Amanda was finally taken from her room, and she was rudely pushed into a carriage at the front doors of a temple so immense it was breathtaking. She didn't have much time to contemplate the architecture, but wherever she went she saw marble floors, electric lamps illuminating a path full of marks, which looked like geometry to her, marked all over the tile on the walls.
"Where am I?" she asked one of the rude priests. "What are these marks on the walls?"
The boy didn't respond, slapped him hard on the neck. But when she reached the carriage, the other priest smiled and said:
"The marks on the temple are sesh, the language of the gods behind the stargates.
"Why can I read it?" Amanda questioned.
It was as if the priests had heard from her, that she could do magic like a witch. Roughly they threw her into the wagon.
Sweating in a cold sweat as the men closed the bars, Amanda scrambled to the ground, trying to grab the clergyman's hand. Quickly, they backed away as if she were a ferocious animal ready to bite.
"Get me out of here, please," she begged, scared, scared. "I didn't do anything wrong...please.
One of the boys looked at his mate. He looked ready to give in, but his friend slapped him on the back of the head.
"That's charm, boy," said the man who wore an almost transparent tunic on his very tall body. "That's how witches are, they seduce you, then kill you to eat your insides."
"Witch?" Amanda frowned. "I'm not a witch. I'm just an ordinary woman, right? I didn't do anything wrong, and I fell into this place without my meaning..."
"Shut up!" the priest banged a curved sword, like a scythe, against the bars of the cart's cage. "The capital's primer tells us that witches like to pass themselves off as victims.
Amanda felt a vein pop up beside her face.
"I'm not a witch, dammit!", she exclaimed, annoyed. ""I'm not a witch, dammit!" she exclaimed, annoyed. "If I were, I would have turned you into a frog!".
The man took a step back.
"I'm glad you're a puppy, and you don't know how to use your witch powers yet." He chuckled, glaring at her with contempt.
Then he pulled the boy beside her, toward the front of the cart, where Amanda barely glimpsed two huge creatures, which looked like buffaloes with horns in the shape of a W. Creatures she had never seen in her entire life. She was beginning to believe that she had ended up in a parallel universe.
She crawled on the wooden floor of the cart, following the men desperately.
"Wait!", she asked eagerly. "Please, I didn't do anything and I'm not marrying that pig..."
The men ignored her.
"Hey! Please! Listen to me! hey..."
Completely ignored, she heard the buffaloes being whipped and the cart began to move. Fear increased as she realized the cart was moving. Amanda expected that, at any moment, her father would appear dressed in a superhero cape. Someone needed to come save her... Maybe, Rafael... Someone.
But no one came. Amanda stopped protesting a few hours later, she had no idea how much time had passed. She huddled in the back of the cart, hugging her own feet, weeping inconsolably.
As distinct landscapes presented themselves, she saw that strange world through eyes that were blurry with tears. The scenarios towards what she heard from afar being Fila, differed from anything she had ever seen in life. Maybe in a fantasy movie. The place was covered with sand so red it seemed mixed with blood, around it, on a trail that lay behind, there were hundreds of monumental rocks. Some were like canyons, others, she realized as she wiped her eyes, guides.
These monuments that emitted blue lights like lasers towards her, were seen on the horizon as far as the eye could see. They looked like huge obelisks that Amanda had once studied about ancient architecture. Even though she didn't see it right, she noticed that there were inscriptions on those guide stones, in hieroglyphics she could read.
If she wasn't in an unfortunate situation, she would certainly have taken out her cell phone to take pictures. Gabriel certainly wouldn't believe any of this. Even in the giant animals that appeared in the middle of the rock cliffs on all sides. She still found it hard to believe.
However, as fascinating as the scenario was, her heart was stuck on the final destination. She would be made the sex slave of a weird monster that reeked weird. As she trembled with that fate thinking in her head, the cart creaked and the buffalo mooed with every step. That whine of the animal was getting on Amanda's nerves.
