Secret Fire

Chapter 13

I feel lost, almost like this is all a bad dream as I walk into the prisoner cell again.

"Hey, Addy!" Kersia says cheerfully and Arina looks back at me and smiles, walking over to me and waving me over to sit down beside them.

"Where's Brayden?" I ask in a shaky voice.

"They're getting him ready for his Master, by the way, who bought you, if anyone did." Kersia asks, sounding more confident than before.

"T-the one person I was dreading to buy me..." I whisper and Arina raises her eyebrows.

"Oh? Who is it?" Arina asks and Kersia flicks her ear

"The Voltaris Master... the Deathsinger..." I manage and Kersia's eyes widen.

"Really? We hear that he's never bought a slave before, he just goes to auctions." Kersia says and shakes her head several times. "I wish you the best."

"Thanks--" I start before the cell door swings open and a few guards walk in along with Sonde.

"Get the brown-haired Nestoris female, Master wants her ready for him in an hour." Sonde snaps and the guards nod then grab my arms and take me out of the cell, slamming the door shut behind them and dragging me over to a chair. I start struggling and one of the guards grunts and lashes his tail while another one swipes me across the cheek with his tail barb. I yelp gently then snarl before Sonde ushers them away and chains me to the seat, Pulling my head back by my hair and frowning as she grabs a brush and starts brushing out my hair.

"You have very messy hair." She comments as I stare into a mirror on the wall in front of me and see the matted mess. She brushes out my hair then starts French braiding the sides to the back, pulling a few strands of hair in front of my face and tying the braids in ponytails once she gets to a certain point on both and frowning slightly. I look at her markings and notice they are very similar to mine just in Voltaris red instead of gold.

"Did you notice we're related?" I ask quietly and see her widen her eyes for a minute, staring at my markings before waving it off and shrugging without responding. She grabs a wet rag and cleans the dirt and mud off of my face before moving my hair more and using another rag to clean off my neck. Scrubbing harder on my neck and applying something I don't recognize but it smells good and sweet. She pulls out a bundle of clothes and unclips the clamps holding me onto the chair, shoving the clothes into my hands.

"Change into these." She orders and I stand up while staring at the clothes in surprise for a moment before she shoves me into another cell and I quickly change into the clothes, the top is a darker grey than my skin, kind of low cut, but only a tiny bit. The lower cover is like my other one, dark grey with a few gold pieces on the top but golden beads hanging down on each side, it looks nice. I put on the sandals and walk out towards Sonde and the guards again. 

"Your not finished yet, get over here." A guard snaps as I back up a bit at seeing several more guards. I slowly walk over and a guard pulls me back into the seat, grabbing a gold lacing and tying it on my horns, linking my horns together. they let me stand up. Now I just have to find a way out of here without getting caught... I think then Sonde pulls out the clamps that all of the owned slaves wear on their wrists and clamps them on my wrists, she tugs on them to make sure they'll stay then folds her arms and glares at me.

"These will zap you if you are more than a mile away from your Master and he can call you with the same clamps which will zap you gently to tell you that he wants you, only he will be able to open them, because you are not Voltaris these clamps are impossible to open for you." She explains as I stare at the clamps. "And he can put whatever other accessories he wants on you, these are just the ones that we put on for special slaves."