Chapter 466: The rogue_Part 1
When Belle opened her eyes again, she was in so much pain, ten times more than she had been when she and Rohan had journeyed to Groovestill to take those souls. Even her eyelids hurt as she tried to force them open, but they refused to move. She was cold, so cold that her body trembled uncontrollably, yet she was sweating at the same time.
Belle drifted in and out of blankness and wakefulness several times, but her fever had taken over, making it impossible to wake fully. Her throat burned when she swallowed, as if pine needles were being plunged down her throat, piercing the walls with each breath. The back of her eyelids felt like hot coals were pressed against them, and her ears rang deep into her brain.
She was burning from a terrible fever that made her begin to hallucinate in her subconsciousness. She recalled the last time she had suffered a fever, her husband had been right there, taking care of her and being as gentle as someone handling a precious treasure. He had kept her warm with his body when she was cold and bathed her when she was hot.
The thought of him brought hot tears to her eyes, and they slid down the corners of her closed eyelids, burning a trail down her cheeks. She felt a hand wipe the tears away and tried to open her eyes to see who it was, but that was impossible.
She didn’t know how long she remained that way, trapped in the haze of pain and fever, but someone was right next to her through it all, pressing something cold against her forehead and cheeks.
At one point, she managed to open her eyes, and her heart leaped at the sight of her man. He was looking down at her with a worried expression, his blue hair disheveled and falling messily over his forehead as he hovered over her. Belle didn’t realize how much she had missed him until that moment.
Her eyes burned with tears, but she forced them back and instead smiled to reassure him that she was fine now. He didn’t have to look so worried and torn. She wanted to say the words, but they refused to leave her dry mouth, so she spoke them in her heart.
I am fine, my love. I did well today in protecting myself... but I miss you and our son so much already. It breaks my heart knowing someone else is living as me in your life... please don’t fall for her, don’t let her fool you, Rohan.
She noticed a look of tenderness settle over his handsome face as he gently began to stroke her hair in that loving way he knew she liked, his fingers massaging her scalp with care and warmth.
"What has happened to you, Isa?" she heard him say softly.
Belle tried to raise her hand to touch him and tell him she was here with him, but her hands refused to move. She was in so much pain she wished it would stop, it only grew worse. So much worse that she cried out at one point and let her walls, her brave front, fall completely.
"I’m in pain, Rohan..." she moaned weakly. "It hurts a lot..."
She wanted to stay awake and keep looking at his face as he rubbed her hair and massaged her scalp, but she slipped back into that blankness that momentarily took the pain away. This time, she welcomed the darkness.
When she came awake again, the fever had gone down, and the pain was less severe. There was someone near her again, pressing something cold to her forehead.
"Rohan..." she breathed his name faintly.
"Stay still, lady, or you’ll reopen the wounds," came a voice she recognized as that woman, Andrea, not the deep, steady voice of her husband. A rush of disappointment stabbed her straight in the chest.
Belle moaned as she forced her eyes open this time around. At first her vision was blurry, until it slowly cleared and focused on the woman hovering over her, applying something cool on her head. She frowned, realizing she was still in the same cell, the dim room lit faintly by the twilight spilling in through the small high window.
"You were talking rubbish in your sleep," grumbled the woman, drawing Belle’s attention back to her. "You kept calling the name Rohan. Your husband, I’m guessing?"
Belle, who was still trying to get a hold of her cloudy mind, heard the woman’s question and slowly managed a faint nod to acknowledge it. Her thoughts were heavy and slow, as if they had to push through fog before reaching her. The smell of rust and dampness assaulted her nose when she finally began to relax, reminding her of where she was.
She was no longer shivering from the cold, but her body was covered in grime and a thin layer of sweat that made her skin sticky and uncomfortable. Her head still throbbed faintly, and she felt weak all over, like she had been beaten and left to rot. She would have given anything for a warm bath and fresh-scented clothes, anything to feel clean and human again.
Her throat tightened as the truth settled in. She was still trapped in this nightmare, and being unconscious hadn’t changed a thing.
"How... how long have I been like this?" she asked hoarsely, her voice rough with thirst.
