Disclaimer: This was written over 10 years ago, and the author no longer agrees with many of the concepts found in this story. Some of the content will be cringey and/or problematic. Please remember this is entirely fictional and does not represent the author's beliefs.

Twitter: dazzleizzy

Copyright © 2012-2023

TRIGGER WARNING: PHYSICAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL ABUSE PORTRAYED IN THIS CHAPTER.

~~

Zayn's POV

There's a throbbing pain at the base of my skull, and on the side of my temple. Really, that's all I can process as I slowly start getting feeling back to my body.

I still can't open my eyes, but I feel my stomach turning. A second later, I jolt right up, sitting and leaning to the side, throwing up a lot of the alcohol I'd managed to swallow down.

It leaves a putrid taste in my mouth, and I can't stop myself from coughing.

When I bring my hand up to wipe at my mouth, I finally open my eyes and suck in a breath.

"Fuck."

"You weren't supposed to fucking pass out, you bastard." I hear Sebastian's voice come from above me. It almost sounds like he was panicked - his words were rushed.

I try to answer, but end up coughing again, struggling to get up. There was too much alcohol in my system, and it was making my coordination hideously impaired. I could feel on my neck where Sebastian tightly gripped it, his fingers digging into my skin.

When I realize Sebastian has crouched down next to me, I don't stop my arm when it swings at him, my fist colliding with his face.

There's a sickening crunch of the man's nose, and he falls back.

When I finally stand up, I feel dizzy - the world around me was a blur.

Focus, Zayn, focus, I scold myself.

"Fuck you, Malik!" Sebastian cries, bringing his hand up to his now most-probably broken nose.

"Fuck you too," I snap at him. Somehow, passing out had managed to sober me up, just a tiny bit. I was still severely drunk, but I sobered up enough so that I could try and deal with the situation around me. "How'd you find me here?"

When Sebastian stands up, he maintains a good distance from me, and there's a steady stream of blood running down from where he had his nose covered by his hand. "I traced your fucking phone number, dumbass. Got the address, and came here," he explains.

I close the distance between us and push down on his back, bending him over. "Apply pressure to your nose, and keep it bent forward. Don't put your head back unless you want to choke on your own blood," I advise, but anger filters through my words, making them seem hostile.

His eyes widen at my sudden aid, but he quickly does as I say.

"Who let you in?" I ask. I'm going to fucking kill whatever guard decided it was okay to let him in without my permission.

His voice comes out nasally as he's pressing down on his nose to stop the bleeding. "Your brother."

Fucking Caleb. Of course. 

I let out a sigh, "I'm going to kill him."

"I'm going to kill you," Sebastian retorts, but I can't take him seriously because of his hideously nasally voice. It was almost comical, had it not been for the reason why he was here.

I snort, my hands coming up to rub my sore neck. "You know, it was really smart of you to choke the only man who knew where you sister was to death. Kill off the one person with any sort of knowledge."

He glares at me, and I roll my eyes. "Let's go see Liam for your nose. It looks like shit,"

Sebastian only glares at me again, "Who's Liam?"

"The doctor."

He shakes his head. "I'm fine. I don't need your shitty doctor."

"You also don't need a fucking ugly face because your nose is broken, so let's go." I say forcefully and pull open the door of the balcony. I don't wait for him to follow me, because I know for sure that he's not going to let me out of his sight.

When I hear his footsteps behind me, I let out a sigh and bring my hand up to my eye where he'd punched me and make my way to the hospital ward.

--

There's a prominent frown on Liam's face as he takes the two of us in, and confusion in his eyes. Danielle is seated next to him in one of the chairs behind the nurses' desk, working on paperwork. Both look taken back by our sudden appearance.

I push Sebastian in front of me, towards Liam's direction. "I broke his nose."

The frown on his face only grows deeper, and he shakes his head. "Okay, Danielle, can you take...him to one of the rooms? I'll be in there in a minute to examine it."

Danielle quickly stands up and rushes off the help Sebastian, and then Liam turns to me. "What happened? And who's that? And Sir, your eye!"

