Consciousness returned in fragments.
First came the ache in my head, a dull, relentless pounding that seemed to echo behind my eyes. Then came the soreness in my shoulders and the stiffness in my neck, as though I had spent the night sleeping in a position no human body was meant to endure.
Finally, I became aware of the movement.
A steady rocking. A faint creaking. The occasional jolt that rattled my bones and sent a fresh wave of pain through my skull.
I tried to open my eyes, but even that felt like an effort. My eyelids fluttered, letting in slivers of dim light before closing again. For a moment, I couldn't remember where I was. My thoughts drifted aimlessly, slipping away whenever I tried to grasp them.
Then I remembered the milk.
The bakery. The elderly woman who had offered me food and a bed. The warm room upstairs. The soft voice assuring me that I could rest without worrying about anything.
And the conversation I had overheard before losing consciousness.
The girl upstairs.
Someone will pay for her.
The memories struck me with such force that I tried to sit up.
Something stopped me.
My shoulders pulled backward, and a sharp pressure tightened around my wrists. I jerked instinctively, but the movement only made the restraints bite deeper into my skin.
My eyes flew open.
I was lying on my side on the floor of a carriage.
For several seconds, I could only stare at the dark wooden boards inches from my face. They were rough and stained, with narrow gaps between them through which pale strips of daylight slipped. Dust danced in the light whenever the carriage bounced over uneven ground.
The air smelled of old wood, damp fabric, sweat, and something unpleasantly sour.
I tried to draw a deeper breath, but the cloth pressed across my mouth and muffled it.
A gag.
Panic surged through me.
I twisted onto my back, struggling to see more of my surroundings. My hands were bound behind me, the rope wound tightly enough that I could feel every rough fiber against my wrists. My ankles were tied as well, though not so tightly that I couldn't move them a little. A strip of cloth had been secured around my head and knotted behind it, covering my mouth.
For a moment, I simply stared at the carriage ceiling.
Then I tested the ropes.
I pulled my wrists apart. The knots held.
I tried turning my hands, searching for enough slack to slip one free. The rope scraped my skin, but my fingers couldn't find a gap.
I bent my knees and attempted to bring my feet closer to my hands. My shoulders screamed in protest. I managed only a few inches before the position became unbearable.
I stopped, panting through my nose.
The carriage rocked beneath me.
Somewhere outside, a horse snorted. Hooves struck the road in a rhythm that was steady but not particularly fast. I heard the faint rattle of harnesses and the groan of wooden wheels.
We were traveling.
The realization was simple, obvious, and horrifying.
I was no longer in the bakery.
Someone had taken me while I was unconscious, bound me, gagged me, and put me inside a moving carriage.
And I had no idea where they were taking me.
I forced myself to breathe slowly.
Panic would not loosen the ropes. It would not stop the carriage. It would not make my arms stronger or the drug leave my body any faster.
I needed information.
First, I needed to determine how much control I still had over my body.
I flexed my fingers one at a time. They moved, though sluggishly. I could feel the rough floor beneath my palms when I twisted my wrists, but my hands felt strangely distant, as though they belonged to someone else.
I lifted my head. The movement made the carriage tilt unpleasantly, or perhaps the world itself was tilting. Nausea rose in my throat.
I lowered my head and waited.
The drug was still affecting me.
I didn't know what the baker had put in the milk. I didn't know how much I had swallowed or how long the effects were supposed to last. I only knew that my thoughts seemed to move through mud, and every attempt to exert myself left me exhausted.
That frightened me more than the ropes.
Ropes were physical. They had knots, tension, weaknesses. They could be cut or loosened. A drug was invisible. I couldn't tell how much of my weakness came from the substance and how much came from this body's natural limitations.
And this body was already at a disadvantage.
I was a child. A small, underfed child with little muscle and no useful tools. Even without the drug, I would have struggled to overpower an adult.
I swallowed against the cloth covering my mouth.
The baker had known that.
She had known exactly how vulnerable I was when she welcomed me into her home. She had given me food, offered me a bed, and spoken to me as though I were someone worth helping. She had even brought me warm milk.
I had thanked her.
The memory made my stomach twist.
I had thanked the woman who drugged me.
I wanted to tell myself that I should have known better. That I should have refused the milk, slept with one eye open, or found some other way to protect myself.
But what could I reasonably have done?
I had spent the day wandering through an unfamiliar city in a body I didn't understand. A stranger had tried to abduct me in the street. I had escaped by sheer luck and spent the remainder of the afternoon trying to find somewhere I could survive the night.
When an elderly woman offered me a warm room and a meal, I had accepted.
Was that foolish?
Perhaps.
But if I had refused every kindness offered to me because someone might be hiding a knife behind a smile, I would have been left alone on the streets with no food, no shelter, and no idea how to survive.
I couldn't afford to trust blindly.
Yet I couldn't afford to trust no one, either.
That was the problem with being helpless. Every choice carried a risk, and I rarely had enough information to determine which risk was worth taking.
I shut my eyes for a moment.
The memory of the baker's face returned with painful clarity. The lines around her eyes. The softness of her voice. The way she had adjusted the blanket around me.
Had any of it been genuine?
Had she ever felt a flicker of sympathy for the child she was selling? Or had she looked at me from the beginning and seen nothing but a convenient solution to a problem?