The worst of all lucks had happened to him: a painful journey over rough terrain, a headache from the heat, the horrible smell of animals. AND...
... How could she define that? Everyone said that he had come through a stargate. So, she could assume that she had been abducted by, who knows, a transporter like the sci-fi movies Rafael had referred her to two months ago. Whatever it was, Amanda was now on her way to a forced marriage.
Her head was dizzy, as much from the heat and stench, as from the strange sound she heard in the middle of that desert of rocks and sand.
Suddenly, Amanda felt a chill. The noise she thought she heard from fatigue became louder. And again higher and closer.
"Saurians!", exclaimed one of the priests who were driving the cart ahead.
Amanda had no idea what that meant. She realized that there were many different words, although she didn't know how she understood what these people were saying. They felt it wasn't Portuguese, but her understanding was perfectly embedded in their mother tongue.
Curious, she braced herself against the rails of the cart, looking up at the sounds that grew louder. It sounded like the ringing of horn horns.
"Ip, Ip!" The priests drew the reins of their great buffaloes.
Amanda had to hold on, nearly falling when the animals stopped abruptly. Rising, she smoothed her tousled hair, startled to see the priests fleeing.
"Run, Athard!" cried the older monk, adjusting his huge belly as he lifted the skirts of his semi-transparent robe.
Watching him pass toward someplace to hide in the middle of the hard rocks, Amanda realized that she was being abandoned in the unbearable heat, feeling a frightening sense of threat. As if she were in the crosshairs of pairs of eyes of an invisible beast.
"Hey!" she cried. "Get back here! Let me go..."
Suddenly, in the midst of her screams, Amanda couldn't expect everything to get worse. The sound of the horn trumpets rang so close, she felt her ears ring. Beside the wagon she heard the crunch of gravel and approaching screams.
Amanda let a startled squeal slip through, startled. She picked herself back with her heart pounding. Again she was assailed by surprise at seeing creatures, and for a moment she wondered if she wasn't on the set of a movie like those her boyfriend Rafael had recommended for her. She brought her hand up to her face, looking up at a bank of hard, dry stones, noticing the presence of something, a creature.
The girl needed to blink a few times to make sure she saw what she saw. The heat must be causing some kind of heat stroke. But Amanda believed she glimpsed the indistinct figure of... bipedal, lizard-shaped humanoid creatures.
Had fine, brightly colored scales in various hues, from tan brown to green and aquamarine. The cheeks were humanoid, with thin lips, golden eyes streaked with thin iris; noses were like snake slits.
Wore heavy robes, like Bedouins in the desert. Some of their clothes were decorated with ornaments in the shapes of coins and red jewels that sparkled in the strong sunlight.
But Amanda flinched with the swords in her hands as soon as they saw her huddle in the cart. They made signs like soldiers, signaling to be careful.
"Oh dammit, they're reptilians... I really ended up on Mars!" Amanda whispered to herself, scared. Her heart was jumping in her chest.
For a while, no one said anything. They just surrounded the wagon, signaling to be cautious as if they were capturing a circus lion that was being transported from one tarp to another.
Just as a gust of wind came sighing with grains of sand, and the fabric of the clothes on those things stirred and lifted, Amanda was terrified as a creature bigger than the rest pushed others away from her to look at her.
He was a giant-looking lizard man, however, she noticed strands of white hair around his eyebrow and beard. He looked like a stocky humanoid, dressed in leather and thick fabrics patched in a yellowish color. He held a curved sword longer than the others, looking infinitely wilder.
"Ankham." His voice was like the breath of a snake. Amanda felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise. "A zophet as usual."
It approached so quickly she barely had time to react. The sand wind blew a strong scent toward her as he pulled over. A very foul and disgusting odor. She wrinkled her nose.
"I heard a weak ankham was being transported to a wedding." Amazingly, the lizard-thing laughed. His big chest rumbled, moving up and down. "I was immediately very interested. Just asking me, "how much would they pay me for an ankham"?