"Two days," replied the woman. "You were dragged back and dropped into the cell by the guards, and they said you wouldn’t be given any food or water. You had a bad fever, and I had to use the rainwater to help you cool down," Andrea said with a sigh as she moved back to rest against the wall now that the lady was awake.
She hadn’t wanted the lady to die on her, because in this place, when people died, their corpses were left in the cell with their mates until they rotted, and Andrea didn’t think she would be able to handle being with another corpse. The stench and the sight always made her sick.
Belle let Andrea’s words sink in. She had been here for three days then, and Rohan had not yet come, which meant he hadn’t noticed that she wasn’t the one living with him.
Belle’s entire body was in pain, so much that she couldn’t even tell where it came from. But a sudden, overwhelming worry for her baby after all the whipping she had endured made her move her hands to touch her stomach. The moment she tried, the burns and swelling on her wrists made her hiss sharply in pain.
"Your hands are swollen, along with your knees. Try not to move them too much for now," came Andrea’s voice, noticing that her cellmate was attempting to move.
Ignoring the warning, Belle raised her hands to her face and almost gasped at how swollen and red her wrists looked. Yet despite the pain, she lowered her hands back to her stomach. She pressed her trembling fingers against her belly, gently poking the stillness there, desperate to feel even the faintest sign of life of the baby, who unlike her son liked to act dead in her womb.
It took several tries, each one sending sharp pain up her arms, before she finally felt a small, fluttering jab from within. The relief hit her so hard her eyes burned.
’Thank God... you’re fine,’ she thought in relief.
"What came over you that made you do that to Master Kent?" came Andrea’s voice again that pull Belle’s attention to her. "You’ve put that arrogant monster in a sick bed, and he hasn’t come back to the establishment since then. I heard he’s fighting for his life in the physician’s house."
Belle turned to look at Andrea. She had wanted to kill the man, not merely put him in a sick bed. Since she couldn’t send his soul to the land of the dead, she had wanted to end his life and let another reaper come for him. But unfortunately, he hadn’t died.
"He deserved it. Men like that don’t deserve to live and torture others..." She whispered, to watch Andrea agreed but then added,
"Though I like that you’ve put him in a sick bed, once he recovers, he’ll make your life miserable, or even kill you. I’m surprised he hasn’t ordered your head yet," Andrea said in a grim tone as she threw herself down on the cold floor next to Belle.
"Then he has such influence in this place to kill me without the orders of his master?" Belle questioned curiously, wanting to know how deep the water she had gotten herself into truly was, and what would come next for it. Actually, she didn’t regret what she had done, her only regret was missing the right spot that would have sent him straight to the other world.
Andrea nodded. "He does. His father owns this side of the establishment, the breeding house. He was put in charge of it since he was young and grew up being cruel, taking pleasure in disciplining the slaves."
Belle frowned at that piece of information. "I thought a woman owned this place, someone they call Mistress?" she asked.
Andrea scoffed. "Not this establishment. Though, for the past few months, I’ve heard wanderers talking about a mistress, she doesn’t own this one. She only collaborates with Master Kent to run the business, sending some of her pregnant slaves here until they give birth, and then taking them back. I heard she’s as vile as he is."
Belle felt something off about that. So Cordelia didn’t own this place after all. Did she have other intentions by putting her in an establishment that wasn’t hers? The thought made her heart grow heavier with suspicion for the vampiress other plans for her.
"Before you, I shared this cell with another woman, but she was killed because she raised her hand to slap Master Kent on the first day she was brought here. He told her to strip, but she refused and he did it for her but she slapped him," said Andrea to a thoughtful Belle, who looked at her with narrowed eyes.
"For how long have you been here?" Belle questioned the woman who had taken care of her through the fever.
Andrea shrugged, turning to stare up at the black, cobweb-covered ceiling. "I’ve lost count of the years. I was brought here when I was sixteen, and I’m almost twenty-four now, if not older. Once you’re here, you begin to lose count of days and years, because every day is the same."
There was no trace of emotion in her tone, which made Belle believe she had accepted her fate, just like she had advised Belle to do as well.
"How many children have you birthed for the establishment then?" Belle asked quietly, never realizing until now just how dreadful the lives of the women here truly were and what they went through.