I wanted to believe she had once been kind.
It would have been easier if she had simply been cruel from the start. Cruelty was something I could recognize. It was easier to defend against than kindness used as a weapon.
But I couldn't know what she had felt.
Perhaps she had debts she couldn't escape. Perhaps she had been frightened. Perhaps she had convinced herself that selling a nameless child was a small price to pay for her own survival.
None of those possibilities changed what she had done.
Whatever her reasons, she had chosen to sacrifice me.
And now I was here.
I opened my eyes again and forced myself to examine the carriage.
It was small, perhaps intended to transport goods rather than passengers. There was enough room for me to lie down and little else. A few sacks had been pushed into one corner, and something heavy shifted inside one of them whenever the carriage jolted.
The rear door was secured with a wooden latch. I couldn't reach it from where I lay, and even if I could, I doubted I would have been able to open it while the carriage was moving.
A narrow gap between the boards offered a glimpse of the road.
I couldn't see much through it, only the blur of brown earth and occasional patches of grass. The carriage was moving away from the city, or at least through a stretch of road that looked nothing like the cobbled streets I remembered.
I listened.
Two sets of footsteps? No. Hooves. One horse, perhaps two. The sound was difficult to separate from the rattle of the wheels.
Then a man's voice drifted through the carriage walls.
“—told you we should've left before sunrise.”
Another voice answered, deeper and rougher. “And I told you to stop complaining.”
The men were outside.
My whole body went rigid.
I turned my head toward the front of the carriage, straining to hear more.
“I'm not complaining,” the first man said. “I'm saying we'd have made better time if we hadn't wasted half the morning waiting.”
“We weren't waiting for you.”
“Could've fooled me.”
A dull thump followed, perhaps a hand striking the side of the carriage.
“Keep your mouth shut and watch the road.”
The first man muttered something I couldn't make out.
I lay perfectly still.
Two men. At least two.
I couldn't see them, and I didn't know whether either had a weapon. But their voices sounded close enough that I could hear them clearly whenever the carriage slowed or the road grew quieter.
I needed them to keep talking.
Every word might tell me where I was going, how many people I was dealing with, or whether I had any chance of escape.
I shifted slightly, trying to bring my ear closer to the carriage wall.
The movement sent a wave of dizziness through me. I clenched my teeth beneath the gag and waited for it to pass.
“She's awake yet?” the younger-sounding man asked.
My heart lurched.
The other man gave a dismissive grunt. “How should I know?”
“You tied her up. Thought you'd checked.”
“I checked before we left.”
“And?”
“And she was asleep.”
“Still?”
The older man sighed with such deep irritation that I could almost picture him rubbing his temples.
“If you keep asking the same question, I'll throw you off the wagon.”
“Just wondering.”
“Wonder less.”
A pause followed.
I could hear the wheels turning, the horse breathing, and the wind moving over the carriage roof.
Then the younger man spoke again.
“Seems a bit much, doesn't it? Tying up a little girl like that.”
I stopped breathing.
The older man laughed once. There was no humor in it.
“You want to untie her?”
“No.”
“Then stop pretending you've got a problem with it.”
“I'm not pretending anything. I'm just saying she can't be much trouble.”
“You want to bet your teeth on that?”
“She looks like she can barely stand.”
“And that's exactly why you don't get careless. You think a small thing can't cause trouble, and next thing you know, she's screaming in the middle of a village, and every fool with a sword wants to know why you're dragging a child around.”
The younger man fell silent.
I stared at the ceiling, my heart beating so hard that I could feel it in my throat.
They were talking about me as though I were a sack of flour.
No, a sack of flour would have been treated with more care. At least someone would have wanted to make sure it arrived intact.
I was cargo.
The word formed in my mind with a cold, terrible clarity.
I was something being transported from one place to another. Something that had a destination and a price.
I tried to pull at my wrists again.
The rope tightened.
I stopped before I could make a sound.
The men were right about one thing. If I began struggling now, I might only exhaust myself. I needed to understand the situation before deciding what to do.
So I listened.
“Where are we stopping?” the younger man asked after a while.
“Nowhere.”
“Not even for food?”
“We've got food.”
“For us, I mean.”
“Then eat what you brought.”
“I finished it.”
“Then enjoy being hungry.”
The younger man groaned.
“You're a miserable bastard, you know that?”
“And yet you keep getting assigned to me.”
“Because nobody else wants to work with you.”
“There's a reason for that.”
Their exchange might have been almost ordinary if not for the fact that I was tied up a few feet away, unable to speak or move freely.
They sounded like two workers on a tedious journey. One was irritable and experienced; the other complained because he was bored.
Neither seemed particularly troubled by the fact that they were transporting a drugged child.
That was perhaps the most frightening part.
They didn't sound like monsters.
They sounded like ordinary men who had decided that what they were doing was simply part of their work.
I had spent most of my former life believing that evil was something dramatic. Something that announced itself through obvious cruelty or a deliberate willingness to hurt others.
But perhaps that was too comforting a way to think about it.
Perhaps a great deal of harm was done by people who didn't think of themselves as evil at all. People who had bills to pay, debts to settle, orders to follow, and excuses ready whenever they needed them.
