Chapter Four

I heard the creaking of wood and the soft voices a damp cloth was gently placed on my forehead.

"How's she doing?" A man asked.

"She should be awake in a little while, sir." A girl answered.

"Thank you." The man shut a door and I could hear his footsteps walking beside us. I slowly opened my eyes. A thick cloth was tightly stretched over the top of what looked like a wagon. It looked like a cross between a covered wagon and a prison wagon. A young woman with long black hair was kneeling beside my head.

"Are you feeling better?" She asked.

"Um, yeah. What happened?" I said up.

"You walked out of the forest. Alician approached you and realized that you were bleeding. Then you collapsed." It must have been that fall in the cave.

"Where are we?"

"We're traveling to the kingdom of Contorce."

"What?" There were so many questions running through my mind. "I'm sort of confused at the moment, but did you say the kingdom of Contorce?"

"I'm sorry if you're headed somewhere else, but we couldn't leave you alone." Another girl said, she must be Alician.

"Oh, no. It's fine. I'm just trying to find my way home."

"Oh, is your husband waiting?" Another girl asked. I looked around. There were ten other women in the wagon.

"No. but...." They gasped.

"How old are you?" One of the younger girls whispered.

"Twenty-three." They gasped again and began to whisper.

"Are you alright?" I asked. The girl who'd been kneeling next to me spoke.

"I don't know where you're from, but here it's odd to find a woman over twenty unmarried."

"Really? From where I'm from it's rather common for women not to marry before their thirties." They gasped again.

"Where are you from?" Alician asked. "Morristown, New Jersey." They looked confused.

"What continent is that from?"

"America?"

"It must be far away, since we've never heard of it. How did you get here? You're in the middle of the Antria continent."

"Well," Should I tell them? Would I be burned at the stake if I told them the truth? "I was visiting some relatives near the ocean and some men came and captured me. They must have drugged me since I don't remember traveling over the land, but I must have escaped and got lost in the woods." Would they believe that?

"That's terrible! Your family must be worried about you." They said.

"We can ask Cap if you can stay with us until we get to the sea."

"Thank you, but I was kind of wondering. Why are you traveling?"

"We're going to be sold as wives." A young blond girl said while blushing.

"What?"

"Yeah, the custom is that once a year all the girls ready to leave home gather in one place and are taken by the traders to be sold as wives. It's a great honor to be taken from your homeland to be sold to another town or even kingdom." A girl to my right said.

"I heard that King Madric was looking for a wife, he's the ruler of the kingdom we're headed to." A girl from the back pipped up.

"Wow, that's amazing." I said. "Usually women and men meet at schools, court for a while, and then marry."

"Women can go to school in your country?" The girl kneeing asked.

"Yes, we learn about science, maths, history, and literature." She stared at me with bright eyes.

"Really? I'd love to visit your country sometime. I would love to learn so many things." Her face fell. "But I would never be able to, when I'm married I won't be able to travel." We chatted for a while, I learned several new things about the world I was in, like how there were four separate kingdoms, Argus, Devus, Exinda, and Contorce. Contorce's king died a few weeks ago and his son just ascended to the throne and was looking for a wife, which is why there were so many traders traveling there.

I learned the name of all the women that I was traveling with. The girl was had taken care of me was Norala. Alician, Corida, Megic, Luran, Dasi, Lunan, Cornia, Lynica, and Manicania were the other girls in the wagon. They ranged in ages fifteen to nineteen. They wore colored coded garments to show how old they were. Pink was fifteen, purple was sixteen, blue seventeen, green eighteen, yellow nineteen, orange was for twenty, and for older was blood red. Usually widowed women who no longer had children wore this and were sold to help other families. Since my other clothes were ruined I wore that, but they gave me a black belt to show that I wasn't for sale. The girls were all treated with respect, but they helped cook meals for the traders and clean their clothes. They told me it would be another two days before we reached the city and I would have to wait a few more before we could leave, plus the days that it took to travel to the sea boarder. I honestly didn't mind, in fact I was enjoying my time with them. They were sparking my imagination for my new book, a genre that I hadn't tried before, usually I wrote dark novels, but maybe I would try a slice of life from a sci-fi world.

While we were in the wagon I told them the stories that I'd written. I make them hold their breaths with anticipation, shriek from fear, and laugh from the comic bits in it. Of course I had to change it for their times, but they still enjoyed listening. Soon we'd reached the city, the sun was beginning to set and it took several tries to find an inn that would take us in. We were expected to go up to the castle tomorrow. It might take several days before Kind Madric chose a wife.

The girls were told to go bathe and they begged me to go with them. I washed their hair with amazing smelling oils, then they all insisted that I also wash up. I hadn't bathed since I left my apartment so I agreed. When my hair dried they all crowed around me. My red hair seemed to be exotic and they all took turns brushing it. I braided their hair into crowns so that it would be wavey tomorrow. We talked while before we feel asleep one by one. I was the last and I didn't feel like sleeping yet, so I opened the window of our room and leaned out of it. The smell of fires dying down made me smile. I could get used to this. Why did I even want to go home anyways? My parents wanted nothing to do with me, I never dated anyone, I had no pets, no friends, only Alan, but he was just my editor, he would get another author and would forget about me eventually. I was accepted here as I was. Maybe, maybe it would be okay if I stayed.