Chapter Thirty One

Bella

How long had I been here? It was a question I asked only too rarely now, I tried to count visits from him but they were erratic too. He had been true to his word and brought "mama" to see us and that frightened me more than anything he had done thus far. Mama was a girl only a few years older than me but her eyes were dead, as if they had seen too much, suffered too much and had shut down. Her once beautiful long dark hair hang in rats tails, her cheeks were hollow and her skin almost as pale as Jaspers but this was no genetic abnormality. She had been abused and ill treated like Kat and I but for far longer and her swollen belly told me she had been raped by him too. From what Kat had described when she was talking to me it had been an oft repeated violation and now she carried his child but if what Kat had said was true this might not be her first pregnancy because Kat said she had been "all swollen" but the girl could only have been a few months when Kat last saw her if showing at all so maybe she'd already had a baby by him.

I was just thankful he saw me as a daughter and not his wife for the thought of his hands on me, his body pressed against mine, made me feel physically sick. She hadn't spoken just stood there staring blankly as he held her arm and told her what naughty girls we were but how he was teaching us how to behave so he didn't need to go find us again. Had he killed others? Is that why he had to go find more? Kat hadn't mentioned anyone but Sophie but if she were a re-placement then she wouldn't have met her predecessor. I felt chills run down my spine at this thought.

He continued to keep us chained up in this cellar with only the rags to cover ourselves and to keep warm. Kat's dress was now so tight she had to wear it open down the back. She'd changed as he instructed when Sophie visited but as soon as they left Kay retrieved her old dress and wore it again. I swapped my stained and dirt encrusted jeans for a pair of cotton trousers that fitted me at the waist but were so long I had to roll them up and an old sweater with holes in it and sleeves that were too short. It was better than nothing but I was constantly cold and I developed a hacking cough that annoyed him.

"Stop coughing, you sound like an old woman Ellie."

"I cant, I'm cold and sick."

I was indeed running a fever but telling him only got me another beating and this time the buckle end which caught in my flesh where it touched and tore strips from my exposed arms and my neck. I just wished he would knock me out, give me a few hours rest from this hell but he always stopped when I slumped down and started to whimper and I couldn't stop myself so I was left in pain and crying over and over again.

I'd been here a long time and heard no one except him, it was quiet in here and there was nothing to do but try to keep warm. It was getting colder so time must be passing and no one had found me, no one was going to find me, he was clever he'd kept Kat and Sophie for a long time and no one found them so why should I be any different? I stopped fighting because it hurt too much, I was so tired and hungry, thirsty a lot of the time too. My lips were cracked, my skin dirty and sore, my ankles where the chains rubbed had swollen and bled a lot. I started spending my time on my makeshift rag bed trying to remember what it was like outside but that was torture too. I would never see the sun again or feel the rain on my face, the breeze in my hair. I would never breath fresh air or drink ice cold water or hot coffee. My food would always be what others, those outside didn't want and discarded. I belonged here where my mother had died at the hands of the man I depended on to live. Kat now didn't talk at all, not even to him unless he addressed her directly, she was like a little mouse curled up hugging Elspeth to her chest and singing little songs although I couldn't hear the words.

My life outside had become a dream, a fantasy, and my lover Jasper someone from a story book. I had no life outside or someone would come looking for me and they didn't, not even my dad Charlie. Why hadn't he come looking for me? Because no one cared, no one was coming for me, I was all alone here. I drank when he brought us water, I ate what he threw to me and over time I looked forward to him coming only to find most of the time it was to hurt me and nor bring anything. What would happen if he stopped coming? If I made him so mad he just left us locked in here? It became my worst nightmare being left so I tried to do exactly what he said and hoped he would keep coming because I didn't want to die. Maybe I had really done something terrible that I couldn't remember, my head hurt so much of the time maybe I had been wicked. Maybe he was trying to help me, I couldn't remember I just wanted not to hurt all the time and not to be cold and hungry.

Then came the day he rushed in to the cellar and grabbed my arm pulling me to my feet and trying to drag me out of the room Kat screaming in terror,

"Don't leave me here alone daddy please."

He shouted at her to shut up then seemed to come to his senses,

"You Ellie are going to help your mama, the baby's coming."

I had no idea what to do and told him but he just hit me with the back of his hand and then went to get a box he'd brought down with him.

"You get ready. I'll bring mama."

He was bringing her down here to have a baby? Was he out of his mind. I didn't know much but I knew a baby needed clean conditions and medical help.

When he came back I heard Sophie crying out before I saw her and then he came in looking at me,

"Why haven't you put the clean sheet down for your mama to lie on?"

I scrabbled about and found the "clean" sheet which looked anything but and lay it on the floor and he pushed the girl down. She was obviously in great pain and I could see blood running down her legs so I shouted at him for some warm water and clean cloths. He stood as if weighing things then went out and I tried to talk to Sophie but she was beyond talking, her eyes were rolling in her head and her belly rippling with the contractions so I just held her hand and called Kat over.

"Look after mama, talk to her Kat please."

The little girls eyes were wide with fear but she crawled over and took Sophie's hand showing her that she still had Elspeth while I tried to help her but I hadn't a clue what I was supposed to do I didn't even have a little brother or sister so no experience of child birth. By the time he got back I could see the baby's head and did my best to guide it out praying it would be alive. For a minute Sophie continued to scream and then there was a gush of hot blood, far too much, and she slumped back, eyes wide and mouth slack, Sophie was dead. Nothing happened as we waited for the baby to cry. It lay unmoving in my hands and I prayed it would move or cry out while at the same time praying that she might be spared the hell Kat and I had endured because Sophie had given birth to a daughter.