The baker had a debt.
These men had a job.
And I was the price everyone seemed willing to make someone else pay.
I turned my face toward the floor and breathed through my nose until the tightness in my chest eased.
I couldn't afford to let fear consume me. Not yet.
I needed to learn where I was going.
The road grew rougher as the carriage continued. Every few minutes, a wheel dropped into a rut, sending a jolt through the floor. My stomach lurched with each impact, and the drug made it difficult to anticipate them.
I tried to use the rhythm to estimate our speed.
We weren't moving quickly. The horse pulled steadily, and the carriage rocked at a pace that suggested a walking trot at most. If the men had been in a hurry, they might have pushed the animal harder.
That was something, at least.
A slower journey meant more time to think.
It also meant more time for the drug to wear off.
I flexed my fingers again.
They still felt numb, but the sensation was improving. The heaviness in my limbs hadn't disappeared, though the fog in my thoughts seemed a little thinner than before.
I could think clearly enough to plan.
The knots were behind my back, where I couldn't see them. I tried to work my fingertips along the rope, feeling for a loose end or a place where the fibers had separated.
Nothing.
My wrists were bound too closely together. I could barely rotate one hand far enough to change its angle, and the rope had been tied with deliberate care.
Whoever had secured it knew what they were doing.
I tested the restraints more gently, trying to discover whether the rope loosened when I relaxed my hands or tightened when I pulled.
It tightened.
I stopped.
Perhaps I could work one thumb free. If I could turn my hand sideways and compress my fingers, I might be able to slip it through the loop.
I had seen something similar in films. The idea seemed simple enough when performed by a trained adult with flexible hands and a convenient camera angle.
In reality, I was a frightened child lying on a filthy carriage floor with a drug still circulating through her system.
I twisted my right hand inward.
Pain flared across my wrist.
I tried again, more slowly.
The rope shifted by a fraction, but there was no meaningful slack. My thumb hurt, and the pressure around my wrist grew sharper.
I stopped before I injured myself.
One failed attempt.
I could try again later.
The gag was a different problem. The cloth was wrapped tightly around my mouth, but I could still breathe through my nose. If I managed to loosen it, I might be able to call for help.
Of course, calling for help would only be useful if there was someone nearby willing to intervene.
I didn't know where we were. I didn't know whether the road passed through villages or open countryside. I didn't even know whether shouting would bring a kind stranger or another person looking to profit from my misfortune.
Still, the possibility mattered.
I rolled onto my side and rubbed my cheek against the floor, trying to catch the edge of the cloth with my teeth.
The movement was awkward. The carriage bounced beneath me, and my face scraped against the rough boards. I managed to catch a small fold of fabric between my teeth, but when I tried to pull, the cloth tightened around the back of my head.
I released it.
Another failed attempt.
I lay still, listening for the men.
They were arguing again.
“You should've seen the baker's face,” the younger one was saying. “Thought she was going to faint when we came in.”
“She's not used to dealing with us directly.”
“Then why take the deal?”
“Because she owes us money.”
“She owes everyone money, from what I hear.”
“Then she should've been more careful about who she borrowed from.”
The younger man chuckled.
“Still. Didn't think she'd actually go through with it.”
The older man's voice hardened. “You want to grow a conscience now?”
“No. I'm just surprised.”
“Be surprised quietly.”
I pressed my face closer to the wall.
The baker.
They were talking about the baker.
I knew it, of course. There could be no other explanation. But hearing them mention her so casually made the betrayal feel newly real.
She had not acted alone.
This had been arranged before they arrived. The men had known where to find me. They had known I would be upstairs, helpless from the drug. They had come to collect me as though they were picking up a parcel that had already been paid for.
I wondered how long the baker had been planning it.
Had she made the decision while preparing my soup? While carrying the milk upstairs? While smiling at me and telling me that I could sleep safely?
Had she lain awake the night before, weighing the debt against the life of a child she had never met?
Or had it been easier than that? Had the choice required no more thought than selling a piece of furniture she could no longer afford to keep?
I remembered the warmth of the room. The smell of bread drifting up from the oven. The way I had felt, for the first time since awakening in this world, that perhaps I could survive one more night.
I had allowed myself to relax.
That was what hurt.
Not because I had expected the world to be kind, but because I had been so desperate for kindness that I had accepted the first convincing imitation of it.
I closed my eyes.
I could mourn that mistake later.
For now, I needed to stay alive.
The carriage slowed.
I felt it before I heard anything else. The rhythm of the wheels changed, and the horse's hooves moved at a more measured pace. The carriage swayed as it turned.
Voices rose outside.
A man called something from the roadside, and one of the thugs answered.
I couldn't make out the words.
The carriage continued for several moments before slowing again. There was a brief exchange, then the wheels began moving more smoothly.
Were we passing through a settlement?
I strained to hear.
A dog barked in the distance. Somewhere nearby, a hammer struck metal. The sounds were faint, but they carried the familiar quality of human activity.
I tried to peer through the gap between the floorboards.
This time, I caught a glimpse of a wooden fence, a patch of trampled grass, and the lower half of a person standing beside the road.
Then the view vanished.
The carriage rolled onward.
“Thought you said we wouldn't stop,” the younger man remarked.
“We didn't.”
