Prologue: Sold

[Tatiana's POV]

Rough voices and the sounds of screams rouse me from my dreamless sleep and make me go on alert. All around me, guards are rushing in and picking out those of us who will be put up for sale this evening.

As I watch them snatch up my cellmates, I try my best to make myself as small as possible so that they won’t see me. But as I cower away, my leg hits a chain, causing it to rattle and drawing one of the guards eyes straight to me.

Fear begins to bubble as many different scenarios begin to play in my head. Most were sold off to vicious alphas and leaders who used them as slaves that satiate their desires, while others became servants.

However, staying here was much worse as after a year due to the flow of incoming and outgoing, anyone who didn’t bring in some income was disposed of by death.

Gasping, I watch in horror as he lets a broad smile spread across his lips before he begins to come for me.

"You," he announces, grabbing me by my hair and pulling. "You’ll fetch a high price with those eyes of yours and this hair."

Letting out a cry, I try to break his hold on me, but I’m a mere child trying to go up against a full-grown man. If I were strong, then maybe I would stand a better chance, but right now I’m left at their mercy.

"Come along," he chuckles, starting to pull me by my hair across the floor, which is covered in piss and feces so that it stains my torn and filthy white gown. The very gown that I was wearing when I was first captured was the only thing I had to wear for the year that I spent in this place waiting for the day I would be sold off just like the others.

Feeling all hope that I could somehow break free and run far away fade, I fix my gaze on the cells that I’m being pulled past, taking in the pity-filled eyes of those who are still awaiting their fate.

Once we reach the room's exit, I’m pulled to my feet and forced inside the bathing chamber, where two women wait for me.

"Oh, isn’t she a pretty one?" One of the women beams. "I’m sure she will fetch a high price."

"Come here, child," the other says, motioning me forward.

"You heard her," the guard snaps, shoving me so that I go crashing to the ground at the women’s feet. "Quit being a disobedient brat."

Ignoring the sting of my scraped palms, I slowly stand and wait as one of the women begins to rip off my gown, so I’m left standing in nothing but my underwear.

"Get in the tub," the other snaps as my underwear are cut off. "You stink."

Whose fault was that? I think miserably, but I keep to myself, as I knew that if I were to be too disobedient, I would be sent to the gallows.

Nodding, I slowly step inside and then sit so that the women can begin scrubbing every inch of my body and then my knotted hair.

"Ugh," one huffs. "It’s going to take some time to unknot all this."

"Just cut it off," the other suggests. "It won’t make much of a difference. With her pretty face, the bidders won’t care that her hair is short."

A gasp escapes me as my hair is pulled and then slashed by a knife.

"That’s much better," the woman cackles as tendrils of my hair drop into the water around me and onto the floor.

Growing quiet, they continue to wash me, and once they finish, I’m yanked out and painfully dried by a rough towel. Then I’m forced into another white gown, but this one is clean so that I can be sent off to be sold.

"Off you go," both women beam as another guard enters to fetch me. "Good luck! Hopefully you manage to get a kind master."

Kind? How could someone possibly be kind if they were buying you?

Keeping this to myself, I allow the guard to lead me down a long hall and then into a large room with cages sitting in the middle of it.

Once inside, I’m led to one of the cages and forced inside while many men and women in masks dressed to the nines watch me with glittering and expectant eyes.

Standing between them and those of us who were to be sold was a man in a top hat and suit.

"Now that our final item has arrived, feel free to come forward and examine the goods before we start."

In an instant, all the men and women surge forward and begin to ogle us as if we were some type of animal on display.

Feeling my stomach churn, I scramble backwards, trying to get far away from them, as a boy who appears to be a few years older than me pops out from the crowd and fixes his bright green eyes on me.

His face is expressionless as he stares me down as if trying to look right into my soul. And when a man and woman come to join him, he points right at me.

"This one," he announces, continuing to watch me. "I want this one."

"Are you sure, Knight?" The man asks, taking me in. "Maybe another more..."

"No, this one," the boy, Knight, repeats. "Buy her for me."

For a moment, the man takes me in as if trying to determine what it is about me that has drawn his son’s interest. 

"Alright, alright," he sighs, tearing his gaze away. "I will make sure that she is the one."

“Has your son taken an interest in this girl, Mr. Dilano?” A guard asks.

“That’s correct, isn’t it, son?”

Nodding, Knight’s eyes flash with satisfaction as he gives me one last look before allowing himself to be led away by his parents.

After that, everything was a blur as the auction began, and just as promised, I found myself being bought by Knight’s father, but this wasn’t some damsel being saved by the prince story; instead, I simply ended up leaving one hell to find myself in another, Hunters Moon, where the Dilano’s were known for being ruthless and easily killing those who didn’t benefit them.