by Cora May
Those who had already been examined were cleared, she realized. Those who had already been examined had nothing that this man wanted—that’s why the unexamined girls were terrified. They might still get picked. And this man was clearly a horrible being.
What was Sorenna begging of her, then? Did she want Brin to blend and be turned down, or was she supposed to look appealing?
She didn’t really have a choice, though. Her heart was pounding so fast, and the sweat was pouring down her face. Her body’s reaction was to hide away, fearfully shrinking back and doing her best to be unnoticed.
She would fail whatever test this man was giving.
She would be overlooked, like all the other girls had been so far. Passed by. Unimpressive. And she didn’t mind that one bit.
Sorenna and the man were now moving on from the last girl before Srilla. Brin looked over at the poor girl. She looked like a terrified child, desperately wishing for her mother’s comfort, but left without it, alone and unknowing in the world she lived in.
Brin could hear the discussion now, spoken so lowly between the man and Sorenna. She could hear the parameters of the examination and what he was looking for.
“The confidence level in this one seems rather lacking,” the man stated.
“Oh, no,” Sorenna assured him, sounding sure of herself. Her eyes told a different story, though—she was getting more and more nervous as the man regarded Srilla. “She’s only putting on an act of innocence—that’s what works for her, you see. She has a young face and a young body. Sometimes they like to think they are corrupting her—that works so much better with an act of innocence.”
“But she is a child,” the man countered.
“No,” Sorenna argued. “Not in the ways it matters. She had been here for so long, she is only a child in body.”
“So she is not fearful,” the man allowed after a moment of thought. “Is she compliant?”
“Oh, but of course,” Sorenna said. “All of my girls have great attitudes—they are required to have that. They are trained here to do as you please, and nothing less.”
“Then why is she chained?” the man challenged.
Brin watched as Sorenna actually paled. She was fearful. She was caught in a lie. It took her half a beat to recover.
“Because,” she said, “this one is one of our feistier girls. She likes to give the illusion of a runner, a naughty girl, someone who is dangerous. I assure you, she is none of those things at heart, but sometimes the men like to pretend she is.”
“Uh-huh,” the man said, unimpressed.
“She is a spirited one,” Sorenna added. “She would fill the position you are seeking with great pleasure.”
“You said that about the last one, Sorenna,” the man reminded her. “That didn’t turn out so well. She was weak.”
“I didn’t know exactly what you were looking for back then,” Sorenna pleaded. “I know much more now.”
“You have said that, too.”
“I have many more girls to choose from this time,” she added. “More possibilities for you to take home!”
Brin’s heart stopped in her chest.
To take home.
The words rang in her head.
She understood now.
Sorenna was selling the girls.
The fear pressed on her chest, threatening to squash her into her bed. She wished it would. A flat girl was not worth this man’s time, surely. She would be safe.
“I have heard that, too,” the man said, thoroughly unimpressed. He turned away from Srilla.
He did not choose Srilla.
Brin was next to be examined.
Her heart thudded erratically in her chest.
The man stopped in front of her and stood quietly. His face turned up slightly and his brows furrowed in thought. Or in confusion? Something. Brin couldn’t quite tell. All she could really see was that he was studying her very carefully.
She couldn’t help but shrink back.
“This one seems even more terrified,” the man stated as he studied her further, one brow raising as if to question her fear. “Why do you have such terrified girls?”
“She’s an exotic, though,” Sorenna said, as if it was going to change his mind about her fear.
“I can see that,” he told her. “Which would mean, of course, a greater risk on me should I be caught with her in my possession. Why would I run that risk if she is nothing but afraid?”
“She could be what you are looking for.”
“I could report you for owning her,” he informed Sorenna. “And then you would both lose your place in this Realm.”
Sorenna paled.
“Just give her a chance,” she begged him. “You can try her out for free, right now. I’ll look the other way. You can see for yourself—she might be exactly what you are looking for.”
The man spat on the ground.
“I do not conduct my business in these rooms,” he hissed. “That is for the filth that is far below me. I think you are wasting my time.”
“No, Donlarr, I promise,” Sorenna pleaded, “I have never let you down before.”
“Ah,” said the man—Donlarr, “yet another promise I have heard from you on many occasions in the past. Tell me, Sor, when are you going to live up to your reputation?”
“She is not the one for you,” Sorenna finally stated with a clear voice that held a bit of aggression. Brin could not tell who that anger was aimed at, though—was it her or Donlarr? “Willa is, though. You can have her, and at a discount.”
Sorenna motioned to the next bed, gently leading him to Willa’s bed. When Donlarr submitted and allowed her to lead him over, Sorenna looked back to glare at Brin.
The glare burned into her soul, and Brin knew then that she would be punished. She was sure, though, that it wouldn’t be as bad as whatever Donlarr was going to do to Willa. He asked Sorenna a few questions as his eyes stripped Willa naked. He didn’t seem entirely pleased with what he saw there, but for whatever reason, she settled for her with one great big sigh. He pulled out a small brown bag from his pocket and thrust is into Sorenna’s hand.
