Chapter 2
**
🥀 Aubrey looked up, startled, at the sound of something crashing into her. Through the tightly woven fabric, she could see a yellowish light.
Thump, thump, thump. She heard the sound of footsteps, one after another, as they scurried around the sack she was hiding in. Aubrey curled into a smaller crouch and clamped her hands over her mouth.
I can't make a sound. I can't be found. I can't go back.
Aubrey squeezed her eyes as she clamped her mouth shut, not allowing a single breath to escape. Through the blackened silhouette, she could see an unusually small body.
"Take me with you.”
He stared at Aubrey for a moment, then, over the shouts of the pursuers, grabbed her hand and started running. The two of them rolled down the mountain and climbed aboard the docked ship.
Luckily, the ship was empty, but they were not safe. They could be attacked at any moment.
With Aubrey's back to him, the boy held up an old, large, empty sack, and with his other hand pointed to a corner of the ship where the sacks were stacked in a row. As if to say, "Hide there.”
There was no time to hesitate. Aubrey stepped straight into the boy's open sack. Her small, skinny body disappeared easily into the sack, and she found a place among the others.
It was then that the ship's owners returned. With what appeared to be the boy's family.
"Hurry up and get going, we've already lost too much time!"
Aubrey gulped and swallowed back the breath she'd been holding, straining her ears to discern the man's voice.
"Move, move, move!"
Luckily, it wasn't one of Yank's men, because the voices of the men here were mostly guttural and poorly spoken. Inside the sack, Aubrey busily moved her eyes. One of the silhouettes of a group of people on deck was unusually small. Probably the boy.
She remembered his face, white in the moonlight. The blue eyes that had warned her, the dark hair that had blown in the night breeze, the boy who, after a moment's hesitation, had run as fast as he could to grab her hand.
A long silhouette stepped up beside him.
"Please sit over here. Please cut the crap, do you realize how much this has been delayed because of you, and where the hell have you been, Master?"
The man called the boy master, but with a hint of condescension. He seemed to be yelling at him to answer right now.
"I'm sorry, the repair was going to take a long time, so I went looking around......."
The man snorted at the boy's response.
"Did you think you were on a trip or something?"
Then he barked at the workers to get going again.
At the same time, the boat lurched forward. The sensation of lurching on the waves of a calm sea. It was clear. They were getting away from this hellish island.
Her hair stood on end as goosebumps spread down her back. Aubrey gasped and clamped her hand over her mouth.
She felt like a scream of joy might escape at any moment.
Finally, finally, I'm here...............
The moment she first came here, the moment she was branded with the stamp on her wingbone. Her mind quickly flashed back to the lashings she’d received and the curses she had uttered.
The ship, which had been rolling along, was now completely off the island. It now sailed gently along the waves.
"Run!”
Phoebe's anguish voice echoed in the air.
Aubrey lifted her head and looked in the direction of the island, and though it was through a dirty sack, her eyes saw Crysis.
Phoebe's face faded from the shouting, and a girl was placed on a peaceful-looking island. Six-year-old Aubrey, a bright-eyed, red-haired girl who had no idea she was being sold into slavery.
She waved from the blackness of Crysis.
Goodbye. Don't ever come back here again.
Aubrey buried her face in her forearms and sobbed away the tears that shouldn't have escaped.
***
Her vision went from pitch-black to eerily bright, and then, with a dull thud, she knew the ship had reached the harbor.
"Let's unload the damned crates of wine first!"
The man shouted. Her briefly relaxed body stiffened with tension. She carefully wiggled her wrists and ankles out of the sacks. Now all that remained was to get off the boat without them seeing her, and then she would run again.
Where no one would know her.
One by one, the men carrying the sacks approached her. Someone opened his arms and was about to pick up the sack she was hiding in.
"I'll help."
A young voice. It was the boy.
"Young master, you stay over there. Listen to Hardy.”
"I'm just trying to help. Just let me carry this one."
The boy used a polite tone of voice that didn't quite match his gruffness. The man hesitated for a moment, then nodded.
"Thank you."
With that, the boy cautiously approached the sack.
"Excuse me."
With that, he whispered, and carefully lifted the sack upright. Then, just in case anyone was watching, he picked it up. He quickened his pace.
The harbor was bustling with early morning activity. The boy looked around and found a huge pillar to hide behind. He set the sack down carefully and untied the sloppy knot.
"Ha."
The sudden appearance of the girl startled a few passersby, but they soon realized the girl's scanty attire and shook their heads as they walked away.
