by ML Guida
Amadi glared. “You’re a gutless codfish.” He tilted his head. “Terrorizin’ a poor little poppet.”
The men gestured toward the crowd. “You’ve worn out your usefulness, boy. I doubt any of these good people would want to buy you.”
“Good. I’m not for sale.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that.” A sugary female voice sent shivers down his spine.
He closed his eyes. The voice reminded Amadi of Natasa, a demon from Coaybay. He jerked his head to make sure the demon hadn’t found her way back from where the time spider had taken her. But instead of flaming red hair, a woman holding a white parasol sauntered toward them. But she wasn’t the one who caught his eye—a petite redhead did.
She was dressed in little better than rags. Her dress was too big for her slender frame, but he could detect the curves underneath. She had curly auburn hair and lost brown eyes. A beacon of beauty in this hellhole.
The blond man bowed slightly. “Mademoiselle D’Aubigne—”
Amadi sucked in his breath and the skin across his chest tightened. D’Aubigne? Mother of Mercy!
“Hush, Owen. I like my bucks big.” She cast her blue, sapphires eyes over Amadi as if he were a prized piece of steak. He scowled. With her curly black hair, there was no mistake—she had to be related to Jacques, his former master. Sister? Cousin?
Owen clicked his tongue. “He’s too much for you to handle.”
“Silence!” She pointed her parasol. “I see no one else here brave enough to bid on him, oui?”
“He needs to be put down like a rabid dog,” Owen insisted.
“I’ll hear no more of your protests. How much?”
Amadi held his head high refusing to cower. “I said I’m—”
Owen yanked on his chain, and Amadi fell to his knees. “Yes, you are.”
Amadi wasn’t done yet and pulled on the chain. “I’ll not—”
“You do seem determined.” Miss D’Aubigne snapped her fingers and pointed down. “Violet, come here.”
The petite redhead walked over to her. Fear flashed in her eyes. She stood a few feet behind Miss D’Aubigne then bowed her head. Her hair shielded her face. “Yes, Maîtresse?”
Mademoiselle D’Aubigne was pretty, but she paled compared to the charming rose. Violet had a turned-up nose peppered with delicate freckles and a tan face. She must spend much of her time outside. He liked a woman who wasn’t afraid of the sun. He stared at her mouth, luscious lips made for kissing. Was Mademoiselle D’Aubigne jealous of Violet? Was that why she was forced to wear such an ugly brown dress compared to the Maîtresse, who wore a green gown that matched her eyes?
“Look at me, buck.”
Amadi glared. “My name is Amadi.”
“Did you give yourself this name?” Mademoiselle D’Aubigne asked. “Violet?”
Violet raised her head and stared. He could not tear his gaze away from her perceptive gaze, even if he had wanted to. ’Twas as if strong hands held his head. When he moved, pain shot behind his eyes.
She shook her head. “No, he did not name himself.”
He gasped as he was released. Was she a witch?
“Amadi?” Mademoiselle D’Aubigne said slowly and frowned as if she was trying to remember. “Are you originally from Saint Kitts?”
“No.” Amadi sucked in his gut. Please, don’t let her remember he was once a slave here. “No, he’s not.”
Amadi kept his face frozen.
But a huge red blotch formed on Violet’s face. It looked like someone had slapped her and left a handprint.
Mademoiselle D’Aubigne pointed her parasol at Violet. “Violet.” Her voice was sharp.
“I’m tellin’ da truth.”
A similar blotch formed on her cheek, blistering. She rubbed her cheeks and hung her head. “No, no,” she whispered.
“No, he’s not from Saint Kitts?”
“He’s from here.”
Amadi glared and bared his teeth. He wanted to slap the wench. Did she have any idea what she’d just done?
She raised her head. Tears glistened in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she mouthed silently.
He blinked. The blotches had completely vanished. What the hell?
Owen slapped him on the back of the head. “You were a slave, here? Who owns you?”
His heart thundering, Amadi gritted his teeth. “No one owns me.”
Mademoiselle D’Aubigne flashed him a confident gaze. “Violet.”
