Page 60 of Evil Hearts

Taken by Monsters

By Elizabeth Dunlap

Chapter 1

IWAS COLD.

Cold, and dirty.

A slow ache built in my belly, and my hunger made its presence known with a loud rumble. The other girls in my cell ignored the noise. I hoped our jailers didn’t hear it. The Minotaur and lizard creature standing in the corner seemed too absorbed in their own conversation to notice us.

I woke up this morning with things to do. I had plans. I was happy. Hopeful, even. There was a roast in my slow cooker. I’d just bought a copy of that musical flick I’d been wanting to see. And I was a day away from finishing a major project at work, one that would probably land me a promotion.

None of that even mattered now. My entire life was ruined in one fell swoop that landed me in this dirty, cold prison. I was walking down the street during my lunch break, minding my own business, when monsters jumped from the alley and grabbed me.

Yes, that’s right.Monsters.

I could easily be talking about the kind of human garbage who violate women for their gross pleasure, but nope. I meantrealmonsters. I didn’t even know monsters existed before today, and I was still reeling as I tried to process my entire world shifting. Every book, every legend I’d ever read came pouring back to me as I watched them talking to each other. Demons. Beasts.Horrors of the deep. They were real. There were at least twenty of them guarding us, and they were all different from each other. The lizard wasn’t even the ugliest among them. The way they looked at us had my stomach lurching.

I might puke.

We’d been in this cold basement for hours, and it still wasn’t clear why me and the other women had been brought here, or what purpose we served to the ones who took us. Clutching my stomach, I slumped onto the cold metal floor of our cage and glanced at the other women. They all looked normal, at least. Not a horn or tail among them. Everyone seemed cold and afraid like me.

I leaned down close, hovering my voice barely over a whisper. “How…” The instant the word left my lips, the Minotaur’s ears perked up, and he stared right at me, as if I’d spoken directly to him. How could he hear me? He was all the way across the room.

His eyes narrowed in a stern warning. “Quiet,” he bellowed, his deep voice reverberating through the basement. I flinched, sinking further towards the floor. I didn’t want him to grab my arm again. It was still sore from when he dragged me to this cage.

Everyone else cowered in fear, and my comforting smile did nothing to help. One woman had a lash mark across her face. Another had beautiful henna patterns on her hands, and a gorgeous green sari that had been torn in several places. She smiled back at me while the others looked on with mild interest.

With a quick check towards the monsters in the corner, I whispered as softly as I could. “How long have you been here?” No one answered, and the woman wearing the sari shrank back into her corner when she saw the Minotaur moving. Maybe I hadn’t spoken loudly enough for them to hear me. I tried again, still attempting to not raise my voice.

The woman with the lash mark rolled her eyes at me. “For fuck’s sake, just talk.” Someone growled in warning, like a bull about to charge. The Minotaur stalked over to us, a whip clutched in his hand. “Whatcha gonna do, big guy? Lock us up harder? Hurt us?”

He banged his whip against the cage, and I winced as it rattled my head. “Do not test my patience, human.”

I stood, pulling on the hem of my skirt. “Why are we here?”

“That’s not your concern, human. You keep asking questions, and I’ll mar that pretty face of yours.” He stalked away, raking his whip along the ground so we could hear the tiny metal spikes in the rope. Those were designed to draw blood, and I had no doubt he would enjoy using it on us.

“He’s all talk,” the other woman said when I turned around. “They aren’t allowed to seriously hurt us.”

The henna girl nervously scratched her hands, like she was trying to peel the marks off. “How would you know that?”

The other woman shrugged and almost looked bored. “Been here for a few days. Could be a week. Hard to tell. I tested them before most of you got here.” She tapped the lash mark on her cheek. “That was all I got for my trouble. Trust me. That one is just grumpy.”

“What are we here for?” I asked her, hoping she would know.

She just shrugged again. “They still haven’t said. But if I had to guess, whatever it is requires us to be presentable. Otherwise, they would make good on those threats.” Her eyes narrowed as she watched the monsters talking and moving around the room. “They’re waiting for something. Maybe their boss, or whoever wanted us to be brought here.”

I could see what she meant. There was both boredom and tension among the monsters. Several of them walked close to the cages, peering at the women inside with piqued interest. Theysaid something in a language I didn’t recognize, but it wasn’t hard to guess that they were being crass.

Jenny was the woman with the mark, the one who kept goading the monsters that guarded us. Sati was the woman with the beautiful henna on her arms. The other women in our cage refused to speak to us and stayed far away as we huddled together for warmth in the cold room. I had almost nodded off to sleep from hunger and exhaustion when a loud metallic bang jolted us awake.

“Get up,” a monster shouted. We almost fell over each other trying to obey. He passed our cage, banging his whip against the metal, a tall, green lizard beast who had a menacing look on his face. “No arguments. No talking back. You will behave and submit to being shackled. Anyone who fights back will taste the sting of my whip.”

Everyone got to their feet inside the small cages, with some just barely able to stand even when they hunched over. The angry Minotaur lumbered towards our cage and unlocked the metal door. His companion, a goat looking man, had an armful of shackles in his hand. Unfortunately, I was closest to the door, and that meant I went first. The Minotaur slipped the shackles onto my wrists and shoved me out of the way for the next girl. The chain between my cuffs was so short, I had to move both hands to scratch my shoulder.

The other cages were opened, and the jingling sound of our chains echoed in the room as all the women were shackled. They lined us up against the wall, forming a single row that wrapped around the entire basement. The last one squeezed next to me, and almost didn’t have enough room. There had to be at least fifty of us. Maybe more.Why did they bring ushere?Even with the question in my mind, I couldn’t bring myself to think of the obvious answer.

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