“Looked like a checkpoint.”
“Just a man collecting a road toll.”
“Since when do they collect tolls on this road?”
“Since the people who own it decided they wanted more money.”
The younger man laughed.
“Fair enough.”
I frowned.
A road toll.
The words meant little by themselves, but they suggested that the roads were controlled by someone. Perhaps a local lord, a town council, or a group that had taken control by force.
In the world I had left behind, a roadblock would have meant a police checkpoint, a construction detour, or a toll booth. Here, it could mean any number of things.
I couldn't assume that the authorities in this world operated as they had in mine.
I couldn't assume much of anything.
The carriage rattled over another rough stretch. I felt the vibration through my cheek and tried to estimate how long we had been traveling.
Time had become difficult to judge. The light through the gaps had shifted, but I couldn't see the sky. My body still felt heavy, though I could move my legs more freely than before.
I had no watch. No phone. No reliable sense of direction.
I had never appreciated ordinary conveniences so much as I did when I no longer had them.
A phone would have let me call for help. A map would have told me where I was. Even a cheap wristwatch would have given me some sense of how long I had been trapped here.
Instead, I had a gag in my mouth and rope around my wrists.
I almost laughed at the absurdity of it.
A few days ago—or perhaps longer; I had no idea how much time had passed since my death—I had been a university graduate, standing among friends and family while people congratulated me on reaching the next stage of my life.
Now I was an eight-year-old girl being transported to an unknown destination by men who discussed her as though she were an inconvenient package.
If someone had told me that this was how my life would turn out, I would have assumed they were writing a particularly grim fantasy novel.
The thought faded before it could become comforting.
This wasn't a story I could put down when it became too unpleasant.
I was inside it.
And if I wanted a future, I would have to fight for one.
The men continued talking outside.
“What's the price on this one?” the younger man asked.
My heart stopped.
The older man didn't answer immediately.
“Depends on who wants her.”
“Thought it was already settled.”
“Getting her there is settled. What happens after that isn't our concern.”
“Still, she's young.”
“That's the point.”
A cold sensation spread through my stomach.
I had known what the men intended to do with me. The conversation at the bakery had left little room for doubt.
But knowing something in theory was different from hearing it discussed in practical terms.
What's the price on this one?
They were talking about my price.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
The younger man sounded uneasy now. “You think she'll fetch much?”
“Enough.”
“Even if she doesn't have a family?”
“Especially if she doesn't have a family.”
“Wouldn't that make her trouble?”
“No family means no one comes asking questions. No one looking for her. No one paying to get her back.”
I felt as though the floor had dropped away beneath me.
No one looking for her.
No one paying to get her back.
They weren't merely counting on my helplessness. They were counting on my isolation.
In this world, I had no parents to call, no friends who knew where I had gone, and no official record I could point to and say, I belong somewhere. Someone will notice if I'm missing.
I didn't even know the name of the child whose body I inhabited.
If I disappeared, who would notice?
The baker had looked at me and seen a girl without a home. The men looked at me and saw someone whose disappearance would cause no inconvenience.
I wanted to protest that I was a person.
I wanted to tell them that I had a life before this one, that I had parents who had loved me, that I had spent years learning and growing and trying to become someone I could be proud of.
But none of those things would matter to them.
My former life was invisible here.
Whatever memories I carried, whatever thoughts and hopes and regrets remained inside me, none of them were written on my face. To the people around me, I was simply a small, frightened girl.
And they had already decided what that made me worth.
I turned my face away from the wall.
The gag felt suddenly unbearable. I wanted to scream until my throat tore, to force the world to acknowledge that I existed.
Instead, I breathed through my nose.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
I had to remain quiet.
If the men discovered I was awake, they might tighten the restraints or drug me again. If they thought I was capable of causing trouble, they might decide that the risk wasn't worth taking.
I didn't know what they would do.
That uncertainty was enough to keep me still.
The younger man spoke again, his voice quieter this time.
“You ever wonder what happens to them?”
“No.”
“Not even a little?”
“No.”
“Must be nice.”
The older man snorted. “You want to feel bad for every person in this business, you'll starve before the month is out.”
“I'm not saying I feel bad.”
“Then what are you saying?”
“Nothing.”
“Good. Keep it that way.”
Silence followed.
I wondered whether the younger man really felt uneasy or whether he was simply uncomfortable with the details. Perhaps he would have preferred not to know what happened to the people he transported.
That didn't make him safe.
A person could hesitate and still do the wrong thing. He could feel a little guilt, then go on with his work because stopping would be inconvenient.
I couldn't build a plan around the possibility that one of them might suddenly decide to become a better person.
If I wanted to escape, I would have to find an opportunity and take it myself.
The thought was frightening.
It was also the first thing that had felt remotely useful since I woke.
I began examining the carriage again, this time with greater care.
The rear door was beyond my reach, but perhaps the latch could be disturbed if I managed to crawl toward it. The sacks in the corner might conceal something sharp. A broken piece of wood could be enough to saw through rope, though I had no way of knowing whether the boards were splintered or smooth.
I could wait until the carriage stopped and try to escape through the door.
That plan had several problems.
First, I would have to reach the door while bound.
Second, I would have to open it without attracting attention.