Violet wiped her eyes. She glanced between Amadi and Mademoiselle D’Aubigne. “I don’t…”
“Before you answer.” Mademoiselle D’Aubigne held up her palm. “Just to let you know, I’ve decided to buy Chloe, and if I see one blotch on that little creamy face of yours, she’ll pay the price. Comprenez-vous?”
This place was monstrous, worse than the bowels of the Fiery Damsel. Not even Quinton Palmer threatened to torture a child.
Violet bit her lip. The same pulling sensation fell over Amadi, and he turned his head, trying to fight it. Willing Violet not to betray him.
Mademoiselle D’Aubigne tapped her parasol on the ground. “I’m waiting, Violet.” Her impatient voice sent a heat flushing through Amadi’s body.
He clenched his fists. Terror pulled into his gut. Don’t say it.
Chloe sniffed.
Violet looked at the little girl. Compassion flooded her eyes. She sighed. “He’s yours.”
The corners of Mademoiselle D’Aubigne’s mouth turned up into a smirk. A tremor of fear quivered through his gut. He remembered that smile.’Twas the same one Jacques gave him before he tortured him.
Chapter 4
Amadi huddled in the cramped wagon next to Chloe and four other adult males. The manacles around his wrists and ankles chafed his flesh. Sunlight peeked through the bars, warming his skin. The stench of human sweat permeated the unusually small wagon. ’Twas twice as small as the Cap’n’s cabin. He wasn’t able to stretch out his legs. Due to the many bodies, he had his knees up against his chest. The other males were just as crunched.
He sucked in a breath at a twinge in his thigh and jerked.
Chloe laid her head against him and gripped his arm hard. For a small child, she had amazing strength. She looked up at him. “I want my mummy.” Wetness dampened her black eyelashes and streaked her dirty cheeks.
His stomach knotted at her pleading face. “I know.” He wanted to wrap his arms around her and comfort her, but his wrists were bound tight. “Try to sleep, poppet.” He cursed at not being able to save her mother and leaned his head back on the iron bars. He sang a song he remembered some of the women slaves used to sing to calm their babies.
Three of the men knotted their brows, surprised at his voice, while the second one raised his eyebrow. He ignored their astonished looks, hoping Chloe would rest.
She slowly closed her eyes and nestled closer. Her whimpers diminished, and her muscles relaxed. She fell asleep. He hoped she dreamt about happier times, if she had any happy times.
He shifted his weight, and the iron neck ring and the manacles around his wrist and ankles rubbed his skin raw. For the twenty-eighth time, he tried calling upon his vampire powers to break the links, but ’twas useless.
The wagon lurched. He banged into the man next to him.
The man stared at Amadi. “You protected da girl.” He was muscular and had a thick scar from his eye down to his chin. The scar reminded Amadi of the Cap’n, and he wondered again where he was.
“Aye, I did.” Amadi lowered his voice so as not to wake Chloe.
“You shouldn’t have brought her here.”
Amadi bunched his eyebrows. “Why?”
The slave leaned forward, but he was shackled to the bars. “Da missus is a witch.”
Amadi tensed. Since the last battle on Zuto’s island, he’d had enough of witches and their strange ways, except for Hannah and Mariah. They weren’t evil.
A bald man nodded. “The mistress claims to practice voodoo.” He looked over his sh
oulder as if someone was behind him, listening. He lowered his voice. “But she’s twisted it. Made it evil. She done killed her last husband.”
“I don’t fear witches.” Amadi’s voice was strong. Maybe too strong.
The driver glanced over his shoulder and glared.
“You should.” The scarred man lowered his voice, and Amadi detected fear.
“The mistress picks a buck an’ takes ’im to her bed.” The man curled his lip. “If he pleases her, she’ll keep him in da house until she tires. When she tires, she tortures him.” He rattled his chains. “But that ain’t da worst part. She’ll order his death. Boiled alive. Dat little girl would be better elsewhere. Any place is better.”
Amadi’s gut hurt. He wanted to debate, but the man’s argument made sense. “What about da redhead with her? Is she a witch too?”
The scarred man shook his head. “I don’ know nothin’ about her. She’s never far from the mistress. Not sure why. But I think it’s magic, the darkest magic.”
Amadi clenched his bound wrists. “Why do you think dis?”
“Because bad things happen around her. I think she’s cursed.”
