Chapter 2

Thomas picked me up and carried me toward the village.

Mom hurried after us in her high heels. "Hold on, you can't put her in a house!"

He stopped in his tracks.

Mom covered her nose and pointed to a half-collapsed shed beside the road. It was pitch-black inside. It was where the villagers kept their free-roaming pigs.

"Leave her there. There's no need to dirty your place. We'll be back later to draw her blood, so it'll be more convenient to keep her in the pigsty."

Thomas glanced at her. Without saying a single word, he lugged me into the shed.

The ground was covered in loose mud and manure, and two black pigs were grunting as they huddled in the corner. He set me down on a stone slab near the entrance, turned on his heel, and left.

Mom seemed satisfied. "Perfect. This place is exactly where she belongs."

The door was latched shut from the outside.

Dad stood outside the pigsty and made a phone call. "Chloe, sweetheart, I've found you some blood. I'll have it sent back tomorrow."

Chloe Bramble, the daughter my parents had raised, spoke in a wheedling voice. "What about that bitch? Did you get revenge for me, Dad? Did you make her cry?"

"Oh, she cried alright. She got down on her knees and bawled her eyes out." He chuckled before hanging up the phone and nudging Mom with his elbow.

He jerked his chin toward the entrance of the village. "Do you see that old woman?"

A hunchbacked old woman sat on a stone block at the entrance to the village, stitching a sole onto a shoe. It was Margaret Fletcher.

Mom lowered her voice and whispered something to Dad. Then, she crouched down beside the fence and got right in my face. "Do you see her? That old woman specializes in trafficking children. Kids from all the surrounding villages who fall into her hands get resold in a heartbeat. The boys are sold to coal mines, whereas the girls are sold to old bachelors deep in the mountains."

Mom patted my cheek, smiling warmly. "A woman your age and appearance would fetch at most three to five thousand dollars as a bride for some bachelor in his 50s or 60s. So, you'd better behave yourself. At least our family still treats you like a human being. However, if you end up in her hands, you won't even be treated as well as a pig."

I lowered my gaze and ignored her.

Margaret had indeed taken in countless children. However, she hadn't trafficked them.

All of those children were orphans, abandoned by their own parents. Some had been left on the roadside, while others were dumped at hospital entrances or stuffed into trash cans.

Margaret had picked them up one by one, washed them clean, and raised them for a few days. Then, she went door-to-door, begging the better-off families in the village to adopt them.

I was one of those children. Supposedly, I was found on New Year's Eve, wrapped in a tattered padded jacket and abandoned beside a snowdrift at the entrance to the village.

Margaret had tucked me inside her own padded coat and held me close to keep me warm all night. I didn't even make a sound until the next day. From then on, the entire village raised me.

Dad took one look at his wristwatch. "Come on. Let's go talk to that Miller guy about tomorrow's arrangements."

Mom rose to her feet, dusting off her skirt. "Are we just going to leave her here on her own?"

"Her hands are wrecked, and her mouth's gagged. Even if she crawls out, what can she possibly do?"

Dad paused for a moment before continuing, "If she wanders off and bumps into anyone in this village, she'll only die an even worse death."

The sound of their footsteps gradually faded into the distance. Silence settled over the pigsty again.

I pressed my back against the wall and tried to grind the ropes binding my hands against a sharp edge of a stone. Before I could make much progress, I heard the sound of slippers shuffling across the ground outside.

Margaret had wandered over at some point. She leaned against the fence and peered inside.

"My, my, since when did we start keeping people in the pigsty?" She squinted, sizing me up. "Why does this young lady have a rag jammed in her mouth?" Margaret immediately reached in to pull it out.

The moment her calloused fingers touched the corner of my lips, I almost burst into tears. "Margaret, it's me! I'm Quinn!" I yelled inwardly.

Her fingers had just pinched an edge of the rag when a furious bellow rang out behind her. "Hold it right there!"