Third, I would have to get away from two adult men while still weakened by the drug.
Fourth, I would have to survive wherever we stopped.
The last problem was the worst.
If the carriage stopped in the middle of an empty road, I might be able to run into the trees. But I was small, unarmed, and unfamiliar with the countryside. The men would have horses. Even if I escaped their immediate reach, I could easily become lost.
If we stopped in a town, there might be people who could help me.
Or there might be people who would help the men.
I had no way to tell the difference.
Still, a bad plan was better than no plan at all. At least a plan gave me something to revise.
I shifted my legs and tried to roll onto my stomach. The movement was awkward, but I managed it with a series of small, painful adjustments.
The floor pressed against my chest. My bound hands were trapped beneath me, and I had to twist my shoulders to keep from crushing my fingers.
I crawled a few inches toward the corner where the sacks had been piled.
The carriage lurched.
I slid backward and struck my shoulder against the sideboard.
Pain shot down my arm.
I bit down hard on the gag to keep from crying out.
Outside, the younger man stopped talking.
“What's that?”
My blood turned cold.
The carriage continued rolling.
“What?” the older man asked.
“Thought I heard something.”
“It's a carriage. It makes noises.”
“Could've been the girl.”
“Then she'd better learn to stay quiet.”
I froze.
The men waited.
I could hear my own breathing, too loud in my ears. My shoulder throbbed, and my fingers trembled against the floor.
After several seconds, the older man spoke again.
“She's drugged and tied up. What do you think she's going to do? Grow wings?”
The younger man laughed uncertainly.
“Right.”
Their conversation resumed, but I didn't move for a long time.
That had been too close.
I couldn't afford another mistake like it.
Slowly, carefully, I eased back onto my side. My arms ached, and the effort had left me exhausted. I rested my cheek on the floor and waited for the pounding in my head to settle.
The drug was wearing off, but not quickly enough.
I had no idea how far we had traveled or how much farther we had to go.
I needed to learn more.
And I needed to find out what the men meant when they spoke about the destination.
The opportunity came when the carriage slowed for a longer stretch of road.
The horse's hooves grew more deliberate. The wheels creaked over what sounded like packed earth, and the men lowered their voices as though approaching somewhere they didn't want to disturb.
“Still think we should've taken the northern road,” the younger man said.
“And spend half the day climbing through the hills?”
“It's quieter.”
“It's longer.”
“Less chance of trouble.”
“There's no trouble on this road.”
The younger man gave a short, disbelieving laugh.
“No trouble? Not with the patrols?”
“Not with these patrols.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you should stop asking questions about things you don't understand.”
“I'm trying to understand why we're carrying a child through a road watched by soldiers.”
“Because the road watched by soldiers is the road we were told to take.”
“That doesn't answer anything.”
“It's the only answer you're getting.”
I stared into the dimness.
Soldiers.
Patrols.
The carriage was traveling along a road where authorities were present, yet the men seemed unconcerned about being stopped.
That could mean they had a legitimate reason for transporting me. It could mean they had forged papers. It could mean the soldiers were corrupt.
Or it could mean the road wasn't watched as closely as the younger man feared.
I tried to sort through the possibilities, but I lacked the information to choose between them.
Then the older man spoke again.
“Besides, the border city's safer for this kind of business.”
My attention sharpened.
The border city.
At last, a destination.
“Safer?” the younger man asked. “For us, maybe.”
“For everyone who knows how to keep his mouth shut.”
“What about the guards at the gate?”
“They get their share.”
“And the officials?”
“Their share, too.”
“Then why bother having laws?”
The older man laughed.
“Because laws look impressive on paper.”
The younger man said nothing.
I lay perfectly still, afraid even to breathe too loudly.
The border city.
I had never heard its name, but at least now I knew what kind of place we were approaching. A city where people in authority could be paid to look away. A place where the law existed, perhaps, but where the people meant to enforce it could be persuaded to ignore it.
It was worse than I had hoped.
A border city might have offered a chance to escape into a crowd. It might have contained a market, an inn, a temple, or some other place where a frightened child could find help.
But if the men were telling the truth, the city was also a place where people like me could be sold with little interference.
The thought made my skin crawl.
“Still don't see why we can't do this closer to home,” the younger man said.
“Because closer to home means people know where to look.”
“Who would be looking for her?”
“That's not the point.”
“Seems like the point to me.”
The older man sighed.
“Listen carefully, because I'm only explaining this once. The district we took her from is small enough that people remember faces. Shopkeepers talk. Neighbors gossip. Even the miserable old women who sit in their doorways all day notice when something changes.”
I remembered the narrow streets, the crowded market stalls, the people watching from their windows.
I had noticed the same thing during my wandering. The district had been poor, but it hadn't been empty. People lived there. They worked, argued, traded, and watched the world pass by.
A missing child might have been noticed.
Perhaps not by anyone powerful enough to help, but noticed all the same.
“The city is full of people who owe us favors,” the older man continued. “Some owe money. Some owe more than money. We know which doors to knock on and which ones to leave alone. That doesn't mean we want trouble walking around with our name attached to it.”
“So we take her out of the district.”
“We take her out of the district, out of the city, and across the border. Once she's there, she becomes someone else's concern.”
The younger man was quiet for a moment.
