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“Forbidden fruit?” I splutter. This is ridiculous.
They’re just like that cult.
“You stomped all over his pride and then decided it was a good idea to defile our island as well.”
“I’m saving him from your insane rules,” I hiss back.
Her eyes narrow. “You think we are insane?” She laughs, but it’s not gentle. Or nice. In fact, it sounds more like she’s laughing at me. But then her face turns so serious all of a sudden that it brings goose bumps to my skin. “We are the Vikholm people. We do not fear, as there is only beauty beyond death.”
She gets up from the ground and stands among the other elders, their heads held high, their thorny crowns making me swallow in awe.
“You are from the outside world, where men strike fear into the hearts of women,” she says, all of them looking at me like I’m the evil one. “Here, women make the rules.”
I suck in a breath. “Then you are no better than the outside world. Punishing men, inflicting wounds, just because they removed a piece of metal you put on their bodies.” I spit on the ground in front of me. “Fuck your rules. Soren doesn’t deserve what you did to him. He did the right thing by freeing me.”
She approaches me again and tilts up my head by my chin until it hurts. “Yet you are here … chained, helpless. So what did that freedom bring you?”
Tears well up in my eyes. “I came here to do the right thing and free him from more pain inflicted on him by you.”
“He did that to himself,” she says, sighing as she turns around again.
“You clearly misunderstand, girl. Our men live to serve this community,” the other gentler lady says. “They devote their lives to their calling, whether it is serving us or serving another owner. It is the greatest honor to be dismissed after completing their mission and come back to us.”
“To claim their prize …” the bloodied elder says, and she opens the tarp and shows me the bonfire outside along with the people dancing there. She points at a particular woman, solemnly sitting at a table where she’s rolling yarn into a ball, the look in her eyes mournful.
“What?” I mutter.
What does she want me to see?
“Soren was meant to be hers,” she says.
My eyes widen.
That woman … was she supposed to be with Soren?
That was his prize for bringing me to the cult?
For completing his mission and being dismissed by the House?
The older woman who was here first slams her cane into the ground right in front of my feet, making me jolt back into my corner. “Instead, you defiled him. Took from him what wasn’t yours to take. You ruined him.”
Tears well up in my eyes as she looks down at me.
“You come here to break rules that weren’t meant to be broken. Soren is where he is supposed to be. He accepted his punishment to regain his honor. And you try to destroy his only chance to regain his honor.”
I gasp.
Soren didn’t want me … No wonder he told me I shouldn’t have come. That I should … leave.
“Do you see it now, child?” she murmurs. “Everything is as it should be … without you, Soren would’ve thrived.”
“Stop,” I beg. “Please. I can’t … I … please just let me go. I promise I’ll go away.”
I don’t know what to say anymore, but I have to do something to make her stop.
Maybe I shouldn’t have come. Maybe it would’ve been better for Soren.
But I don’t think they’ll allow me to leave.
She smiles. “You came here uninvited, sneaking into our homes … and now you wish us to stop?” She shakes her head. “You’re not going anywhere.”
Panic entrenches in my heart. “No. You can’t do that.” I look at all the women, but they seem serious. “I’ll call the cops,” I say in a desperate attempt to intimidate them.
But all they do is laugh. “Child, do you honestly think policemen come to this island?” the gentler one says.
The bloodied one steps forward. “No outsiders come here. This is our land.” They come closer and closer until there’s no way I can creep out from their grabby hands. “And what happens here … stays here.”
The oldest stomps her cane onto the ground, and the guard comes back inside to whisk me away. I try to fight him off, but I’m powerless against his strength as he drags me away from the hut and toward another one on the other side of the bonfire. All the people here look at me like I’m a criminal in need of punishment, and I scream out loud to try to capture their attention, to let me free.
Instead, I’m thrown inside, and the door is locked behind me.
I scramble up from the floor and jerk the door handle.
