26. Isla
26
ISLA
T he pulse of my heartbeat in my chest is steady but weak, and a little on the fast side. I lie curled in a ball watching a smattering of other women on the other side of the room huddled together talking quietly. I haven't eaten in four days. I'm starving, but I have no appetite. My entire body feels weak, like I've just finished a marathon or strongman contest. And I'm cold, shivering, and wishing for a blanket.
"She don't look too good," one of the women says. Her dirty skin and filthy clothes make her look like she just walked out of a coal mine, or maybe a garden digging in the soil. When she looks at me, her eyes seem to see through me, judging me silently.
"None of us look too good. Shut up." A younger woman comes to my defense, giving the first a shove. "You're alright, honey. Just rest. You'll need your energy when they move us."
I hate how they speak like they've been doing this long enough that they understand what is happening. It strips away my hope like dead skin after a sunburn, little by little whittling away at my will to live. I blink and hear my eyelids click against my eyes. Even when I sip water, it comes right back up. I know now that it's not nerves. It's morning sickness. I'm slowly starving myself and my baby to death, and I can't think of a reason to change that.
"Yeah, well with the way they carry on about her, you know…" The first woman sneers at me and picks at her tooth with her tongue. The fact that they call me Princess isn’t my fault. I don’t even understand it. Sebastian is a horrible man, playing mind games with me, telling me I'm carrying the heir to the O'Connor family. He's not wrong. My baby will definitely be my da's pride and joy, but we don't have a kingdom to rule over. I'm not a princess.
"Shh, don't speak about her like that." Another woman shushes them and shakes her head, spitting on the floor and performing the sign of the cross on her forehead, chest, and shoulders. Such a superstitious action. I close my eyes to pretend I don't hear them. Even they feel like this is some conspiracy or something. It exhausts me.
"Well, for some reason they think she's special, and that isn't a good thing for her."
I press my palm to my ear and block out the sounds as I replay every decision I've ever made in my life over and over in my head. Regret sucks me into a spiral that traps me there behind my eyelids, and every time I open them, it gets worse. More women populate the room. There is less space, and the stench of unwashed bodies rises.
When the door swings open and boots clomp on the ground, I fully expect it to be more women being dumped. I open my eyes to see Sebastian standing over me with a smug grin. He's wearing a white suit, a wide-brimmed white hat with a black ribbon on it, and a matching black shirt. His black patent leather shoes look recently shined, and I wish I could conjure up some stomach acid just to vomit on them.
He crouches next to me and pushes the hair off my face. "How is the princess fairing?" he asks, and I squirm away from his touch. The women in this room are dead silent, but I hear them rustling around, also uncomfortable with his presence. "What, you don't like me?" He feigns innocence, and I search my mouth for moisture to spit on him but my mouth is bone dry. I'm far too dehydrated.
"You are the wife of my enemy, so I can't kill you. But it doesn't mean I can't sell you to get back what you stole from me." He remains crouching next to me, chuckling like a madman. Then says, "In a few days' time, you'll have a new home with lots of new friends and plenty of work. I hope you're in shape."
"Screw off," I snip weakly. It comes out in a ragged, scratchy tone I don't recognize, but it's my own voice. It draws gasps from some of the other women in the room who clearly would never stand up to a man like him. But I have nothing to live for. I can't imagine letting this baby I'm carrying come into the world like this. Who knows what they’ll do to him or her? And that cements my will to die.
"You have a temper, Princess, and it's going to get you in trouble." Sebastian stretches out his hand, and I push it away, but he's stronger than me. What appears to be another attempt to touch my hair turns into me guiding his hand toward my mouth where I bite down hard enough to draw blood.
"You cunt!" he screeches, then smacks me hard. I scramble as far away from him as I can on the filthy mattress, pressing my back to the wall. But Sebastian grabs my leg and pulls me back toward himself. Blood drips from his thumb as he wraps his thick fingers around my throat and squeezes. "You're damn lucky you walked down that aisle." His grip is so tight I'm seeing stars. I grab his wrist with both hands, trying to pry him away from my neck, but he is relentless, clamping down to the point that I can't breathe.