“And if someone asks where she came from?”
“Who is going to ask?”
“Someone might.”
“Then she came from somewhere else. Or no one knows. Or the buyer doesn't care. You think people pay good money for questions?”
I felt sick.
They weren't simply relying on the authorities to ignore them. They were relying on distance, confusion, and the fact that I had no one who could demand answers.
They wanted to put enough roads and borders between me and the place where I had been taken that even if someone eventually wondered where I had gone, the trail would already be cold.
And the baker had made it easier.
She knew I had no family here. No one knew my name, because I didn't know the name of the child whose body I inhabited. I had no home to return to and no familiar face waiting for me.
The men had not needed to conceal a complicated crime.
They had only needed to remove someone the world had already forgotten.
My hands curled into fists behind my back.
For the first time since waking, my fear gave way to anger so sharp that it cut through some of the fog in my head.
I was angry at the baker for betraying me.
Angry at the men for speaking about me as though I were merchandise.
Angry at the world for making it so easy.
And, beneath all of that, I was angry at myself for having no way to stop them.
I had been an adult. I had earned a degree, navigated difficult decisions, and believed that I could learn my way through most problems if given enough time.
Yet here I was, unable to untie a rope.
I couldn't overpower the men. I couldn't call the authorities. I couldn't even tell them who I was.
All the knowledge I had carried from my former life seemed useless when confronted with the simple fact of my physical weakness.
But useless was not the same as worthless.
I could still observe. I could still think. I could still wait for a mistake.
The men had spent the journey talking as though I were unconscious. Their carelessness had already given me information they probably hadn't intended to share.
If they continued underestimating me, perhaps I could turn that against them.
I forced my fingers to relax.
Anger could wait, too.
For now, I needed to understand the city.
The younger man spoke again.
“What's the auction house called?”
I held my breath.
“Why?”
“So I know where I'm taking the wagon.”
“You don't need to know.”
“What if we get separated?”
“Then follow the instructions you were given.”
“And if I forget them?”
“Then you're more useless than I thought.”
“Come on. Just tell me.”
A pause.
Then the older man answered, with obvious reluctance.
“It's called the Hall of Ledgers.”
The name meant nothing to me, but I repeated it silently.
The Hall of Ledgers.
An auction house.
The words from the bakery returned in a rush, along with the conversation I had just overheard. They were taking me somewhere people bought and sold human beings.
I knew it before either man said it aloud, but hearing the destination confirmed made it impossible to pretend otherwise.
I was going to be sold.
I didn't know what kind of buyers would be there. I didn't know what they wanted from a child. I didn't know whether I would be purchased as a servant, a laborer, or for something far worse.
My mind tried to fill in the unknowns, and every possibility made my stomach tighten.
I forced myself to stop.
Speculation wouldn't save me. It would only give my imagination more ways to frighten me.
I needed facts.
“It's not really an auction house, is it?” the younger man asked.
The older one answered immediately.
“It's an auction house.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I know what you mean. I also know that the walls are thick, the doors are locked, and the people who pay to go inside prefer to keep their business private.”
“So it's not legal.”
The older man made an impatient sound.
“Legal enough.”
“That doesn't make sense.”
“Of course it doesn't. You're still thinking like someone who believes the rules are the same for everyone.”
The younger man fell silent.
I absorbed the words.
The rules were not the same for everyone.
I had already begun to suspect that. The poor district was controlled by a gang that collected money from residents and shopkeepers. The gang's reach extended beyond the streets where it operated, and the men transporting me appeared to have little fear of being stopped.
The border city offered something the district could not: a place where the people involved in the trade could gather under the protection of officials willing to accept payment.
Perhaps the city wasn't entirely lawless. Perhaps ordinary people lived there, worked there, and followed the rules as best they could.
But there were doors behind which those rules became negotiable.
The Hall of Ledgers was one of them.
I imagined a building with high ceilings, polished floors, and men in fine clothes examining people the way merchants examined horses. The image was born from my own assumptions, and I knew it might be wrong. This world could have its own customs, its own procedures, its own particular cruelties.
The details didn't matter.
Whatever the building looked like, I would be inside it as a captive.
And once I was sold, escaping might become much harder.
The carriage moved on.
The conversation shifted to less important things: food, the condition of the road, and an argument about whose turn it would be to sleep after they reached the city. I listened as long as I could, but the men offered little more useful information.
My body was growing tired again.
The drug still clung to me, though the worst of the dizziness had begun to fade. My wrists hurt where the rope had rubbed them, and my shoulder throbbed from striking the sideboard. My mouth was dry beneath the gag.
I needed water.
I needed food.
I needed to be somewhere else.
Instead, I lay on the floor of a carriage, bound and gagged, while two men carried me toward a place where my future would be decided by strangers.
I thought of my parents.
The memory came without warning, as it often did when I was too tired to keep my thoughts in order.
My mother asking whether I had decided what I wanted to do after graduation.
My father pretending not to worry while asking whether I had looked into any jobs.
My friend laughing and telling me that none of us knew what we were doing, so I might as well enjoy the uncertainty.
The ordinary questions of an ordinary day.
I remembered the car, the road, the sudden violence of the collision. I remembered trying to call out, unable to tell whether anyone could hear me.
