits on the table, then he goes to the fire and sticks the poker into the flames.
“Garth!” he yells, and one of the guards comes through the door. “Hold her.”
I knew my escape was too good to be true. Before I can make my sore and trembling body scramble from the bed, Garth has ahold of me and drags me to my feet as Wulf removes the poker from the fire. He blows on the end, making it glow even redder, and then brings it perilously close to my face.
“If ye came from ah-below ground, and have been in ah-cell since the smoke ah-came, then why do ye care so much ah-boot the others?” He leans the poker in closer, not close enough to touch me, but close enough that the heat singes my cheek.
“I shared a cell with Jilly,” I say. “The other woman is older and weaker than the rest of us. I knew she would not survive it. Jilly is crippled from the walk. I don’t want anyone to die when I can save them.” I speak the truth yet I continue to hide much. At this point I know that whatever I say will not make any difference. Wulf will do what he wants to do. Still I cannot help but think of Alex. Of how he burned.
“The boy knows ye.” I know he is talking about Pace. He had to have seen us together and have known there was something there.
“I knew him before,” I say. “He is from above. It was forbidden for us to be together. The woman is his mother. The other one is his friend.” Once more I have told a version of the truth. I dare not lie. I know Wulf will see it.
The heat from the poker is less intense, yet I know it will still burn me. Wulf looks at it for a moment, then at the fire. Then he tosses the poker aside as if he has decided it is not worth the effort to heat it up again.
Please don’t ask about the Quest …
“Take her,” he says to Garth, who promptly propels me through the door and shoves me at Ragnor and Janna. Janna, surprisingly, puts her arms around me.
“It was your ah-courage that captured his ah-tention,” Ragnor says with approval.
“I wish I’d have known that beforehand,” I say as I try to make my trembling subside. Janna releases me as quickly as she grabbed me, as if she is embarrassed by her show of emotion.
“He will ah-give a good price for ye,” Ragnor says.
“Why? Why are we yours to sell? What gives you the right?”
“We ah-answered the call,” Ragnor says simply.
I don’t know what to say. And I am finding it very difficult to put one foot in front of the other. Too much has happened in too little a time, and my body and mind are reeling. I cannot keep up with it all. I still don’t believe I have escaped, and I realize that I haven’t. Not really. Come morning, I will belong to Wulf and my friends will be sold as well. We will be separated and have no way to escape our fates. We can’t let that happen. We have to find a way out of here tonight.
“You can’t do this,” I say. We are walking across the bridge now, and I know there is not much time. “There is a better way. A better way to live than this. You are better than this, both of you. I’ve seen it in you.”
“Quiet!” Ragnor barks, and Janna looks around to see if anyone is listening.
“You must help us escape. You must.” I plead.
“No more,” Ragnor says. “Ye will not ah-speak again, or I will gag ye.”
I open my mouth and clamp it shut just as quickly. If only I had time to make them see. I can understand their fear, and I have nothing better to offer them. If only we knew where the Quest was. Even if we escape, where can we go? Where can we hide?
For the first time since this all began, I am truly helpless. My fate is not my own. Were we not all better off before we began this crusade? Certainly there were things we did not like about our lives, but we had homes, food, security, and choices.
All the deaths, all the losses we suffered were for naught if this is where we end our days, as slaves to the rovers. It would also give my father the satisfaction of knowing he was right all along. Despair fills me. I have accomplished nothing. I left my friends hoping I could fill them with hope. Now I am going back to them to tell them there is no hope, there is no future, and there is no hope of rescue.