Her eyes opened with the heaviness of lead. Sound… only sound.
A voice that pierced her ears like a rusted dagger: screams, laughter, drunken shouts. Darkness had devoured everything around her, yet the flickering flame burning near her feet cast a wavering glow, its harsh warmth licking her skin. The stench of smoke and charred fat clung to every breath she drew.
Her hands were bound; her shoulders throbbed with pain, as if every bone had been shattered. The blow to her head still echoed, a dull drumbeat pounding inside her skull. With agonizing effort, she turned her neck and forced her eyes to take in the scene around her.
What she saw drained the life from her veins.
Half-naked figures with bronzed, scarred skin. Shaven heads gleaming in the firelight. Long, tangled beards spilling over their chests.
She knew them.
The same savages who, only two days ago, had descended upon her village with howls like jackals. She remembered the stench of blood, the cries of mothers, her father's lifeless body crumpled in the dirt… and herself, weeping so hard over him that her forehead had been slick with tears. Then—darkness. A blow. And now—this.
One of the men leaned on a staff and barked a laugh.
"Ha! Look at this chick! Still doesn't know where she is!"
Another, his yellow teeth flashing in the firelight, stepped closer.
"Don't be afraid, little one… we won't hurt you. Not if you behave."
The words were coarse, but she understood every one. And that was worse than the fear—because she knew their promises reeked of lies and death.
In her heart, a single thought coiled tighter and tighter:
I must escape… before dawn. Or I'll never see another sunrise.
Elvira forced her eyes open wider, letting them adjust to the trembling glow. She scanned the place more carefully—and realized she wasn't alone. Faces ringed her: dust-streaked, despairing, some with wounds that bled like gaping mouths, others sunk in unconsciousness that might be mercy, or death.
But what froze her blood was the sight just beyond the fire's reach. One of the brutes—arms like tree trunks, eyes glittering with wickedness—was hunched over a frail young girl. The child's terrified breaths cut through the men's coarse laughter and found Elvira's ears.
She tried to scream, to lunge forward, but the ropes and the pain bound her like serpents. Heat rushed through her veins… was it rage, or helplessness? Even she couldn't tell.
Then, above the clamor, a voice boomed—low and commanding, silencing the camp.
A man stepped forward. Unlike the rest, he wore more than rags: a stained, tattered coat, but intact. His gaze swept over each prisoner, then returned to the fire.
"None of you… will touch them."
The camp fell into a chilling hush.
The brute paused, his filthy hands still clutching at the girl's torn clothes.
The leader took another step closer. His voice wasn't loud, nor pleading—but it carried a weight that bent the air around him. A twisted smile curved across his lips as he added:
"The masters pay well… for virgins."
The fire threw shadows across his face, turning the gleam of his teeth into something more monstrous than any blade.
Elvira's breath caught. He wasn't saving them—he was merely revealing another layer of their damnation.
That night stretched on longer than any she had ever known. Every sound clawed at her nerves: the stomp of guards' boots, the ragged breaths of drunken men, the mournful howl of wind funneled through the canyon. She clawed at her ropes until her nails split, even tried once to crawl toward the shadows, hoping to vanish behind the dark rocks. But the crack of a whip on another prisoner's back shattered her courage.
Near dawn, exhaustion dragged her into a shallow, restless sleep. But the savages' howls tore it apart like an axe through cloth.
"Up!" a harsh voice roared, followed by a savage kick to an old man's ribs.
Breakfast—if it could be called that—was a child's fistful of hard bread and three shriveled dates. They swallowed it dry, without even a sip of water.
Then the march began—long before the sun had fully risen over the peaks. Frost clung to the earth, breath plumed in the air, and frozen pebbles sliced bare feet raw.
The prisoners' wrists were tied together in a human chain that ended at the black horse of the chieftain. No iron shackles bound them—only the cold, unblinking promise of the whip.
The leader sat tall in his saddle, a dark figure against the paling sky. His gaze missed nothing, his silence sharper than any command.