Sorenna greedily took the bag and shoved it down the tight clothing that was stretched around her chest. It gave her another lump around her breasts, but she didn’t seem to mind at all. She yanked Willa’s wrist forward, toward her stomach, and pulled a knife out of her tight skirt. Brin hadn’t noticed the weaponry she kept on her body. She used the knife to scrape off the mark on Willa’s wrist.
Brin looked away the moment the knife dug under the girl’s skin. She wished she could have closed her ears, too, to protect them from the piercing scream that followed. Her heart, too, needed to be protected, as she felt the scream pierce right through it.
What had these girls done that was so bad to deserve this?
When the screaming was over, Brin looked back at Willa’s wrist. In place of the mark was now one giant square of blood, and on the ground was one matching square of flesh, departed from the body it belonged to.
Sorenna dropped the girl’s wrist and walked away, ignoring the Anam man as completely as he was ignoring her. The transaction was complete.
She glared at Brin again as she walked past her bed, and glared at Srilla, too. In fact, Brin watched as she glared at each and every girl that had been turned down, as if they had done something horribly wrong to her personally. Each girl looked down at their beds in shame.
Brin wondered, though, if the only bad thing they did was survive.
As much as one could survive in this place.
“Nothing makes sense,” Brin mumbled to herself through the fear. “This is Hell, why isn’t everyone being punished?”
“We have a society,” Srilla told her again. “We have a system. We are at the bottom. Dimonis does not look on us with favor. We have not pleased him, not in the last life and not in this life.”
“Who is Donlarr?” Brin asked again. “What is he going to do to Willa?”
&
nbsp; “We don’t know,” she said sadly. “We have never known. He doesn’t tell us or Sorenna what he has done after he purchases the girl and walks away.”
“He comes in and beats us,” another Anam girl said. Anjelik, Brin thought was her name. “He uses the whip, and sometimes he uses a knife. He hurts us. That’s his pleasure. It’s what he gets off on. But Madam Sorenna will only let him go so far in this room. She does not want her girls to be permanently damaged, because that means they are worth less. We’d bring in less money if something was too broken, which means her establishment would suffer.”
“How much does he give her, then,” Brin began, “if she is willing to lose an Anam girl completely?”
“More than we can comprehend, I’m sure,” Anjelik said.
“He probably pays off our debts,” Srilla said, “and doubles it.”
“Where has he gotten that much money?” she asked quietly.
“Dimonis has favored him greatly,” Anjelik said. “He is one of the Anam Dorcha who is allowed to enter through the portal to get to the human world. He is what the Anam Solas have come to fear.”
Brin perked up.
“What do you mean?” she asked. “Why are the Anam Solas afraid of him?”
Srilla and Anjelik both looked at her with confusion in their eyes. She had acted too eager at the words, and it didn’t fit the somber mood. She couldn’t find the energy to care about the general atmosphere in that moment, though—she was too concerned with the mention of the other worlds.
“I don’t know,” Anjelik told her. “I’ve been stuck here as much as you have. I do not dare leave this brothel, even for a bit of information. Sorenna would find me. I have been marked. We all have. Leaving this place is not possible.”
Brin bit her lip. She dropped the conversation, sensing that neither of the girls was willing to talk about it anymore. They had surrendered themselves to this life for the rest of eternity. They did not look forward to anything more for themselves—though, they probably shouldn’t, Brin told herself. After all, they were Anam Dorcha, even if they were more abused and mistreated than others. They had still done something in the human world that told the Reaper they belonged in the Realm of the Dark. They were dark beings.
However, Anjelik was wrong, Brin realized. Although she could not prove the girl wrong about many of the things she had said, she knew for a fact that there was a way to get out of Sorenna’s brothel. She knew because she had just watched it be done. Willa had left, and her mark had been removed as well. Perhaps Donlarr did not come to rescue her, and perhaps she was going to a place that was much worse, but she was out of Sorenna’s grasp. She had been set free.
The rest of the information Anjelik had just shared was just enough to go on. Donlarr was able to get into the human world and, from there—or perhaps from this Realm, Brin could not be sure—he was able to terrorize the Anam Solas. Perhaps she had not been able to talk to the Reaper like she and Chanta were supposed to do, but maybe part of the puzzle was down in the Realm of the Dark.
She could do her part from there if only she could get the attention of the man who these girls feared—and if he showed up in time.
Over the next few days—or months or years or hours or whatever it was in this place that time never seemed to notice—Madam Sorenna did punish the girls. She took away their food, and each one of them began to starve. Brin felt herself losing weight, but she also felt her resolve growing stronger now that she had a way out and a way to help her friends. Now whenever Sorenna walked by to check her girls and update them on their debts, which seemed to grow faster without the food costs somehow, Brin kept her head high as she glared at the woman without saying a word, rather than cowering in the back of the bed with a couple of sobs.
Orak had noticed her change in behavior and regarded her with a close, watchful eye. He expected her to try and make a run for it at any moment. He made a habit of checking her chains to make sure there was not a weak link or a broken spot in any of them. Brin knew, of course, that there was not.