I groan, "I punched him in the nose; he's..." I pause, not wanting to say her name. I don't want to think of her. I don't want to remember.

"Who?"

"Sebastian," I say slowly. "He's her brother."

A look of understanding crosses over his face, and I know that he's aware of who I'm talking about. "Oh. How does he know to come here?"

I shrug my shoulders, lying. "Beats me. And why is Danielle here?"

Liam sighs, and there's a sudden sadness in his eyes. "I need help in the hospital. So I decided I could train her to be my nurse, since Harry's gone."

The mention of the traitor's name send my blood rushing, boiling, and I see red. I can barely contain my anger, but I manage to hold myself and exhale in order to calm myself. "Did you know about this?"

Liam takes a step towards the direction Danielle had taken Sebastian, but pauses to answer me. "What, about Harry leaving, and taking her with him?"

I nod slowly, trying to ignore the quickly growing aching pain in my chest. "Yes."

He shakes his head slowly, and lets out a melancholic sigh. "He never said a word. I thought he was acting weird a few days before, but he didn't mention anything. I thought at least he would have said some form of goodbye, but nothing."

I nod my head solemnly, and close my eyes. "Okay. How'd you find out, though?"

"Word gets around quick in the mansion, Sir." Liam answers quietly.

Sighing, I nod slowly, and bite the inside of my cheek. "Yeah, it does, doesn't it?"

He nods. "Yeah. Sir, come with me. You need ice on that black eye."

Groaning, I look at him. "Is it that bad?"

He doesn't reply, walking off down the hallway, leaving me no choice but to follow him.

--

"Periorbital hematoma," Liam says calmly. "best way to help it heal is with time and ice."

"English, Liam."

He lets out a chuckle, handing me an ice pack. When I press it up to my bruised eye, Liam finally answers. "A shiner. A black eye. Is that English enough for you? Or should I try Arabic? Urdu? You do understand both, right?"

I hiss when I press the ice pack to my eye - it's fucking cold. "No, I only understand Urdu. I can read Arabic, though. But you don't know either, so shut up and use English."

He chuckles again, shaking his head. "How much have you had to drink? You reek of alcohol."

I flick him off, standing up from the patient table. "Don't you have Sebastian to go and worry about? Fuck off."

It only makes him laugh harder, and he nods, and shuts off the light of the small room we were in as we stepped out. "Yeah, you're right. I hope you didn't do too much damage to the poor man."

I'm about to inform him on how he almost choked me to death to defend my actions, but then decide against it and remain silent as we walk down to the room where Sebastian was.

--

"Well, it's not terrible." Liam concludes. I stand against the wall of the room, while Liam examines Sebastian, who's sitting on the patient table.

"Thank you Danielle. That's all I'll need from you right now - you can go finish the paperwork." Liam says to Danielle, who nods and quickly makes her way out of the room.

I cross my arms, watching Liam work.

"The nasal septum hasn't deviated, so it doesn't need reduction or surgery. You should be fine, since Dani got your nose to stop bleeding. Just apply the ice, and I'll give you some painkillers as well to deal with the pain. Also, keep your head elevated when you sleep."

When Liam hands him the ice pack and painkillers, I realized that both of us looked like idiots with these ice packs to our bruised faces.

I half-laugh, half-scoff at the situation we were in, and I can see Sebastian raise his eyebrow at my random outburst.

When Liam's finally done with us both, I motion for Sebastian to follow me. "Thank you, Liam. I'll talk to you tomorrow, yeah? Get some rest - it's getting late."

The doctor nods appreciatively. "It's almost ten; I'll be going to bed soon. No problem, but next time, the both of you need to communicate without getting physical. Please," he adds more softly.

"Not guaranteeing anything," I reply, "but I'll try?"

Liam smiles, shaking his head. "I wasn't expecting you to, anyways,"

--

"So where is she, you maniac?" Sebastian asks, sitting down and adjusting the ice pack that he was holding to his nose. Although his words are hostile, his tone was not. It was as if the choking me until I passed out, and punching me in the eye had subdued some of his anger towards me.

