Prologue
Bright lights flash by through the abyss of darkness. The endless road stretches onward, unending, unchanging. I know not how long we have been driving, having been rendered unconscious for most of it. I stare out the front glass trapped between two giant men, both built like warriors. They speak in a foreign tongue. A woman sits in the passenger seat. Her white hair betrayed by the red roots. I know of her, we all did back home. Kaunaz Eiwaz, Fire death, known as such due to the color of her hair and the way death follows wherever she went in the three months she stayed in the village. A man is driving. He is the darkest man I have ever seen, with skin the color of fertile earth. He looks at me through the rear facing mirror and smiles. I do not smile back. I see no point in doing so, these are my captors. My hands bound in some strange metal contraption, they hurt when I move. The blonde man to my left says something to Fire Death. I do not understand, but the way the earth man glances at me with a strange look in his eyes tells me it is about me. I debate asking why I am here, but I know only Fire Death could understand, and I know she does not speak my language well. The dark haired man next to me moves, his right arm coming over my shoulders to rest on the back of the seat. I flinch at the movement then look down, thankful that my hair covers the fear and shame on my face.
The beast makes a turn down a bumpy path, I bounce as much as I am able given the two giants who are next to me. The sun begins to set and I wonder if it means making camp like the hunters would at home. It does not. The earthman brings large jugs out of the back and fills the beast with fuel. I know that this means no stopping in the near future.
I wonder what they want from me. I am just a girl in the village. I am not one to be stolen, I have no wealth, nor a family name of whom wealth could be gathered. I fear I may not like the answer.
The dark haired man looks at me and with his left-hand turns my chin up and to the right to look at him. His hand is cold and unyielding, made of what seems to be the same metal that binds my wrists and feet. There is a sorrow in his eyes. He gestures and mimics eating and drinking. I refuse. The man chuckles under his breath before removing his hand to pull something out of his pocket. A black beaded bracelet is placed around my wrist. I shake but remain silent and still. He speaks again but the runes of what he says glow above the bracelet allowing me to read.
"This is a translator, I speak into my bracelet and it appears in yours and vice vera. Thus we may communicate. Now, you need not fear us, we will not harm you," I read, though I do not believe a word. "Do you need to relieve yourself?" I shake my head in the negative.
When they took me it was Ostara, on which we fast for three days in preparation for the feast. I have no food or drink in my stomach. We are given water in the morning, but they took me mid-afternoon, nearly an hour before the sun falls.
"Are you hungry? Thirsty?" The man asks. I turn from the floating words and look at him with skepticism in my eyes. Surely this is a test, to see if I would willingly eat or drink, thus they may give me poison later. I shake my head in the negative despite the pain and growing weight of my head, and the growling of my stomach.
"I know you are, you needn’t lie to me,"
I look back at him, and for the first time, I speak. "I will not allow you to poison me through food or drink," I speak in my native tongue into the bracelet. The man’s matching bracelet translating my speech into a language he understands. He laughs out loud, causing the others to look at him in wonder. He speaks to them, I assume he is repeating what was said because the earth man laughs while the blond man and Fire Death look at me with respect in their faces.
Fire Death speaks to the dark haired man and he nods. He opens a bar of some kind and bites into it, chewing then swallowing, he then offers me the rest of the bar. Still wary I take the bar and sniff it. I can smell no hint of belladonna or other poisons, thus I take a nibble. The taste is nothing strange, just nuts and honey and a fruit of some kind. I quickly eat the rest of the dry bar. He and I repeat these actions with a clear crinkly jar of water.
The dark haired one nods at me and smiles. I can tell he is proud that I ate and drank. It is with that I fear that instead of death awaiting me as I had thought, a worse fate is to befall me.
I turn away from him and soon the car moves again this time with the blond man driving, and earth man on the other side of me. He is not as big as blond man, thus there is more room.
We turn around and travel once again down the endless paved path, with each mile crossed, dread fills my stomach, and prayers fill my head.