It seemed that there was a punishment for the sudden behavior change, though. Now that she was no longer terrified in the corner of her bed, the Anam men seemed to take note of her more. Sorenna began to send more and more of them her way, offering a big discount as well. None of the other girls had been discounted. Sorenna was trying to break Brin. She was trying to get rid of the attitude. It scared her. Scaring Sorenna was one of the best feelings Brin had ever felt. It made her feel powerful, even if it earned her one of the worst punishments she could fathom. It also kept her going and made it impossible for Sorenna to break her.
She began to bruise very quickly. Her once beautiful brown skin was now marred with big, purple marks around her chest and legs, where the men grabbed as hard her as they could while they had their way with her. She had big gashes in her back where one of the men had paid to whip her. Her throat was covered in dark red marks from where many of the men had put their mouths. She even had some bite marks in various stages of healing. She even earned herself a black eye from one that was so rough, he had thrust her into the chains that dragged around her on the mattress.
Sorenna had broken her own rule about physical marks on her girls. She had allowed Brin to be beaten and broken. She allowed each Anam to do whatever pleased him, no matter how badly it would harm her. Through the pain of the beatings and the humiliation of the activities that happened in a public brothel, Brin held her head as high as she could. Once the men were gone and Sorenna had come around to update her on her debt, she held her head even higher, pushing down all the vomit and tears that wanted to come up.
It infuriated Sorenna. She began to increase Brin’s debts at exponential rates until it was so high that she knew she could fuck a million of these men in one day and not have made enough to pay off the debt. She stopped feeling shocked at the new numbers. She stopped processing them at all, in fact, her mind barely even recognizing the sounds that came out of Sorenna’s mouth as numbers. It didn’t matter, she would tell herself. She could owe every bit of money from all the Realms combined, and it wouldn’t matter. She was not here to pay off a debt—none of these girls were. They were all here to suffer for the rest of eternity. Brin was just waiting for someone to come and pay off her debt for her. He would come, she knew.
She didn’t know Willa well—she made it a point not to get to know any of these girls that well, really. What she did know of the girl made it obvious that Donlarr would need a new girl soon enough. Willa was weak. She was terrified. Brin had watched what the men would do with her. It was easy to dominate her because she would immediately start to cry. She must not have been in this place for too long before Brin, because she still had tears to cry. Most of the other girls had just let things happen to them with a stone-cold, emotionless face, and when it was done, they simply closed their eyes and went to sleep for a little while. Willa was still able to sob about it.
Donlarr would grow tired of listening to her sob. Brin wasn’t sure what would make him find a new girl, or what he planned to do with the old girl, but Willa’s debts had been paid. Her mark had been removed. She was free of the brothel. She was free to live her afterlife away from Sorenna. Perhaps Donlarr only marked his girls with something else, but that didn’t matter to Brin. What mattered was that she would be in a place that was more productive than being here was. What mattered was finding out any bits of information, and finding a way to get that information to Addy and Chanta.
When she wasn’t too busy being beaten or fucked by an Anam, she was talking to the other girls. She was gathering information on the society and how it worked in this Realm. She understood now that, even though they were all dark creatures and essentially demons that worshipped Dimonis, they all had their own free wills, too. They all had their own personalities. Many of them were allowed to cross over into the human world. The idea was to harm the humans in some way, or to harm the Anam Solas from the human world, but Brin began to wonder if some of thos
e Anam Dorcha might have a reason to cooperate with her and work with her. Perhaps they would even bring her back to the human world, where she belonged. At the very least, she could get them to act as messengers.
Soon enough, it felt like an entire year had passed. Brin still had not gotten her opportunity to get Donlarr to take her away from the brothel and Sorenna was still angry at her. Her debt continued to climb as her attitude continued to grow more obstinate and haughty. She began to fear that the debt would be too big for Donlarr to afford her at all, but with the low prices Sorenna was putting on her services, there was not a whole lot she could do about it anymore. She could only hope that Sorenna was tired enough of her attitude that she would give him a discount on her life as well.
If, that was, he ever came.
PART FOUR:
DONLARR’S WIFE
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: CHANTA
S he waited for what seemed like hours after class, but Addy never came. She even left the dorm room to glance out over the Jasper field, but it was empty. None of the students were practicing that day. Addy was supposed to have come up with a plan for her, but she had disappeared.
That’s two missing roommates, it seemed, Chanta had told herself. She had felt relief that at least the second one she could not blame on herself.
But something else had happened, too, while she waited for Addy. Something that had her stunned, sitting on the edge of her bed and staring at the wall across the room as if she could see through it. She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it, or if, by some miracle, it could be true. She sure as hell didn’t know how to respond.
Chanta, the voice was saying again.
The voice belonged to Brin. It was a pleasant, soft-spoken tone that had always reminded Chanta of a child’s voice. It was the most recognizable sound to her, partly because it was so lovely, and partly because of her guilt at having been the cause of its disappearance. That could easily explain why she was hearing things, couldn’t it? She had wanted to hear it so bad that she was imagining it. That was the best explanation she had. Yet, she couldn’t make the voice stop.