Vanquished Read online

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  ~1~

  ~2~

  ~3~

  ~4~

  ~5~

  ~6~

  ~7~

  ~8~

  ~9~

  ~10~

  ~11~

  ~12~

  ~13~

  ~14~

  ~15~

  ~16~

  ~17~

  ~18~

  ~19~

  ~20~

  ~21~

  ~22~

  ~23~

  ~24~

  ~25~

  ~26~

  ~27~

  ~28~

  ~29~

  ~30~

  ~31~

  ~32~

  ~33~

  ~34~

  ~35~

  ~36~

  ~37~

  ~38~

  ~39~

  ~40~

  ~41~

  ~42~

  ~43~

  ~44~

  ~45~

  ~46~

  ~47~

  ~48~

  ~49~

  ~50~

  ~51~

  ~52~

  ~53~

  ~54~

  ~55~

  ~56~

  ~57~

  ~58~

  ~59~

  ~60~

  ~61~

  ~62~

  ~63~

  ~Epilogue~

  About The Author

  Vanquished

  Copyright © 2015 by S. E. Green. All rights reserved.

  First Edition: July 2015

  Cover and Formatting: Streetlight Graphics

  This eBook is licensed for the personal enjoyment of the original purchaser only. This eBook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this eBook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.

  ~1~

  Hot. That’s the first thing that enters my mind as I come to gradually, my lashes fluttering open. Thirsty. That’s the second.

  “Hi,” comes a whisper to my right, and I roll my head toward it. A blond-haired woman about my age holds a tin cup to my lips. “Water. Drink.”

  I do. Gladly.

  “Where am I?” I croak, searching the crevices of my brain, trying to remember something. Anything. But my thoughts are foggy.

  “I don’t know. They haven’t told us anything.”

  Us? It’s then that I hear them. Whispering over to the left and quiet crying behind me. I’m lying on a shallow bed of straw on a coarse stone floor with rough wood beams stretching above me. Where am I?

  “My name’s Camille,” the woman tells me. “I was assigned to care for you. They renamed you Valoria. They said you fought them and they had to knock you out. They think you had a reaction to the sedative.”

  “I’m allergic to most all medicines,” I say more to myself than her. Wait a minute. They renamed me?

  Suddenly it all comes rushing back—Miami.

  My sister flips on some sugary pop music and we both slide into our own thoughts as I navigate us through Coconut Grove toward Vasquez’s estate. I’ve never been outside of South Florida. I don’t want to get too excited, but this job as a live-in maid could be the start to a real future for us. I might even be able to enroll in some night classes.

  How long ago was that? Hours? Days? There was a prick in my neck.

  “My sister.” I struggle to sit up, frantically looking around the cramped, shadowed room, searching for her.

  Blood surges through me. I don’t see her! “Lena!” I cry out, and the sound resonates off the walls.

  Camille slams her hand over my mouth. “Shut up,” she hisses.

  I claw at her hand, kicking up the straw, and fight to get to my feet.

  “Shut. Up.” She presses her palm harder against my mouth. “They will come in here. The last time they did, they took one of us out and she hasn’t returned.”

  I bite down on her hand and she slaps me hard across the side of the head. “Calm. Down. Your panic is not going to risk the rest of us.”

  I don’t know if it’s the slap in the head, the horror in her eyes, or the fear in her voice, but I clench my teeth and nod my head.

  Camille shoots me a warning glare before sliding her hand away.

  My panting breaths fill the air around us and I look around again. There’re only women in here—twenty or so—and we’re all wearing matching brown tunics and leather sandals. They look about my age—late teens, twenties. Most of them sit huddled in clumps, clinging to each other, quiet, some looking at me and others staring off in a shocked trance. Silent terror fills the atmosphere.

  We’re in some sort of holding cell, like a dungeon, with stone walls and floors that have been weathered by the elements. A row of tiny windows along the top let in the only sunlight and fresh air.

  Piss. The place smells like piss. I wrinkle my nose as my gaze drifts to the corner where a woman squats over a bucket. The smell hits me even harder, and my stomach pitches.

  What the hell is going on? “How long have we been here?”

  But before Camille can answer, the door to the dungeon creaks open, and a huge man dressed in leather and metal armor steps into our cell. He bizarrely looks like an ancient Roman soldier, but it’s no costume.

  “Let’s go,” he barks, pointing his very real sword, and my muscles immediately tighten.

  Several of the women shrink back. Others start to cry. Camille grabs my arm and pulls me to my feet. “Just do what they say,” she whispers, and I can feel her fingers shaking as she tugs me toward the door.

  Instinct has me pulling back, and she only tightens her grip.

  The soldier snatches up a few of the sniveling ones and shoves them outside.

  The bright sun pierces straight into my skull. I hold up my hand and squint at the same time I gulp in fresh ocean air. However, the reprieve is short lived as another soldier grabs me and shoves me to the side where I stumble into line with the other women. Camille again grips my hand and together we straighten our spines.