I gasp and choke, hearing the other women in the room also murmuring and gasping too. My eyes blink rapidly, filling with moisture that leaks out onto my cheeks and runs down onto the mattress under me. My chest screams for air as it burns and heaves to suck in a breath. I mouth the words, "Please stop," but the sadist won't let go of me. He only squeezes harder.
My eyes shut, and I pray they’ll never open.
A loud noise startles me awake, a hollow crash of metal on metal. I jerk upright and regret it. My head slams into something hard and makes me wince. It's pitch black. I can't see a thing, but I sense I'm not alone. The same murmuring of voices and the stench of filthy bodies meets my senses, and I reach out and grope in the darkness.
"Hey, there, watch it." A woman's voice greets me, her tone angry.
"Where am I? What's going on?" I say, still groping in the darkness. My hand finds another person, this one kinder. Their hands clasp onto mine and calm me.
"I told ye we were being moved, dear." The same younger woman who spoke kindly about me in that room is here. But where is here?
"I don't want to move," I whimper, and then I cough. My throat hurts. It feels like my neck is collapsed in on itself, which makes me remember Sebastian's hand wrapped around me, squeezing the life out of me.
"’Fraid we don't get a choice," I hear, and something sparks, a light or a flame. I focus on it until I see the face of the woman behind the light. I've never seen her before. She's my age, at least, maybe slightly older, with dark blue eyes. She holds up a candle to the flame, which I can see is from a match, and the candle ignites. "They ship us all over the world in metal boxes like this. You get used to it. I learned to be prepared," she says, nodding at her candle.
In the dim light I can see several other faces, though the glow doesn't show me the entire space. I hear more people talking too, farther away. This has to be a shipping container like they put on boats and trains to transport cargo. Those women weren't kidding. Sebastian is really selling us like we're livestock.
My body shudders as I spin around and see a woman behind me nursing her head. That's probably what I ran into when I jumped up so quickly. I feel bad for that, but how was I supposed to know we'd be stacked up in here like sardines, or that we'd be in here at all?
"No, they can't just sell us. We're not property." My legs are weak, but I push myself upward and lean on the cold metal wall for support. "We have to find a way out."
A few of them chuckle. Others whose faces I can see in the candlelight look scared. I can tell for some of these women, it's not their first time doing this. It sickens me.
"Ain't no way out, Princess," one of the women spits, and I sense her hostility. I recognize her voice too, from the room.
"I'm not a fecking princess." Slamming my hand on the wall, I scream as loud as I can, "Help! Someone help us!" The blows hurt my arms and wrists, but I smash my hands over and over against the thick metal, making my already hoarse voice worse.
"Yer wastin' yer time. Ain't no one gonna hear ye." The angry woman stands and grabs my arm, shoving me back into my place. I fall to my ass and curl into a ball, and a strange sensation washes over me.
I don’t want to die. I don’t want to give in to the consuming fear that I'll never see my family again, that my child will be born into this slave trade where women are abused and molested. I can't let my hope die. I have to believe Declan and Ronan will come and find us, that they'll stop Sebastian and his men from selling us like whores.
Some of these women look young, too young. I know the O'Rourke men would never do something like this. I know if I had just stayed with Declan, I'd be safe too. Our child, which I would've eventually discovered, would have a loving home, a safe home.
"Ain't no one out there to hear ye neither." She sits back down, and the whoosh of air as she does makes the candle's flame dance.
"You're wrong. Declan is coming. He'll stop Sebastian from doing this and he'll save us." I tuck my chin to my knees and clamp my eyes shut. If I had any water in my body, it would turn to rivers on my cheeks right now.
"Yer man ain't gonna save ye. If he was, why'd he let ye go, anyway?"
The woman's cynicism detonates something inside my chest and I feel my hope come to life. "You're wrong. I know you're wrong. You’ll see. Declan O'Rourke will die before he allows me to be sold off like a slave. He'll be here. And you'll eat your words." My eyes lock on the face of a girl who can't be much older than Rebecca, and I see that my words are giving her hope too.
She doesn't break eye contact with me at all until the flame of the candle snuffs out and we're plunged into darkness again. But even the blackest night can't extinguish the truth rising up in me. A war will break out, and Declan will fight to the death to find me. It's the only thing I can let myself think. He will come.
He has to.