Then darkness.
I still didn't know what had happened to my parents. I didn't know whether they had survived the crash or whether they had died alongside me. I didn't know whether anyone had mourned me, or whether my body had been buried beneath the life I had left behind.
Sometimes I wondered whether I had truly died or whether this was some kind of impossible dream.
But dreams rarely made your wrists bleed.
I opened my eyes and stared at the ceiling.
Whatever had happened, I was here now.
I could spend every waking moment grieving the life I had lost, or I could try to preserve the life I still had.
I didn't know how to reconcile those two things.
Perhaps I never would.
But I couldn't let the memory of my former life become another chain around my wrists. I had loved my parents. I had cared about the future I might have built. I had regrets, unfinished plans, and questions that would never be answered.
Those things mattered.
They mattered even if I never saw my family again.
And this life mattered, too, even if I had never chosen it.
I was frightened. I was angry. I was helpless in ways I had never imagined possible.
But I was still thinking.
Still breathing.
Still here.
I turned my attention back to the ropes.
If the drug continued to wear off, I might eventually regain enough strength to try something more ambitious. I could keep testing the knots. I could look for a sharp edge. I could watch for a moment when the men were distracted.
If I found an opportunity, I would take it.
If I failed, I would try again.
I had no guarantee that any of this would work. I might be caught, punished, or restrained more securely. I might never get another chance.
But doing nothing would guarantee only one thing: that I would arrive at the destination the men had chosen for me.
I refused to surrender to that outcome before I had even seen the city.
The carriage continued onward.
As the hours—or what felt like hours—passed, the air through the cracks in the boards grew cooler. The road became smoother, and the carriage's movement changed. We no longer jolted over ruts as frequently. Instead, the wheels rolled over a firmer surface, producing a steady, hollow rumble.
I heard more voices outside.
Not just the two men now, but distant shouts, the clatter of other wheels, and the occasional sharp call of someone directing traffic.
The countryside was giving way to something more crowded.
We were approaching the city.
My pulse quickened.
I tried to push myself upright, but the movement left me dizzy. I settled back against the wall and listened.
“About time,” the younger man muttered. “Thought we'd never get here.”
“Keep your eyes open.”
“For what?”
“For anything that looks like trouble.”
“Thought you said there was no trouble.”
“There's always trouble. The trick is knowing which kind belongs to someone else.”
The younger man laughed, but the sound lacked conviction.
The carriage slowed.
I heard a series of sharp clacks, followed by the scrape of metal against wood. Someone called out, and the older man answered in a voice that had suddenly become polite.
The difference was striking.
A moment earlier, he had spoken to his companion with open contempt. Now his words carried a careful deference, as though he were addressing someone whose opinion mattered.
A gate, perhaps.
A checkpoint.
The city entrance.
I strained to hear the exchange, but the words were indistinct. There was a pause, the clink of something metallic, and then a brief laugh from outside.
The carriage moved again.
I released a breath I hadn't realized I was holding.
We had passed through.
I didn't know whether the men had shown papers, paid a bribe, or simply been recognized by the guards. I didn't know whether the authorities had looked inside the carriage or whether they had even bothered to ask who was being transported.
But whatever had happened, no one had stopped us.
The road beyond the gate was busy. I could hear merchants calling to customers, wheels rattling over stone, and the layered murmur of a crowd. The sounds echoed differently here, bouncing off buildings and narrowing into the spaces between streets.
The carriage turned sharply, and the movement threw me against the sideboard.
I bit down on the gag and swallowed a cry.
The drug had weakened me, but I was no longer entirely at its mercy. My thoughts were clearer now. My fingers moved more easily, and I could feel the floor beneath my hands without that strange, distant numbness.
If I was going to escape, the city might offer opportunities that the open road had not.
Crowds. Narrow streets. Alleys. People who might be willing to help.
It might also offer guards, locked doors, and people who would sell me again if the price was right.
I couldn't decide whether the prospect of reaching the city should fill me with hope or dread.
Perhaps both.
The carriage rattled through the streets. The sound of the crowd grew louder, then faded as we turned into another road. The air smelled different, too. Smoke, animal dung, cooking oil, and the sharp tang of metalwork mingled with unfamiliar scents.
I caught glimpses of light through the cracks, but nothing clear enough to identify. The buildings were taller here, their shadows crossing the road. Somewhere nearby, a bell rang several times, followed by the distant shout of a vendor.
The city was alive around me.
People were buying food, carrying goods, arguing over prices, and going about their ordinary lives. They were laughing and talking, hurrying to their destinations, worrying about things that might seem insignificant to someone else.
And hidden among all that ordinary activity, I was being carried toward an auction house.
The contrast was almost unbearable.
The world did not pause because someone was suffering. It did not stop its work to acknowledge a frightened child in the back of a carriage. The crowd would keep moving whether I escaped or not.
That realization had a strange effect on me.
It made me feel insignificant.
But it also reminded me that the city contained more than the men who had taken me. More than the gang that controlled the district. More than the officials who accepted bribes.
There were people here who knew nothing about me.
People who might never hear my story.
People who might, given the right circumstances, become part of it.
I couldn't afford to assume they would help me. But I couldn't afford to assume they would all turn away, either.
The carriage slowed again.
