Read Online The Bride Price by Karen Jones Delk - Free Book Online

the house.
    Suddenly Bryna’s head reeled with the pain from a brutal blow. Lights danced before her eyes, dimming as she slumped to the ground at the feet of her assailant. No one stirred in the house as the rough Arab nudged the girl with his booted foot, rolling her onto her back to be sure she still breathed. Moving unhurriedly, he sliced a piece of fabric from her pink skirt and secured it to the outside of the gate with a small ornate dagger.
    “Let there be no doubt,” the man muttered grimly. “O’Toole must know Gasim Al Auf has taken his daughter and understand the reason.” Flinging the girl’s limp body over his shoulder, he stole into the night.
    * * *
     
    The injured girl lay very still, not daring to stir. Clenching her teeth, she steeled herself against another wave of bitter bile that burned the back of her throat. She swallowed hard and willed herself not to retch. Moving her head slightly, she gasped as an excruciating pain exploded behind her closed eyes. Lights flickered inside her lids again, now bright and red-tinged.
    “She’s coming around, I think,” Bryna heard a female voice exclaim excitedly. The cultured English accent of the speaker cut through a discordant rise and fall of otherworldly wails whirling around her pounding head.
    She opened her eyes and blearily surveyed the murky darkness of a tiny, windowless room. Groggily she focused on the fragile, blond-haired girl who leaned over her.
    “I say, are you all right?” the British girl asked anxiously.
    “I think so,” Bryna answered hoarsely in English, stirring tentatively on the blanket that shielded her from the hard-packed dirt floor.
    “We’ve been ever so worried about you. You’ve scarcely stirred since they brought you in last night.”
    “Last night? Where am I?” Bryna attempted to sit up but succeeded only in jostling her throbbing head.
    “Slowly, dear, you’ve quite a goose egg,” the other girl warned, pressing her reluctant patient back on a filthy pillow.
    “Who are you?” Bryna asked curiously. Her nurse was young and obviously a gentlewoman, though her patrician face was streaked with dirt and her hair matted and dirty.
    “I am Pamela Hampton-White,” the girl responded, graciously offering her hand. “And like you, I am a captive of the slave trader Nejm Al Anwar.”
    “A slave trader?” Wincing, Bryna lifted herself onto one elbow. “Where are we?”
    “We are still in Tangier, but I do not know for how long.” Pamela’s chin quivered, but she continued bravely, “We are, all of us, to be sold into bondage. Even those poor wretches from among his own people.” She gestured toward the opposite corner of the filthy room.
    Bryna peered through the gloom, where she discerned a huddle of black-clad Arab women who clung to each other, a tragic chorus that lamented its fate loudly. Their voices rose and ebbed, echoing off the high-domed ceiling of the minuscule chamber.
    “We cannot be sold into slavery,” Bryna muttered disbelievingly.
    “Of course we can,” a contemptuous voice disagreed from nearby. “This is Morocco.”
    “May I present Condesa Theresa Delgado, a noblewoman of Spain.” Pamela directed the newcomer’s attention to the source of the voice. Bryna twisted gingerly on her pallet to see another woman in European dress, sitting behind her with her back to the clay brick wall. Theresa nodded disdainfully, her demeanor haughty even under these adverse conditions.
    “Theresa was captured by pirates.”
    ‘“They had the audacity to attack my father’s yacht,” the Spanish girl fumed. “The Conde Tomas Ramone Fernando Delgado, the most powerful man in Ceuta.” The nostrils of her aquiline nose flared with indignation.
    ‘‘Yes, yes, Theresa,” Pamela interrupted soothingly, having heard the story a dozen times. “May I introduce...” She faltered. “I am sorry, what is your name?”
    “Bryna O’Toole.”
    “How do you do, Bryna,” Pamela replied courteously.