The cool air rushed into her nostrils, and soon the smell of something fishy and slimy assaulted her senses. Aubrey sucked in a sharp breath and looked around.
The women in their finery, the gentlemen in their dapper, impeccably groomed attire, the child selling baskets of bread around his neck, the man with a large bag full of newspapers. The whole scene was unfamiliar.
After a quick glance around, her eyes landed on the boy standing in front of her.
"Oh, thank you so much."
"Now go."
The boy cut off Aubrey's words. It was a dismissive tone. And rightly so, since the boy's situation didn't seem to be much better, judging by the conversations they'd had on the ship.
But she did want to say thank you.
Aubrey looked up with a grunt, his face a little unfamiliar in the light.
Black hair dulled by the light, his face white with spots of color. Blue eyes that blinked absentmindedly. The boy gave off a strange aura that Aubrey had never experienced before in her life.
"Go, you want to get caught again?"
But the boy's words made Aubrey's parted lips tighten. If the boy was telling the truth, they had barely gotten off the island. If Yank wanted to capture the runaway slave, he was probably already on a ship, crossing the ocean.
Frightened to finish the thought, Aubrey pushed past the boy. Then, with a thud, her little bare feet took off running.
The boy looked at her retreating back. A girl in plain clothes was running away from him through the crowd, her long red hair swaying like dancing flames.
***
Was the fourteen-year-old slave who had run away from the island happy?
For a while, she was. She felt like she had the world at her fingertips just by running away from that hellish island.
She felt like she could accomplish anything.
But that sliver of hope was so easily shattered.
Her tattered clothes, dirty bare feet, and messy red hair attracted attention wherever she went. The stares soon turned to Yank's whipping men, then to the pimp's men, then to the men who were chasing her.
"Hey, it's okay...... Oh my God!"
Aubrey flinched at the sound of anyone's voice, her body reacting automatically even if she didn't want to.
As she ran through the streets, heated by the fall sun, Aubrey looked everywhere.
But everywhere she looked, there was not a single place in this sophisticated city that would welcome a runaway slave.
She was in the woods again. It was the only place she could see to go.
It took her two days to reach the mountain she thought was so close. Along the way, she slept under a crooked bridge and in a clump of bushes by a river where no one came to visit. Hunger was quenched by water.
She finally made it to the mountain, but it didn't make a difference. It was nice to be out of the public eye for a while. The unquenchable hunger and the lingering pain of her wounds plagued her.
The soles of her feet, the ones she'd used to flee Crysis, were completely tattered from running through the hot streets. She could barely walk anymore.
Five days after her escape, Aubrey lay on a wide expanse of rock, barely breathing in shallow gasps.
She didn’t know where she was anymore. She didn't even know how far she was from the harbor. It had been a while since she'd last seen anyone, so she'd probably gotten pretty far.
A faint smile crossed her dirty face, a relief that no one was after her in all this.
But unlike her mood, her body was raging with hunger. The hunger that she had been satisfying with water had reached its limit. Her vision spun, and shimmering dust floated before her eyes.
"Haa......."
Aubrey let out a long breath and closed her eyes. So this was what it was like to be so close to death, she thought, as her lethargic body sank deeper into the rocks.
In her fading mind, she heard a cheerful voice. A girl with scarlet hair in a bun appeared before her closed eyes. It was Phoebe.
"Phoebe..."
[There. Did you think you were going to get away with it?]
Just as Audrey was about to say the name out loud, Phoebe snorted.
[Why would you abandon me like that!]
Her usually smiling face contorted and she began to howl. Her hair, which she had always worn in a braid, was now in disarray.
"Phoebe, I'm......."
A cracked, hoarse voice escaped Aubrey’s lips.
"I'm sorry....... I'm sorry, Phoebe......"
I shouldn't have left you, but there's nothing I can do about it.
I should have come with you.
With you................
[Don't move, stay still, before I burn your face off.]
This time, the voice was husky. Where Phoebe had been, a man with an iron skewer stood, frowning.
[Wherever you go from here, you will always be a slave of Crysis.]
Her back burned frighteningly before the voice finished. It was then that Aubrey's eyes widened.
The memory of the faces of the men who had laughed as they branded her, at the age of six, hardened her weak heart in an instant.
I will survive somehow. I will live.
Aubrey staggered back down the rocks. The sun had now set, and she stared into the inky darkness.
"Ugh............. What's that smell?"
A foul odor, carried on a cool breeze, assaulted Aubrey's nose. It was not a smell she could stand.
Searching for something to eat, Aubrey quickly wrinkled her nose and looked around. Where in the world was this foul odor coming from?
***
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