Amadi’s throat closed up. He didn’t respond. Unfortunately, he understood curses all too well.
The conversation died as quickly as it had started. No one spoke as the wagon creaked along the rocky road and each time the horses’ hooves clomped on the cobblestone, they jostled into each other. Soon, he’d be assigned to a slave gang again and forced to work in the fields. He desperately missed the open sea and the salty air on his face—the right to make decisions or offer an opinion on the Soaring Phoenix without fear of reprisal.
The sun sank lower as the horses pulled into the slave quarters—a bunch of broken down wooden shacks. Weeds—oleander, nightshade, dumb cane—grew around the shacks. All deadly. Unease settled into his taunt muscles. He didn’t remember the poisonous weeds being here when he was enslaved.
He whispered to the man next to him. “What’s with da deadly weeds? They weren’t here when I was here.”
The man moistened his lips. “Spells. The mistress uses them for evil purposes.”
The cage door swung open.
The man lowered his gaze and stopped talking.
Amadi cursed his blight. Gèrard Dubois stood with his feet shoulder length apart and held a cat-o’-nail-tails in his hand. “Hurry and get out.”
Dubois was uglier than what Amadi remembered, with his dark eyes and curled lip. He had been Jacques D’Aubigne’s overseer, and Amadi had hoped that after Dubois’s last entanglement with the Fiery Damsel, he’d stay clear, but he wasn’t that smart.
Amadi nudged Chloe. “Wake up, lass. We’re here.” He tried to keep his voice calm so as to not scare the mere chit, but the vacant eyes of the slave children huddled around their mothers left little doubt the horror they’d witnessed.
Chloe blinked open her eyes. “Mummy?” She clasped his arm.
“Shhh, we need to move.” He tilted his head for her to move, afraid if she hesitated, she’d experience Dubois’ whip.
Dubois narrowed his eyes. “I said now.”
Chloe’s eyes widened, and she stood, her little legs trembling. She stumbled after the men, but kept glancing back. Amadi forced his cramped legs to move and maneuvered out of the wagon, keeping his head down, hoping Dubois wouldn’t recognize him. But his fortune hadn’t been good ever since he drank from Zuto’s lake.
Dubois flicked his whip. “Welcome back, Amadi.”
Amadi blinked.
“Oui, I remember you. You’ll not like it here. I promise.” He slapped the butt of his whip on Amadi’s chest. “If you try to strangle me like you did poor Franc Bèringer, when you escaped, I’ll see you burned alive. You’re damn lucky you’re not dead. But the decision’s not mine. If it were, you’d be dead.”
Amadi’s muscles strained and his breath was loud in his ears. If he had half a chance, then he’d strangle Dubois with his bare hands.
Amadi filed into line next to the other men, and Chloe wrapped her arms around his thigh. A white carriage pulled up to him, and the door swung open. Maîtresse D’Aubigne stuck out her hand, and the footman helped her out. Her white, frilly gown swooshed as she headed over. She twirled her white and pink parasol. Her black hair was pulled up into a bun, and loose black curls flared around her face.
She was a beauty, but he couldn’t take his eyes off Violet in her pale, drab, brown dress. Her face and hands were tan opposed to the mistress’ white creamy skin and the gloves that protected her hands. Violet followed the mistress, but always three steps behind like a trained dog.
“Oui, Fine bucks.” She stopped in front of Amadi and flashed a leering smile. “Especially you. You make these other garçons look like mere boys.” She turned to Dubois. “He’s the one.”
“But Mademoiselle D’Aubigne, he’s not to be trusted.” He slammed the butt of the whip into Amadi’s back.
Amadi bit back a groan.
“He strangled Franc Bèringer, the last overseer. He should be burned alive.”
Amadi braced his shoulders in defiance and glowered at Dubois.
Maîtresse D’Aubigne pointed at Dubois. “Touch him, and you will feel my wrath.”
Dubois’ eyes widened, and he set his jaw. Fear itched into his face. He was afraid, very afraid.
She smiled. “Fix him up and bring him to me. The smell of the other slaves is tainting his.” She sauntered up to Amadi, her eyes gleaming with devilry. “I want to smell only him. Then bring him to my private chambers where he can pleasure me.”
