Chapter 4: Welcome to Hell.

Lyra’s POV

Perhaps I shouldn't have been born.

Perhaps my birth was only a mistake.

I had indirectly caused my parent's death by an obsession for amusement parks, I had begged them to take me there without knowing it was the last time I'd see them. The same happened with Tracy. If I had known Uncle Zorah was cruel enough to end a teenager's life, I wouldn't have involved her. She died in a cruel way, way too cruel way.

I'd been locked up in a different room, somewhere smelly,  dark and rusty. I hadn't tasted water in a long while, but all I could think of was Tracy. I still saw her wide eyes each time I closed mine to sleep. Her laughter still echoed in my ears each time I was close to losing it.

I ran my hands through my hair and screamed out loud, pulling my hair like a maniac, a maniac Uncle Zorah had formed. Meera had indeed given me a choice, I should have killed myself when I had the chance. I cried out loud and kept punching the wall until my knuckles got bloody, ignoring the overwhelming pain that made me lose my strength.

I slumped to the ground and cried out loud,

“Why?! Why?!”

“You shouldn't have tried to escape.” My uncle's cold voice suddenly filled my ears, shattering the deafening silence, “You killed your friend just like you killed your parents. There are rules to—”

I rose up quickly and tried to move, but I realized I couldn't. My eyes trailed lower and I figured I had been chained. My heart sank further as I choked out a sob,

“I'm going to kill you, Zorah!” I growled, struggling against the chains bound to my feet. I must have been consumed with so much pain, I didn't notice I had been chained earlier. Zorah opened up the gate and took slow strides towards me, folding his arms behind him,

“I would like to see you try.”

“Why are you doing this to me, Uncle?”

He took another step towards me and raised his fingers, flicking a syringe,

“Because you're just as ignorant as your father, naive as your mother. It's going to be the end of you.” He approached me and pushed the syringe down my arms, making me scream out loud. I tried to resist, push against him, but in less than seconds, my eyes turned blurry as I fell to the ground.

*******

My eyes fluttered open and the first thing I noticed was my strange surroundings. My mouth was sealed, my hands tied, and I realized I was in a moving van due to the horns blaring across the streets and screeching tires. My eyes widened as I struggled to stand, but I could barely lift a finger. Zorah's last actions suddenly replayed before me like an horror movie, he had drugged me with the fucking syringe to bring me here.

But where was I?

Where were we going?

My eyes burned as I screamed on top of my lungs, straining my voice only to get a muffled cry. With my mouth sealed, no one would hear me, but I didn't dare to stop. I continued hitting my fist on whatever I knew I was, bruised myself in the process, but I didn't stop until my eyes felt heavy again.

*****

“Who's she? I think she's new here.”

“She's going to need a whole lot of sleep to survive here.”

“I would rather pity myself than start to pity her.”

My eyes shot open and my stomach churned at the rotten smell that wafted into my nostrils. I didn't know where I got the strength from, but I was able to sit upright and stare at the few ladies who stared back at me with dead eyes. I swallowed hard, thinking about what they'd said earlier.

Where was I?

What was this place and why would I need a lot of sleep to survive?

Swallowing hard, I leaned towards the young girl on the left, her brown eyes wide with something I'd call fear. She flinched when I moved closer and I halted, shaking my head slowly,

“I'm not going to hurt you.” I whispered. She was younger than me, I could see it in her eyes, and from the way she stared at this whole place, she seemed to know a lot.

“That's what everyone says.” She whispered back, her soft voice like light in this bottomless pit. I ignored my bloody knuckles and forced a smile, “You can trust me.”

“My brother told me that before selling me away.”

My heart shattered into a thousand pieces as her words kept ringing in my head. She said it so nonchalantly, she believed she could trust no one else, she believed everyone was born to hate her. She was too young to have such thoughts, but a single word she used made me furrow my brows,

“What do you mean by ‘selling you away’?”

She lowered her gaze and dragged her feet on the ground, “I don't know if I'm allowed to tell new prisoners about the rules in here, I might get whipped.” Her voice trembled with so much fear, I felt a chill run down my spine. She was hesitant to speak, it was no use forcing a fragile girl to break her own rules.

While I moved away, the large doors were suddenly pushed open and a tall, athletic girl made her way in, clutching a long, black whip. Her eyes seemed to trail everywhere at the same time and when her gaze landed on me, her lips curled into a mischievous smile,

“Welcome to Hell's pit.”