  We’re standing in a sandy courtyard in what looks like an old world marketplace. To the left and in front of us sit multi-level stone buildings. To the right is the holding cell we came from.

  On the balconies of the buildings stand people. Men and women dressed in long colorful gowns and sashes, like they’re in Roman cosplay.

  They are laughing, drinking, eating, talking—oblivious to us terrified down here in the courtyard. Though I know she’s not up there, I search every face for my sister.

  Two soldiers pull a wooden platform over and situate it between us and the people on the balcony.

  I glance over my shoulder to see the ocean spreading in an endless black. There is no other land in sight.

  One of the soldiers yanks the woman at the end of our line and shoves her toward the wooden platform. Shaking, she stumbles up, looking back at us, eyes dry but so full of fear it twists my gut.

  She’s tall, easily six feet, and big boned with short dark hair.

  “Take your gown off,” a man barks and I snap my gaze to him.

  He’s fat and dressed in a white wrap with a black braided belt. He’s got his hair combed forward in a slicked style and holds a whip.

  The tall woman doesn’t immediately move as she looks around, seemingly wa
iting for someone to intercede.

  “Take your gown off,” he barks again and unravels the whip.

  My heart leaps into my throat. Just do what he says! I want to yell.

  Quickly, she lifts the hip-length dress over her head and clutches it in front of her as she stares down at the fat man.

  He sneers. “Turn around.”

  She does, slowly, her face pale and terrified. She makes eye contact with a few of us before returning to the front. She’s wearing a white band across her chest and white underwear. But her breasts are big and the bra barely supports them.

  The fat man looks up to the balcony where most of the people aren’t even paying attention.

  “Ten!” A short skinny man up and to the left yells.

  Ten what?

  “Fifteen.” Another man…

  “Twenty.”

  My God, we’re being auctioned!

  The fat man scans the rest of the balcony, but when no one else yells anything, he motions the tall woman down and over to the left where—I’m just now noticing—a muscular bald man stands.

  Fierce describes his strong jaw and stature. A trained fighter. Someone who could defend all of us women standing here in line. Wearing leather armor over a bare chest and baggy black pants cut off at the knee, he’s dressed different than everyone else.

  The tall woman puts her dress back on and the bald man snaps shackles on her ankles and motions her to sit.

  I glance down the line to the next woman. She’s got long dark hair and olive skin like me, and is small, too. Probably not more than five-foot-two and one-hundred-and-ten pounds.

  She starts screaming and shaking her head and backing away. A soldier yanks her across the sand and shoves her up on the wooden platform. Her uncontrollable sobs fill the air and the fat man cracks his whip across her body.

  I gasp.

  “Shut up!” he snaps and motions for a soldier to wrangle her out of her tunic.

  Sun glints off something and I track my eyes up to the balcony where an immaculate red-haired woman stands. Her bright hair is piled on top of her head in some fancy complicated knot pinned with jewels, and where everyone else wears colorful gowns, she has on the only silver one.

  She lifts a golden rod in the air and doesn’t shout out a number like the skinny man had.

  The fat man doesn’t wait for a counter offer and instead nods to a soldier. He pulls the small woman off the platform and tosses her over to the right where she’s shackled and shoved down to sit in the dirt.

  I want to run. But instead I stare at that small woman and the red welt across her face. I’ll be of no use to my sister if I don’t stay strong.

  One by one it continues. Each of us going up to the wooden platform, the people on the balconies bidding, and we being separated into clumps.

  I notice, though, the skinny man is buying most of the bigger girls and the red-haired woman is purchasing the majority of the petite ones. Is that where my sister went? With the red-haired woman?

  A soldier approaches the next woman in line, the one standing beside Camille. Before he can yank her away she whispers to me, “He took your sister,” and rolls her eyes up to the balcony and the skinny man.

  I jerk my gaze up to where he stands. He’s laughing and drinking. He has my sister. A bead of sweat slides down my back and I continue watching him. I will be bought by him. I’ll figure it out.

  Camille releases the hard grip she has on my hand and I snap out of my trance. I flex my fingers and feel them flash hot, then cold as the circulation comes back to them.

  Without anybody telling her, Camille walks right up on the auctioning block, strips her tunic, and stands proudly in her white undergarments.

  She’s not big or small. She’s average and muscular. A few people bid and she ends up owned by the skinny man. Exactly where I want to be.

  I’m the tiniest of us all and I know deep down in my gut that the red-haired woman is going to make a bid on me.

  I do exactly what Camille did. I straighten my shoulders, walk up on my own, strip, and though every muscle fiber in me quivers, I toss my dress aside and stand defiantly for all to look.

  The red-haired woman up in the balcony raises her golden rod, and I blurt “No!” before I know fully what I’m going to do.

  And pray it doesn’t get me killed.

  ~2~

  The fat man with the whip narrows his eyes. “Excuse me?”

  The laughter and chatter gradually dies down from the balcony. The captive women still crying grow quiet. And all eyes slowly turn toward me.

