Vain (The Seven Deadly, #1)(23)

When we drove the small distance to what looked like a clustered village, droves of little children with dark faces and white teeth came bounding up before the jeep had come to a complete stop.

“Dingane! Dingane!” they all shouted as they raced around to his side of the jeep.

My door was clear of children and I could remove myself easily, but Dingane had a tougher time of it. He began laughing, further bewildering me. When he could free himself, he began shouting in a bizarre tongue. I studied his face and saw perfectly straight, perfectly beautiful teeth shining in the most perfect smile to the crowd of children around him.

That’s when I saw them, noticed what Dingane was trying to prepare me for. Children, all ages, missing arms, eyes, parts of their faces, even legs. I held back my gasp and met Dingane’s eyes. They were warm and full of understanding but for the children only. He looked at me sternly and his eyes conveyed what he wanted me to do.

I looked down on them, half-smiling, trying so very hard to look sincere when all I wanted to do was run and lock myself away from their terribly shocking faces. I had never in my life thought humans could endure such physical damage and survive.

Dingane held his hand out toward me and introduced me to them, finally using a word I recognized: my name.

“Sophie, Sophie, Sophie,” I kept hearing over and over as the children tested my name on their tongues.

“Hello,” I greeted them shyly.

I was overwhelmed and incredibly and most surprisingly sad for them but had no idea what to say or do. They stared at me, smiling, when finally a young boy approached me and touched my clothing. I stood still. This was an invitation to all of them to surround me like they had Dingane and they enveloped me. They pulled on my clothing speaking animatedly in a language I knew nothing about. They forced me to their height where I could fully take them in. One little girl’s right arm was missing below her elbow, another little boy was missing a leg below the knee, another girl had some sort of bandage wrapped around the left side of her face. The injuries went on and on, but they didn’t seem to care or remember they had no arms or legs or faces. They carried on, smoothing my clothing over with their tiny hands or running their fingers over my hair. One little girl told me in English that they all found it to be soft.

I fought tears and tried to keep in mind that if I started bawling in front of the small creatures before me that they would have no idea what it was for.

I was swallowed by children but could still hear a booming man’s voice come from the direction of the largest dwelling on the complex. I say dwelling, but it was far from that. It looked like a large open run-down building made from very old wood.

“Dingane, where is our prisoner?” the man’s voice cracked across the grounds making the children scurry from my side and glue themselves to his. “Yes, yes, you’re all very excited to see our newest member, but let’s all calm ourselves.” I stood. “Now, where is she?”

The man was tall but not as tall as Dingane and he was middle-aged. His salt-and-pepper hair laid flat against his head but was rather full for someone I pegged for being around sixty.

“Ah, our latest victim!” he jested, yet the words still made me more nervous than I already was.

He approached me and threw his arms around me, picking me up in one motion and swinging me playfully from side to side before setting me right again. “You must be the infamous Sophie Price! I’ve heard many things about you, child!” he said in an accent similar to Pemmy’s.

“All good I hope?”

“No, not all good,” he stated honestly, making me blush. I peered Dingane’s direction for his reaction, but his face was stoic. “But that is neither here nor there. It has brought you to us and that is all that matters. Second chances. I’m all about second chances.”

I could tell Charles was the type to find the good in everything. I wasn’t quite settled on whether or not I would like him. I was peculiarly leaning toward liking him and that amazed me. I looked to my left again and noticed Dingane had already started making his way toward whatever fence he claimed needed mending.

“Ah, she’s here!” a female’s soft voice exclaimed.

I looked to my right and noticed a woman with burgundy, shoulder-length hair. She was also in her sixties and she was beautiful. I could tell she was the type of woman who, in her prime, would have had all the boys running around like imbeciles. A kindred spirit.

“Hello!” she said, extending her hand.

I grabbed it and she tossed me into her arms for the kind of hug I’d never once gotten from a woman but was so desperately in need of. It was the kind of hug a mother gave her daughter. I know, I’d seen Sav’s mom give her them many a time.

“It’s so nice to meet you, Sophie!” she sang in a lovely English accent, London if I were to have guessed.

“It’s nice to meet you too, Karina.”

I silently thanked the almost mute Dingane for mention of her name earlier. It would have been so embarrassing not to be able to say her name after such a warm hug.

“I suppose I’ll help Din with that fence then. Let the ladies get acquainted.”

“Yes, yes,” Karina said, shooing Charles with her hand and leading me toward a cluster of buildings just to the left of the main building. She stopped and turned to her left. “Kate! Kate! Please see that all the children wash before bed?”