This time, it did not stop immediately. It moved at a crawl, the wheels grinding over stone as the horse navigated what sounded like a crowded street. The men spoke in low voices, and I caught fragments of their conversation.
“...not through the main square.”
“...too many eyes.”
“...said the west road was clear.”
“...then take it.”
The carriage turned.
The crowd noise diminished, replaced by the hollow echo of a narrower street. The horse's hooves struck the road more distinctly, and the wheels passed close to a wall or building, scraping something with a harsh, brief sound.
I lay still, trying to picture our route.
If I could remember the turns, perhaps I could use them later. If I escaped, I might be able to retrace our path to the city entrance or find a busy street.
But I had no map, no sense of direction, and no reliable way to know how far we had traveled within the city. The carriage could turn ten times before reaching its destination. By then, any attempt to reconstruct the route would be little more than guesswork.
Still, I paid attention.
Left turn.
A brief stretch of smooth road.
Right turn.
The sound of running water somewhere nearby.
Another turn.
I repeated the sequence silently.
It was a small thing, perhaps useless, but it was something I could do. And as long as I could do something, I wasn't entirely reduced to waiting.
The older man spoke.
“Nearly there.”
My stomach tightened.
The younger man sounded relieved. “Good. I'm sick of this trip.”
“You'll be sick of the work inside, too.”
“That's your problem. I'm only delivering the goods.”
“Then deliver them properly.”
I closed my eyes.
The goods.
The word settled over me like a blanket of ice.
I wanted to hate the men. I wanted to imagine them as cruel beyond comprehension, the kind of villains who enjoyed every moment of another person's suffering.
But I had already heard enough to know that the truth was more ordinary and, in some ways, more frightening.
They did not need to hate me.
They did not need to enjoy what was happening.
They only needed to keep doing it.
The carriage slowed once more, then rolled forward over a rough patch of stone. I heard a horse neigh, followed by the clatter of another vehicle passing nearby.
A door slammed somewhere outside.
The older man muttered a curse.
“What's wrong?” the younger one asked.
“Nothing. Keep moving.”
The carriage continued.
I tried to turn my head toward the rear door. From my position, I could see only a narrow strip of darkness and the edge of the wooden latch. It looked no different from before.
I wondered whether the men would leave me alone in the carriage when they arrived. If they did, perhaps I could work my way toward the door. If they carried me inside, I would have fewer opportunities.
My mind ran through possibilities, one after another, none of them reassuring.
I was too small to fight. Too weak to run far. Too unfamiliar with the city to disappear into it without help.
Yet I had survived the first attempt to abduct me in the district. I had recognized the danger before the man could drag me away. I had escaped because I had noticed something wrong and acted when an opportunity appeared.
I needed to remember that.
I had not survived because I was strong.
I had survived because I had paid attention.
The carriage turned onto a broader road. The sounds around us changed again, becoming more distant and more orderly. The wheels rolled over smoother stone, and the horse's hooves slowed to a measured pace.
Then I heard it.
A deep, resonant sound, like a bell struck from somewhere high above the street.
It rang once.
Then again.
The men fell quiet.
I lifted my head as far as the restraints allowed.
Through the narrow gap between two boards, I caught a glimpse of the sky. It was pale and washed with the light of late afternoon. Beyond the roofline of a nearby building, something dark rose above the city.
A tower.
Then another.
The carriage moved forward, and the gap widened for a moment as the wheels struck an uneven stone.
I saw walls stretching across the distance, pale stone broken by tall watchtowers. Beyond them rose a dense mass of rooftops, chimneys, and narrow spires. Smoke drifted above the buildings, blurring their outlines against the sky. A banner hung from a high stone arch, its unfamiliar emblem shifting in the wind.
The city was larger than I had imagined.
Its outer walls were thick and imposing, built from blocks of weathered stone. Towers stood at intervals along their length, each with narrow windows and dark openings beneath the battlements. Beyond the walls, buildings crowded together in layers, their rooftops forming a jagged landscape that disappeared into the haze.
I couldn't see the Hall of Ledgers.
I couldn't see the streets where the auction would take place, or the people who would gather there, or the strangers who might eventually decide what I was worth.
But I knew they were somewhere inside.
The carriage rolled onward.
My hands were still tied behind my back. The gag was still pressed against my mouth. The ropes had left angry marks around my wrists, and my body ached from the cramped position. I had no weapon, no ally, and no clear plan for what I would do when the carriage stopped.
I had no idea whether I would ever escape.
But I had learned something on the journey.
The world I had awakened in was not merely unfamiliar. It was a place where a person's safety could depend on the whims of strangers, where poverty could be used as a weapon, and where the law might bend for anyone willing to pay the right price.
The bakery had offered warmth, food, and a bed.
The carriage had shown me what those things could cost.
Ahead, the city gates loomed larger with every turn of the wheels. The walls seemed to rise out of the earth itself, separating the road behind me from the streets that waited beyond.
I watched them through the narrow gap, unable to look away.
Somewhere beyond those walls was the place where I would be sold.
Somewhere beyond those walls, my choices would become fewer.
The carriage carried me toward it, steady and indifferent, while the city swallowed the last light of the afternoon.
And I understood, with a certainty that settled deep in my bones, that I was running out of time.