Dust Of Lust

Chapter.1*Owned By The Royals*

The night was memorable, I had just turned eighteen, but it wasn't something I wanted to happen soon. I was born in one of the worker family in this big village called Orsis Valon. The village was under powerful families, known as Royals. These were the rich people who the worker's families worked for. We were basically their slaves.

"We don't have to do this," I said, following my friend Kanika. Her pale skin was covered in beautiful freckles, which were more prominent that night as she had worked under the sun the whole day. Her russet brown hair was tied behind to keep them from coming into her brown eyes, which had a shine of happiness that night.

We had just returned back from a stroll before the guards had started taking rounds. She was just like me, a slave of the royals. My ancestors have been workers too for this one family. This is all we had, this was our entire world. Every family in our village was workers for one of the Royal families. It was a fancy way to call us workers when I knew we were just their slaves.

Our houses resembled small huts with no resources for a better life. We weren’t allowed to furnish or copy the Royals in any aspect not like we had money to do so. We could hardly afford enough to have a meal two times a day. Every log house in the village had the same interior and exterior.

"But it's your birthday," Kanika spoke softly, making sure our voices couldn't be heard around. I didn't mean my birthday, I was more anxious for tomorrow, I was called to the mansion to be hired as their worker. I didn't wanna go, I knew they were harsh and merciless. I have always hated the idea of treating someone wrongly on the basis of how poor one was. I, in no way, shape, or form, thought working was erroneous, but the rules and the way they treated us was something I have always objected behind closed doors.

We had one small leftover of brownie for my birthday, that my mother stole from the kitchen where she was assigned to the kitchen duty. I didn't eat the brownie myself, my two little siblings: Tiara, my six years old sister, and Cica, my nine-year-old brother, did, and they loved it.

Now it was just me and my friend Kanika left outside the hut. We weren't allowed to light fire to keep ourselves warm, instead, we have just one lantern outside for five houses, and then the same rule was followed for the rest of the house in the Orsis Valon.

After midnight, the guards and the examiners, working for the Royal families would start walking around to keep a check on us workers and make sure we are not breaking any rules. The examiners would sneak around and gather information to report it back to the Royals.

We both sat down across from each other on the rocks under the open sky.

I hugged myself in sorrow, deeply thinking about tomorrow. The light brown knee-length dress I wore, failed to keep me warm from the cold breeze as winter was at its rise by the arrival of December. The cold wind played with my open black hair, letting them dance freely on my dark healthy skin.

I haven't worked before, so as compared to others, I was still in good health, with no bruises, no rusty skin so far.

"You will be fine. You are still lucky to be spared till you turned 18." Kanika, with her high pitched voice, stated.

It was a long ago that Madame Noela, the wife of Lord George and the Lady mother of the Hunter Mansion, fulfilled my mother's one wish, which was to spare me till I turn eighteen. I thought my mother should have saved it for Tiara, but she didn't know back then about her pregnancy.

I did feel blessed to be spared till I turned 18 because sadly for other girls, they were forced to work in the kitchen and help around as early as the age of fourteen.

"There are three of them!" I mumbled in my mouth, "Three royal families, the hunters, the lighthouse, and the Knights," I nodded my head very gently.

"Yes! We both are marked by the Hunters," she replied to remind me who we are enslaved by. Basically, whichever royal family marked the log house, the members inside the house were bound to work for them.

"Tell me how it is there," I questioned for the first time. We weren't allowed to talk about them or to say their names aloud with our filthy tongues, those were the rules.

Since I wasn't a worker yet, so whenever they would be on a round of the village to enjoy the beautiful scenery and the sights, I wasn't allowed to leave the hut hence I ended up never seeing them. But now that I was going to be a worker, I was going to see them around pretty often.

"It will work, you'll be fine." her eyes were watery, but her lips were smiling, pretty much everyone's reaction when they talked about those Royal people. We knew the moment the sun comes out, they will begin beating our men and torturing our women but we couldn't do anything about it.

We were the workers and the only pay we got for working so hard was a two times meal in a day, three times if they were pleased, and these huts in the name of homes.

"I heard they are looking for ways to punish us," I stated, I haven't heard it from anyone, but have seen their faces being bruised up all the time. It was another quest how they knew exactly what we are doing even in their absences.

"Look, you just need to be careful and act accordingly when you are around certain people." she said very confidently like she has cracked the biggest mystery, "Madame Noela is strictly by the rules, if you do as she says regardless of a good or a bad deed, then she is all set. Then there is Lord George, you keep that old man's bed warm and you are good, but make sure his wife, Madame Noela doesn't see you or you are dead." She waited for my reaction which was bland since she really thought I would allow any old man to touch me? "They have three kids, the twenty-two years old Prince Luke, who is arrogant and mean, he will make you do a chore twenty times before he calls it quits. Then the youngest one Princess Flora is unpredictable, sometimes sweet and sometimes bitter and even worse." she detailed everything very briefly.

"I heard they have another son, the youngest son." actually, they had four kids, the eldest daughter died, but there was no point in talking about her so I skipped her.

"Prince Warrick?" she waited for my nod, "he is always drunk so you better stay away from him. We can expect anything from a drunk handsome rich guy. " she simply described with no further information about his behavior. But him being drunk all the time was enough to make me resist him. I thought 1902 would bring us some good news, but it has been the same just like all the years prior to that.

"I just don't understand why we can't stand united and fi---" I was about to mumble some of my crazy views when Kelly, my elder sister intervened us.

"Why are you two awake? No one would admire you drooling in the kitchen Kanika." She bitterly spoke to her, making her stand up in a hurry. We didn't even see her coming, she has learned to be extremely sneaky with time.

"I will see you tomorrow." Kanika ran inside her hut after whispering in my ear.

"What were you going to say?" now that we sisters were alone, Kelly groaned, threatening me through her eyes. I got up from the rock and shrugged my dress off dust.

"Why are we bound to be their workers? We are wasting our sweat over what price?" I whispered, knowing well my views would piss her off. Had we worked this much somewhere else, we would have become Royals ourselves.

"Listen, if anyone hears this, our whole family is dead." She wasn't playing, she moved onto me and grabbed my arm to jerk my body awake, "This is our home, just admit we are poor, we are their servants, their slaves, and we are bound to serve them. Don't make things hard for us." she muttered in my ear in anger. She was right, we had no rights. I lowered my head and nodded, that's what we do, we just nod and lower our heads. I feared how I was going to react to these people's atrocious behaviors.

"Now off to sleep." after letting go of my arm, she eyed me madly. We had no other choice but to grab a good sleep and then wake up again to be prepared mentally and physically for a whole day of torture.