You'd think that if you made a mistake once, you won't make it twice. Let's say for example you get caught by human traders and sold to some terrible people who consider themselves gods, the tenryuubito for short. Next, imagine you actually managed to escape. A rational thinking human being would've been careful not to get caught again, but I guess I couldn't think rationally at the time. But yes, I got caught again. AGAIN. I heard them talk about a brothel downtown, so I guess that's where I'm going. I think a brothel would be better than the tenryuubito, no chains, only locked rooms at best. This translates to; a lot easier to escape. I looked around me and saw some other girls, they'll probably be sold to the brothel as well. One girl looked about the same age as me, about 15. The rest seemed older, around 18 I'd guess. The girl my age was crying, but I pretended not to see. When escaping it's a lot easier if no strings are attached to the people you're leaving behind. And since I was planning on escaping soon, I'd better not make friends. The older girls don't cry, but I could see a certain sense of hope around them I didn't quite understand, maybe they're planning on escaping too. Maybe the brothel we're being brought too is very easy to escape from. I certainly hope so. Though I don't think any place could keep me locked up forever. The tenryuubito had a lot of security, I was locked inside a room, chained to the floor, with guards almost constantly around. I have to say I'm actually quite proud of my escape success.
Then the car stopped, we'd arrived. We got out of the car and I saw an enormous building in front of me, easily the biggest in this red light district. It's symbol was a crescent moon. We're guided inside the building into a room where a woman was waiting for us. As we walked into the room I observed her, she was dressed in a revealing outfit. Loose, red pants that fell onto her knees, bracelets around her bare feet. A light blue top, which looked more like a bra to me, with a red, open vest on top. On her arms a few more golden bracelets dangled around. She had long black hair, tied back into a high ponytail, that matched her eyes, which were just as black. Her skin was darker than mine, though I wouldn't call her black. I looked down as soon as she prepared to speak.
"Hello everyone, my name is Mai."
I don't show any sign of hearing her, I just keep looking down, make no noise. One of the men who brought us here coughs deliberately.
"Ah yes, the matter of money." Mai takes an envelope out of a place I didn't think she could hide anything and hands it to the men. "These ladies will escort you out." She said, pointing at two other women wearing revealing clothing. The men take their money and leave.
"Now please look up." Mai said. "All of you." I look around me a little bit and notice I'm the only one holding my head down. Even the girl who's crying has her head held high. So I look up.
While I take a second look at the woman called Mai I see a certain motherly aura around her. Her black eyes look kindly into mine before I avert my gaze. I see her body again and notice that, though she is slender, she is not deprived of anything, she looks healthy. Do all women look like that here? I was used to a more malnourished look with bruises and wounds, actually I myself must look like that right now. I move my hand over my stomach and know my ribs stick out, my skin has this odd yellow color, indicating the lack of food my body has known. I haven't been able to wash my hair in days, so it's color is now far off my normal dark gray-brown. Maybe I could take a bath before I escape, I could use one. Steal some new clothes maybe, hopefully they also kept some less revealing clothing here.
"I know life has been hard for you girls." I hear Mai say, "And I'm not going to say life won't be hard here, it will. But I can promise you this; you'll get a meal three times a day and you'll be able to wash yourselves every other day. If a customer ever beats you, he will be shown the door, we are not that kind of brothel. I hope your life here will be slightly better than the lives you've known so far." I hear the sigh of relief from the other 15 year old girl, those are certainly better conditions than any of us have known so far. However it didn't take away my resolve to escape.
"Now, please follow me for your first bath here, let's get you cleaned up." Mai smiled and we all followed her. While walking around I noticed this building was like a maze. There were windows however, so I remained hopeful. I was also pretty sure there were some secret rooms and maybe hidden ways out. I was good at finding those kind of things, it's how I managed to escape the tenryuubito. I bet they didn't even know about the secret passageway, but they would now. We were then being led into an enormous room, I could see the steam of the hot bath, which was enormous too. Some women were already in there, taking a bath, they laughed while they talked to each other.
"Please hand your clothes to me, you will be given new ones after your bath." A woman who appeared next to Mai said.
"Thank you Diana." Mai said to the woman.
I took my filthy clothes of and handed them to Diana, I wasn't attached to them anyway, in fact I rather hoped I'd never see those clothes again. The older girls were already naked too, handing there old clothes over. But the other girl my age was fidgeting. I guessed she wasn't used to being exposed this way and was embarrassed to take her clothes of in front of all these women. Somewhere I could understand, having been a slave of the tenryuubito I bear their mark on my back. But right now, dignity is the last thing on my mind.
"Is anything the matter?" Mai asked the girl. The girl shook her head. "Please tell me your name." The girl looked up and visibly hesitated for a moment "Jeanne." She said.
"Okay Jeanne, will you tell me what's wrong?"
Jeanne blushed and shook her head, instead she lifted her shirt a little bit, she was severely scarred. I couldn't be completely sure but I thought she had severe burn wounds, the skin around her belly was twisted in a weird way and crumpled. "I see." Mai said "I guess you won't be able to entertain the customers with that but there's something else you can do." Mai then addressed Diana "Take this girl to my chamber immediately after her bath."
"Yes, Mai." Diana answered with a smile.
"Now please take your clothes of Jeanne and join the others in the bath."
Jeanne smiled and did as she was told, I however was skeptical about this 'nice treatment', if you can't entertain a guest in a brothel, than what's there for you to do? I came to two logical conclusions, one; they were going to sell her to some other place. Or two; they were going to kill her. I've seen it happen, if a slave wasn't useful anymore, he was disposed of. Like a horse with a broken leg, Jeanne wouldn't suffer long. However bad I felt for her, I was in no need of someone tagging along on my escape plan, she would only slow me down and we'd probably get caught. Again. No, this time I was going to be careful and smart about it. And it'd work, I was sure.