I had taken him back to one of the small conference rooms, except this time, there was no conference table or chairs. Those had been cleared away to make the room almost like a small living room, with couches and sofas and lamps and a coffee table in the middle.

I shake my head, "you tried to murder me. The one person who actually knew something about your sister. You're not very bright, are you?" I say sarcastically. Somehow, I feel as if I've sobered up for the most part, but I don't understand how or why. With the amount of alcohol I'd consumed, I should have passed out when Sebastian deprived me of oxygen, and stayed out until tomorrow morning.

Perhaps I was developing a tolerance to it all, from all the drinking I've been doing lately.

Sebastian's eyes narrow. "Knew?"

I move my head up and down in a solemn nod.

"What do you mean, 'knew'?" There's a new edge to his voice.

Sighing, and tensing, I realize that I have to tell him. I had no other choice.

I exhale slowly, trying to calm my nerves and speak through the pain. "She was here. With me."

"Was," Sebastian states dumbly. "Past tense?"

I nod slowly. "She came here back in September. She was brought back by one of my Traffickers."

I can see his hands ball up into fists, and his jaw clenches. "You didn't do anything to her, did you?"

I know what he's implying, so I shake my head slowly. "No, I didn't touch her."

He looks up at me incredulously. "You didn't use her?"

Once again, I shake my head solemnly. Bringing up the subject of Abigail is like someone had not only stabbed me, but was moving the knife around and slicing though my insides. It wasn't just one hit - one jolt of pain; it was continuous, chronic, and never ending. "No."

He inhales sharply, surprised by my answer. "Are you serious? Why? Don't all slave Owners use their-"

"I'm not like that." I say quietly.

The expression on Sebastian's face changes, and there's something behind his eyes that I can't distinguish. I don't bother trying to figure out what it was, anyways.

I just feel tired.

Worn out.

Betrayed.

"Okay, so where is she now?" Sebastian asks. "Is she here at the mansion? Do you have other slaves? How does she live here?"

I let out a defeated sigh, "I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?" His voice rises.

"I mean exactly what I said," I repeat, slower this time. "I don't know where she is."

"Liar!" He rages all of a sudden, standing up from the sofa he sat on. "Where the fuck is she?"

My words can't come out any more defeated than they do now. I'm done, I'm finished, and I can't anymore. The weight of my own words come crashing down on me, ten times harder now that I have admitted it out loud. "She's gone. She ran away."

There's a deafening silence all around us, until Sebastian takes in a sharp breath.

--

Perrie's POV

Zayn hadn't showed up to breakfast, or lunch, or now, even dinner. Apparently, he's super angry, and upset, because Niall is ruthless on the rest of us lower slaves. He's making sure we're all doing our regular work plus more.

His excuse was that Zayn was already angry at Harry and Abigail, and that we shouldn't do anything to piss him off further.

But I knew better - he was just afraid of the consequences he had to face - so he was taking out his fear on us.

He stopped by occasionally, checking up on our progress in the kitchens, the laundry rooms, and other work, and then disappeared for a long period of time.

Funny thing was, was that I never saw Amber today.

I wonder how she'd feel about knowing what had happened when Niall attacked me.

I came to the decision that I was not going to tell her. I didn't want to ruin what was between the two - since they both seemed truly in love with each other. But I would confront Niall about it - he was going to have to tell her, in his own way. She had to know - it was unfair to Amber if she didn't.

And in a weird, crazy way, I kind of felt...bad for Zayn. For losing Abby.

I know I've hated her for the longest time, but I was only blinded by my own jealousy to see that Zayn was so into her - like nothing I've ever seen him like before, considering I was one of his first few slaves.

And he held this sort of respect for her - this reverence and awe.

But now, she was gone.

He had to be crushed.

And my heart hurt for him.

As for Harry - I did not know what to think. I didn't know how to feel. I couldn't get Jillian's words out of my head - they rang over and over again, like a bell.

As I'm sweeping the interior of the kitchen, my thoughts flash back several years ago, to when I met Harry.

--

My stomach growled - I couldn't even remember the last time I had a proper meal. Or snack. Or anything, really.