The woman had no shame, and neither the slaves nor her men flinched.
Amadi turned his gaze from her lusty one and stuck out his chest. “No.”
She arched a thin eyebrow. “You defy me?”
Violet shook her head and mouthed the word no. Did she actually think he would submit to such degradation? He’d been forced to once, and once was one too many times. He’d vowed never to submit again to another man—or woman. He was a free man.
Maîtresse D’Aubigne folded her parasol and ran it down Amadi’s bare chest. “I’m going to enjoy breaking you. Take him to the dungeon.”
Amadi remembered Jacques’ dungeon and how he’d found the Cap’n strapped to the wheel, his limbs broken, spikes tearing through his flesh. The realization he was going to be imprisoned in the hellhole sent dread to tangle in his stomach, to knot into a mass of nerve endings that rippled with terror and panic over the thought of what the mistress would do.
A lanky man grabbed Chloe, who stretched out her arms. “No!”
Tears pooled in her eyes, and she screamed.
“Leave da chit alone!” Amadi’s commanding voice fell on deaf ears. He wasn’t the master gunner, feared and respected by his gun crew.
The man shoved Chloe into a nearby tall woman. “Take the brat.”
The slave immediately picked Chloe up and held her close. “Hush, child,” she said. Although fear coated her voice, she strangely comforted Chloe, and the little girl clung to her.
Two men seized his arms. Amadi twisted his body, trying to knock them to the ground, but ’twas useless. His bound neck, ankles, and wrists prevented him from sliding off his jailers. A man yanked on the chain around his neck, nearly choking him, while two others clamped onto his arms. He struggled to breathe as he was dragged into the large, white-columned house. Fear lodged in Amadi’s throat and rolled around in his gut. He slipped on the hardwood kitchen floor and banged his knee, sending pain throbbing up his leg. But the man didn’t care. He pulled Amadi toward a door that led to the chamber.
“Open the damn door.” The man tilted his head at a wide-eyed servant girl.
The girl opened the door, her hand shaking. Before Amadi knew what was happening, he was shoved down the stone steps. He rolled headfirst and slammed his side onto a step. Blackness shrouded him.
Chapter 5
Amadi woke naked and with his arms stretched high over his head
and his legs pulled apart. He dangled from the ceiling like a starfish. Dried blood caked on his left side where he’d slammed into the step. If he’d been human, he probably would have died. The stench of human gore clung to the dead air. A smoldering fire burned in a blackened pit. Pain throbbed between his temples, and his stomach swirled. He leaned his head back.
“He’s awake,” a male voice said. “Go tell the Maîtresse.”
Heavy footsteps hurried up the stone steps. Amadi strained to glance over his shoulder. The skinny man who had thrown Chloe at the slave woman watched him with a wiry grin.
“You’re going to learn your place. You may be bigger than most darkies, but you will learn to respect your betters. The Maîtresse will see to that.”
Amadi lowered his head. It seemed like it would take a hundred days before the full moon would rise, but it was less than two days away. Then he’d rip his tormentor’s skinny ass apart.
The door creaked open, and soft footsteps clicked along the steps. “Leave us, Troy.”
Amadi cringed at the silky feminine voice.
Troy nodded. “Yes, Maîtresse.”
The door slammed, and Amadi leaned his head back. Spider webs hung from the ceiling along with black lichen.
Maîtresse D’Aubigne strolled around him. She no longer wore her frilly dress and dressed like a man, reminding him of Hannah, who always wore the Cap’n’s clothes. But unlike Hannah, the Maîtresse’s black shirt and breeches fit snug around her body. A whip hung off her hip, and on the other, a dagger stuck into a sheath. She stared at his manhood boldly and licked her lips as if he were roasted meat. “My, you are magnifique.”
The wench had less shame than a Billy goat. She ran her bare hand down his chest, and he struggled to bounce her fingers off his skin, but he could barely even move. The woman was worse than the demoness Natasa.
“Flog off.” He used his best commanding master gunner voice.
She narrowed her eyes like a pissed off cat ready to lunge. “I know you’re part of the crew of the Soaring Phoenix.”
Ignoring his heart scurrying around in his chest, Amadi refused to wince from the hatred flooding her eyes.