"Today I'm going to teach you how things work in the Crowe Tribe!"
The man yanked the belt from his waist and brought it down across my body, again and again.
Every strike sent tremors through me. My chest still throbbed from being thrown to the ground earlier, each breath shallow and ragged, my body so weak I couldn't even form words.
"Barrett, take it easy. Don't kill her."
"Yeah, we paid the trafficker half a pound of gold for this one."
Their conversation hit me like ice water, and my mind snapped to Jeanette's boyfriend.
When I'd gotten into the car, I'd heard him on the phone the entire time, telling whoever was on the other end that he'd deliver the goods on schedule.
The goods. He'd been talking about me.
I never imagined my cousin had gotten involved with someone like that.
I didn't even know if Jeanette herself was okay.
"If you don't believe me, call Declan and ask him. I have photos of us together on my phone..."
From the way they talked, I could tell Declan held real weight in their world. If I could just prove our relationship, they'd have to let me go.
But before I could finish my sentence, another hand cracked across my face.
"She dares call the young master by his first name? I'll smash her mouth in!"
"This one's crafty. She just wants to get her hands on a phone so she can call the cops."
Slap. Slap. Slap.
Three open-handed blows, one after another, right across my face.
I felt my teeth loosen in their sockets. Blood pooled against my gums, metallic and warm, and my skull rang so loud my vision blurred.
Pain radiated from everywhere at once. It felt like my organs had shattered inside me.
No matter how much injustice burned in my throat, I didn't dare say another word.
These men held nothing back.
"Throw her in the pigsty. She'll behave by morning." The man in charge gave the order, and two others grabbed me by the arms and dragged me toward the pen.
The pigsty was open to the wind on all sides, the ground slick with filth and urine. I collapsed into a corner, hugging my knees, shaking so hard my teeth chattered.
I held on until well past midnight, when every light in the valley finally went dark.
I crawled out of the pen. Only one thought existed in my mind: run.
I made it a few yards before a spotlight locked onto me.
A horn blast split the silence, echoing across the entire settlement.
In less than a minute, I was surrounded by Crowe men.
Some carried axes. Others held long wooden staffs. Every face glared down at me like I was something to be put down.
"Told you this one was crafty. Trying to sneak off in the middle of the night!"
"Doesn't matter. Run her through the standard process."
"Even the most stubborn women can't survive the third ordeal. By the end they're either broken or brain-dead. Either way, they stop fighting."
Declan had told me about the old customs of his tribe, the ones he despised. He'd mentioned the Three Ordeals.
The tribe needed outside women to stay, to bear children for their men. They couldn't kill the women outright, or there'd be no one left to carry on their bloodlines. So they'd devised methods that stopped just short of death.
The first ordeal: the Itch Pool.
A bath brewed from a toxic plant. The moment it touched skin, a rash erupted across the body, an itch so maddening it could drive a person to claw their own flesh raw.
The second ordeal: the Cactus Pit.
They pressed cactus pads covered in spines against every inch of exposed skin, embedding hundreds of needles into the body. The woman was left to pull them out herself, one by one. The ones buried in her back, where her hands couldn't reach, stayed. The pain never stopped. Body and mind, ground down together.
The third ordeal: the Final Trial.
For ten days, any man in the tribe could enter the woman's room at any hour, day or night. A doctor examined her daily. It continued until she was pregnant.