I should be used to feeling starving by now, but I still don't feel accustomed to it. No matter how long I remained hungry, I never got used to the pain of emptiness in my stomach.

A cold metal anklet was clasped just above my right foot, and a metal handcuff was placed around my right wrist. I was down to just bones, so much that I could just almost slip off the handcuff. Just almost. There was a long iron chain connecting the two, keeping just enough length so that I could walk - but made running impossible.

And even if the metal chain didn't keep me from running, I wouldn't have been able to, anyways. I could just barely walk, limping from repeated punishments I'd endured from my ruthless slave Owner. I'd been whipped, beaten, starved, violated, and forced to have sex with people against my will. Repeatedly.

I should be used to this by now, I keep telling myself, but I'm not.

The chain connected between the two cuffs - one on my leg, and the other on my arm -  made me stand out as a slave, as one who was less than worthy, less than human as I made my way to the black market like I'd been instructed to by my Owner.

I was to pick up an order for him, and to return immediately. Because of how secretive he warned me to be, I assumed I would be picking up drugs.

I considered running away as I made my way there, but there was no way I could get rid of the GPS handcuffs, so I was stuck picking up the package and making my way back to the hell-hole.

Using the description of the man I was given, I looked for the person Master had said would give me the package I was supposed to pick up. Once I found him, I made may way to the lanky old man that looked too old to be alive.

I didn't say anything to him, keeping my head low as I passed the sheet of paper over to him.

The man took the paper from me, glanced at it, and nodded. He walked behind the booth he had set up - one that had on display fake jewelry as a disguise to what he was actually selling - and came back with a closed cardboard box.

I took the box into my hands, and turned away, still not making eye contact with the man I'd just gotten the drugs from. I needed to get back to the hell-hole, and quick, or I'd be beaten again.

But there was only one perk to going out to retrieve things for Master, even though it was impossible to run away. I could actually get some food.

And although I didn't have any money - I could easily trade a minuscule amount of the drugs I had for a piece of bread. Master wouldn't notice - it's only a small amount.

Rushing as fast as I could without hurting myself to a booth where an old lady sold food, I quickly looked at her for help.

"Do you have any food left?" I asked quickly, my voice low, hoarse, and unsteady. It was the end of the day, and most of everyone were picking up and putting away the things they sold.

If I found any food right now, I'd be lucky.

"That's the last piece of bread I have, hun." She motions to the small roll that sat abandoned on the table. It looked old, and stale, but it was food.

I had no other choice.

My hand reached out to grab the roll, but it was too late. Someone's hand had already closed over the roll, and I looked over to see who had taken probably the only food I'd get to eat this week, until Master sent me out again.

"How much?" his gravelly voice asked the woman nonchalantly, not even giving me a second look.

"Hey!" I protested. "That was my food."

When he turns to me, his jade green irises glare at me. "You're not the only one who's hungry, and I got it first."

I turn to the lady, "Ma'am, please, I asked for it first-"

The woman shrugs. "Whoever pays me more can have it. I don't care."

"I have cocaine," I state immediately, showing her the box in my hands, and the woman raises an eyebrow at me.

"Do I look like a crackhead to you? I want money, not your coke."

The man, who's taken my one shot at food, shoots me a smug smile, and shakes his head. "Maybe you should bring actual money next time, babe."

I glare at him, and turn away.

My stomach rumbles again furiously, and the empty feeling feels worse than ever.

I don't realize that a few tears had escaped and were now running down my face, but it didn't matter. I had to go back - I had to head back before I got in trouble for being late.

As I take a few pained steps away from the booth, I feel a hand close around my arm, pulling me back.

My blood runs cold, until I realize that it's the same man who's taken my food. When I look up at him, he looks shocked at his actions - almost as if he didn't mean to grab me - and I don't understand.

"Take it." A hand extends, the bread roll offered up to me.

I hesitate, unsure of what his motives were. "I can't."

"No, you can. I'm sorry. I've just had a shit day, and I'm starving, but you're literally a bag of bones. Take the food." He pushes.

When I bring