Chapter 2

ZARIA

I woke up to the sharp sting in my arm and a pounding headache that made it hard to breathe. My limbs were heavy, and my mouth tasted like metal. It took me a moment to realize I couldn’t see. Panic spiked in my chest as I reached up, only to feel a thick cloth tied tightly around my eyes. I was blindfolded. My breath hitched, and I froze.

Voices echoed somewhere close, muffled by distance but still clear enough to pick up.

"She’s awake?"

A deep male voice said, it was smooth but laced with cruelty.

"Not yet fully. The drug should wear off any minute now," A woman replied, she sounded calm and uninterested.

I tried to sit up, but my arms were tied. A whimper escaped me before I could stop it and the voices grew louder.

"Her father's a bastard, you know that? Selling his own daughter like a piece of meat," the man said with a laugh.

"Arturo Mendez always did have a price. We just happened to pay it."

My breath caught in my throat. Did I hear that right? My father? My father sold me?

"Well, he delivered. She’s white, beautiful and just the kind of girl the elite pay top dollar for once she’s properly trained."

I couldn’t breathe. My stomach churned and bile rose to my throat. I wasn’t here by accident. I was here because my own father gave me away. To people who trafficked women, who saw me as nothing but profit.

Footsteps approached me and rough hands gripped my shoulders and pulled me up. I whimpered again, struggling as best as I could.

"Let me go, please…"

The blindfold was ripped off, and I blinked rapidly against the light. My vision cleared, and I saw him…the man who’d been speaking. He was tall and mean-looking, with a cigarette between his lips, and a smirk that made my skin crawl.

"Fiesty," he muttered.

I spat at his feet. "You’re disgusting."

He raised his hand and hit me hard across the cheek. My head snapped sideways and a burning sting spread through my skin.

"Don’t damage her face," the woman snapped sharply from behind him. She was elegant, but her face expressionless and her eyes cold. "That’s our money-maker."

He grunted but stepped back. "Fine."

Then, without warning, he reached out and pressed the lit end of his cigarette into the top of my hand. I screamed. The pain was blinding, searing through my flesh.

"Just a taste of what disobedience gets you," he growled.

I fell to my knees, cradling my hand. Tears blurred my vision as the woman stepped forward and grabbed my arm.

"Come on."

"Please," I sobbed, trying to pull back. "I don’t belong here. I didn’t do anything…please."

She didn’t say anything until we were deep inside the house. It looked like a mansion but felt like a prison, cold and silent.

"I saw your mother on the news," she said softly. "I admired her. Isela Mendez was a voice for all of us. She had courage I never did, I’m so sorry for your loss."

I stared at her, stunned. She spoke like she meant it.

"Then let me go," I said almost in tears.

"I can’t," she said, barely above a whisper. "You’re here now and I can’t risk everything. But I’ll take care of you… until I figure something out."

Then she led me into a room. Two girls were waiting there. They stripped me, bathed me, cleaned the blood and soot off my skin. My body ached, but I didn’t resist. They dressed me in a tight, short red dress, combed my hair into soft waves, added light makeup, and called it done.

I stared at myself in the mirror. I didn’t look like me. I looked like something packaged for someone else’s pleasure and I immediately felt sick.

They took me to a room where the air was thick with cologne and cigar smoke. A man sat at the head of the table, surrounded by others who looked equally vile. He turned when he saw me and laughed.

"She’s perfect."

He stood, walked around me slowly like I was a horse he was about to bet on.

"Bring the TM."

The words made no sense. I turned to the woman beside me, confused. "What’s a TM?"

She didn’t answer. A man entered carrying a metal rod, the end glowing hot. I caught the letters—TM and a code 1245.

I understood too late.

"No," I cried out, trying to run, but guards grabbed my arms, and pinned me down. I screamed, fought, and begged, but it was useless.

The hot iron was pressed behind my ear.

Pain exploded in my skull and I screamed until my throat gave out.

Then silence, the smell of burnt skin filled my nose and they let go.

I curled on the floor, sobbing. The woman knelt beside me, helping me up.

"I’m sorry," she whispered. She lifted her dress just enough to show her thigh. A brand, like mine.

"We all carry something," she said. "Yours just happens to be visible."

I didn’t reply, because I couldn’t. I let her lead me away again.

That night, I sat with the other girls at a long table. We ate quietly, with hollow eyes, but no one spoke, I guess we're all here for different reasons.

Later, in the room where we all slept, I curled into a corner of my bed. The pillow muffled my sobs.

I cursed my father. I hated him with everything inside me. I wished I’d died with my mother. At least she wouldn’t have let this happen.

My grief turned to rage and then…to something stronger. Resolve.

My mother would have fought. She would never have let anyone turn her into a caged bird.

Neither would I.

I decided that night, I would be fearless. I would survive this hell and I would find a way out.

Slipping out of bed, I tiptoed across the floor, careful not to wake the others. I barely knew the layout but I'll make do with what I had seen. I knew the hallway, and the back door. I was going to run and I didn’t care where.

I turned the handle and then… hand slammed against the door.

I froze.

A figure stepped out of the shadows.

"Where do you think you’re going, princess?"