  My nervous throat fights the urge to swallow, and I raise my left arm and point to where I want to go. Where my sister is. “I want to go with them.”

  The fat man’s eyes narrow even more to two seedy slits, and then he laughs, deep and evil, as he unravels his whip and snaps it above his head.

  I dig my nails into my palms and concentrate on not flinching when the whip’s crack reverberates in the air around me and vibrates through my skull.

  The fat man turns and looks up to those on the balcony, like he’s waiting to be told what to do. No one does or says anything for a good solid few seconds. And then the red-haired lady starts to raise that golden rod again.

  Determination replaces any lingering fear. “No!” I repeat and jab my finger over to the left. “I said I want to go with them.” I lock my jaw muscles and keep my eyes fastened on the lady while all around her people start to whisper.

  She smiles, but nothing pleasant comes across in the curve of her lips. And though nearly twenty five feet separate us, her wickedness curls around me.

  I scowl. No, I definitely don’t want to go with her.

  She nods, ever so slightly, and the fat man slings his whip through the air. I register its lash a second’s fraction before I back flip off the platform and drop and roll across the dirt.

  I come up on all fours, staring, concentrating on keeping my loud breaths steady, like my father taught me. The crowd on the balcony laughs like they think it’s the funniest thing in the world to see a little woman about to get beat.

  Blood rushes through the fat man’s face, spreading red all the way to his hairline. He nods to two soldiers who each grab one of my arms.

  They’re enormous and I’m nothing next to them, but I still fight their hold. I yank at it. Jab the heel of my foot into one of their legs. And sink my teeth into the other one’s bicep.

  The fat man stalks toward me, his eyes clinging to me as he slowly winds his whip and makes a show of fastening it back onto his hip. Blood pounds in my ears, echoing in my head, muting the lingering laughter and whispers from the balcony.

  He steps right up to my face. “You’re a little bitch. And I will break you,” he promises.

  I hike my chin. “Give it your best.”

  He rears his meaty hand high in the air. I catch a glimpse of a gaudy silver ring right before he backhands me across the face.

  Blood flies through the air. From my mouth, my nose, I can’t tell, but I snap my head up and spit right in his face.

  I won’t go down easily.

  The fat man brings his fist back and punches me straight in the gut, lifting me off the sand. A grunt escapes my lips and I wish more than anything I could draw it back in. I don’t want him to know he’s causing me pain.

  I kick out with my sandaled foot and my heel connects with his shin. I concentrate on the most defiant look I have. Little does this fat man know the training I used to do with my dad. My pain tolerance is high.

  “That all you got?” I sneer in full on provoking mode, which earns me another backhanded slap.

  This time his ring catches on my cheek and I feel a sliver of skin peel away.

  “Fifty thousand!” someone yells from the balcony and I look up to the short skinny man.

  I smile. Yes.

  Everyone just stares at him, like fifty thousand is a ridiculous amount to spend in this twisted marketplace.

  “Fifty thousand,” h
e says again, staring right at me.

  The fat man gazes up to the red-haired lady, who gives me a long menacing look but doesn’t raise her rod. Relief washes through me as the soldiers sling me over to the clump of women going to where my sister is. My sister.

  The bald fierce man roughly slides my tunic back on me, and after he shackles my ankles he stands and looks down at me. His gray-eyed gaze traces the cut on my cheek and the blood seeping from my nose. But his stoic expression gives no clue as to what he is thinking.

  In our shackles, we’re led from the marketplace into a back alley and loaded into a wooden cart attached to horses.

  “Are you insane?” Camille whispers as she slides in beside me.

  “Wherever we’re going, my sister’s there.” I don’t want to think about what they may have already done to her.

  The bald fierce man closes the hatch, climbs up beside the driver, and we’re off.

  No one talks as our cart rolls down a dirt alley and out into the countryside, and it’s like I’ve literally stepped back in time. Stone villas dot the hillside, encircled by lush lawns, gardens, and fountains. Small cottages are scattered here and there and attached to farms. Horses and cows graze within corrals.

  People dressed in cream and white gowns tend the animals and gardens. Others like the ones on the balcony in the marketplace lounge on terraces. Yet others dressed like me, like a slave, scurry about carrying stuff. I wonder if they were bought and sold in the same marketplace.

  An elaborate carriage passes us going in the opposite direction. Inside of it I catch sight of two beautiful women, laughing and eating grapes. Neither of them even glances our way.

  We peak the hillside and I take in more of the same. Villas. Cottages. Gardens. Farms. A round structure that seems to be some sort of small arena, and thick woods off to the left surrounded by a tall wall. I wonder what that wall’s about.

  We’re definitely on an island. A very large island. I can barely make out where it starts and stops. Dark ocean surrounds us, spanning all the way in every direction to the horizon. I catch a glimpse of a galleon with all sails hoisted going away from land. Is that how I got here? On that galleon?

  But more importantly, where in the hell am I? And what is going on?