I wanted to call out the nas of all the girls, but my lips wouldn’t move, and I felt muted. The truth was that I was scared that if I were to call out their nas, I wouldn’t get a reply. The place wasn’t at all large, so I could already tell with a sinking feeling in my core that none of the girls were there anymore.
“There’s no one here...anymore...” I murmured as I felt tears welling up in my eyes.
What happened to the girls? Where did they all go?
The sight of little dear Sally chained and locked in a cage when she was brought up on the stage at the auction house imdiately ca into my mind. Although I didn’t want to think of that, I couldn’t help but fear that the sa thing might have happened to all the girls that used to live here.
“Mila...” the prince called my na calmly.
“Prince Leonard...Leo...where did all the girls go? Please tell , where did all the girls go? There were so many girls living here...with ...” I asked as I stared up into his face.
I could feel tears swimming in my eyes as my vision beca blurry. The prince made a soft hushing sound before I felt the warmth of his fingers softly stroking the side of my face. As far as I could see, the place didn’t look like it had been abandoned for a long ti. It was still relatively clean, and everything still felt quite familiar to just like the ti that I was still living there.
“Don’t worry. Everyone is safe, Mila,” he told reassuringly.
“Safe? Really? Where is everyone? What happened here?” I asked the first few questions that ca to mind.
“It’s a little bit of a long story. For now, you can rest assure that everyone is safe just like Sally,” the prince said before showing a gentle smile.
I didn’t know what else I could do beside put my trust in the prince that he was telling the truth and that all the girls were indeed safe and sound.
“How did you find out about this place?” I asked in wonder.
“It wasn’t at all that hard when I got so people to look into it,” he replied casually without any further explanations.
“You were looking into this place?” I asked as I started to feel anxious.
Why would he do sothing like that?
“Now that we’re here, why don’t you take on a tour?” he suggested.
Suddenly, I felt like a bad host for not showing my guest around, but I also realized that the prince probably didn’t want to discuss any difficult topics with at the mont. While trying to put my curiosities and worries under control, I smiled at the prince before leading the way.
“This place isn’t big at all so it shouldn’t take long for you to see everything. Well, not that there’s much for you to see...” I said before trailing off softly.
Just walking along the hallway brought back so many mories and I had to admit that I missed the place where I grew up so much. Trying not to think about the orphanage and the girls had been difficult but I had thought that I had gotten over them even if it was just a little. Returning to the orphanage proved that I was quite wrong. All the feelings that I had been holding back ca surging forward and I found it quite hard to hold my tears back. That was one of the reasons why I led the way and walked in front of the prince so that he wouldn’t see the grim look on my face or my teary eyes.
“This is the kitchen and also where we ate our als...” I explained as I gestured into the kitchen with my hand.
The door was opened but the kitchen was quite empty and unused. It was hard to believe that not so long ago this room was the most crowded and lively out of the rooms. All the girls, including myself, would gather to enjoy each other’s company here over our als. Since there wasn’t much food for us to enjoy, we would make up for it with lively chatter. It made us feel like we were really a family because all we had was each other.
“Show your bedroom,” the prince requested.
“Ok...” I replied in a murmur.
The way his blue eyes focused on my face made my heart skip a beat while at the sa ti, he reached for my hand and held it gently in his own. It was still hard for to believe that I was really back here. On top of that, it felt so unbelievable that the prince was here with . The prince truly looked out of place and that was probably because he didn’t belong in a place like this.
“It’s this way...” I murmured softly as I led the way.
I felt excited to see my old bedroom again but at the sa ti I felt nervous showing the prince such a small and shabby room. It was nothing compared to what he was used to at the palace and even the maid quarters felt luxurious when compared to the orphanage. Before the day that I was auctioned off, I had to admit that I thought that no place on earth would make happier than the orphanage despite the dire condition that I was living in.
“It’s...really not much...” I mumbled softly to prepare him for what he was about to see.
“Don’t worry, Mila. I’m just a little curious to see where you grew up,” he replied before showing a reassuring smile.
“Well, Ok...” I mumbled.
The door was unlocked and when I opened the door, I could see that nothing much had changed at all from the day that I left the room. It didn’t seem like another inhabitant had moved into the room after my departure. If anything, the room looked deserted, empty, and very void of life.
--To be continued...
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