Whenever one of the captives collapsed, a boot or a fist forced them back to their feet. Cries of pain mingled with the clatter of hooves, echoing against the mountains—mute, stone-faced witnesses to their misery.
Hours dragged like centuries. Every step tore another shred from Elvira's soul, until the familiar soil of her homeland was nothing but a memory fading behind her. Even the savages' coarse dialect, once sharp with terror, now blurred into meaningless noise.
At last, barren plains gave way to busier paths. The silence of the desert shattered under the din of wagons, the murmur of crowds, and the acrid mix of smoke, leather, sweat—of humans and beasts alike.
And here, the eyes were different. Not hungry like the savages, but calculating, covetous. Eyes that belonged to merchants, nobles, and opportunists who prowled this thriving crossroads.
Elvira felt their gazes crawl across her and the other girls—measuring, weighing, desiring. Voices rose in a tongue she didn't know, but she understood enough: it was the language of ownership.
Suddenly, a deep, booming shout split the crowd.
"I'll pay thousands of *korur for that one!"
A burly man, eyes gleaming with greed, pointed straight at Elvira, a pouch of coins jangling in his fist. Another, dressed in finer silks, ignored the guards entirely and reached lewdly toward one of the girls, as though she were nothing but livestock.
But the savage chieftain remained unmoved. Seated upon his black steed, he cast only a cold, dispassionate glance over the chaos. His expression bore neither hunger nor hesitation. With a flick of his hand, he ordered his men to tighten the line, driving the captives forward.
For him, this was no marketplace. The glitter of coins and promises of pleasure meant nothing. His eyes were fixed on the horizon, on a destination far darker—and a bargain far greater—than the crowd could imagine.
Hours stretched on as if drawn out by some invisible spell; days bled into nights, nights into days, in an endless cycle of suffering and march. Their halts were brief, miserly—just long enough to choke down a crust of bread that tasted of dust and despair, or a sip of water that carried the bitterness of tears. Then, without mercy, the march resumed, the cursed caravan drifting like a phantom across the vast, merciless plains.
The presence of the savage chieftain loomed over them all like a long, malignant shadow. Seated tall upon his black stallion, his eyes fixed always on the horizon, as though driven by an urgency none could name. It was clear: he was desperate to reach their destination, a place veiled in fear and mystery. That haste stripped him of even the faintest shred of pity.
Along the way, the captives witnessed cruelties that carved themselves into memory. More than once, they saw little girls—tears staining their frail faces—sold off to strangers in quick, merciless trades, their futures bartered away for a handful of shining coins. And for those too weak to continue, fate was crueller still. They were abandoned on the roadside, left to the blazing sun or the freezing nights, their desperate eyes following the caravan as it moved on without them.
One such moment branded itself deep into Elvira's heart.
An old woman, her legs swollen and trembling, collapsed mid-journey. Her ragged breaths screamed louder than any words could, yet the desert's silence swallowed them whole. The slaver—a man with a lifeless face and eyes drained of all humanity—snapped his whip against the ground and said coldly to one of the brutes:
"Leave her. She won't last. And under the Haroyan, she'd never survive anyway."
The name Haroyan was spoken with a weight that curdled the air—half whispered, half spat, as though it were forbidden. Even the slaver himself seemed reluctant to utter it fully. A chill rippled through Elvira's body. Whatever—or whoever—the Haroyan was, it promised a fate far worse than death alone in the desert.
Yet amid this living hell, Elvira found herself trapped in another torment—the torment of being noticed. Wherever the caravan halted, or when they passed through towns, greedy eyes and hushed whispers followed her. Her beauty, her golden hair, the spark of hope that still lingered in her eyes despite the hardships, made her a prize beyond measure. Offers for her soared—thousands of korur, perhaps more.
But the chieftain refused them all. Sometimes with a cryptic smile, sometimes with nothing but a cold, dismissive glance. He wasn't keeping her for a coin. He was saving her for someone else.
That truth weighed on her chest like iron. Her fate, it seemed, had already been written. And the mysterious destination toward which the leader drove them with such urgency… it wasn't for the caravan. It was for her.
*Korur: The monetary unit of the Western Territories