His henchmen laughed, Amanda didn't want to have noticed how they glowed like dollar signs.
"I think the King of Xisto would pay us all his shale reserves, don't you think, Chief?" said the nearest creature.
"Perhaps Legionnaire Tartarus would honor us with a protection for our merchandise." One of the creatures rested what looked like a huge club on his muscular shoulders. "Deshret's sheikaah are a pain in the ass, and they make our hunting zone difficult.
"No, imagine what Nydra would give us...?"
They were silent, looking at each other. Then they burst out laughing.
Of all the strange things she had seen in her life, Amanda never thought she would hear laughter from lizards that looked like people.
"Then we will leave for Nydra, after notifying Numeera Huppuri." The one who looked like the leader nodded. "Or we can speculate and raise the price for anyone who wants to buy it." After all, she is an Ankham. Her name is worth priceless riches.
"I'm thinking of Nydra's beautiful gems, boss," said the guy with a clava on his shoulders. "But I'm also confused. Is she really that weak? She looks at us and doesn't react. We came armed to the teeth by a frightened child.
His forked tongue licked his snake lips.
"I smell the fear the zophu give off when we take them to the market," sneered.
The boss snorted deep in his throat.
"I think she urinated too," laughed the reptilian with a clava. "Or will she pass out?"
Amanda looked down, feeling her cheeks burn. She felt the dirty cotton fabric of her pajamas, wet between her legs.
"Look how her cheeks turn blue," chuckled one of the lizards.
"Is that an Ankhamret? I'm disappointed".
"We can try to play with her, as a sumilki plays with a samila before devouring him. Maybe she will react".
"I'm tempted," laughed the creature with the clava. "I love challenges".
"One day in the weriasha's labyrinth, and I'll bet her gifts would come out," suggested a rogue-eyed lizard.
— Weriasha! Do I fear one of these?
"You are as blind as Mabala, Araduk. Didn't you even see that weriasha that Esuur brought us last night?
"Oh sure, Esuur always has a mystical creature for us to sell," the thing with the club declared, in a tone of excitement. "He once brought a Dameash, and it killed my brother when he got distracted for a second. But you must know the story of how I took revenge, using my teeth to tear the skin from her jugular, as I felt her blood pulse hot on the blade of my knife buried in her heart.
"You've told us that story ten times, Zuri," laughed the thing that called him Araduk. "But it would be very interesting, seeing our Dameash here, reacting beyond pissing your pants.
They started laughing in unison again.
"One day in the weriasha's labyrinth, and I bet her gifts would come out," suggested a lizard with bulging eyes.
"Weriasha! Do we have one of these?"
"You are as blind as Mabala, Araduk. Didn't you even see that weriasha that Esuur brought us last night?
"Oh, sure, Esuur always has a mythical creature for us to sell," the thing with the clava declared, in a tone of excitement. "He once brought a Dameash, and it killed my brother when he got distracted for a second. But you must know the story of how I took revenge, using my teeth to tear the skin from her jugular, as I felt her blood pulse hot on the blade of my knife buried in her heart.
"You've told us that story ten times, Zuri," laughed the thing that called him Araduk. "But it would be very interesting, seeing our Dameash here, reacting beyond pissing your pants.
They started laughing in unison again.
Those things were dangerous. And the fear she was experiencing now was something surreal. Her body was beyond shaking and paralyzed. For a moment, she thought that was what a rat felt in a snake's mouth. Her senses of self-preservation said she had no chance of escape.
"It doesn't matter." The boss narrowed his eyes at the girl's face, after studying her in silence. Her companions laughed and mocked. "The little girl is ours, and we're going to get money from her." What she does next will not be our problem.
They laughed, agreeing with their boss with a collective acquiescence.
"Escort the merchandise. Let's go to Abraxos."
A long silence. And then:
"Yes," mumbled the other things.
"Yes"
"Yes"
"Yes".
Amanda wanted to answer something, but she couldn't. The words simply curled up on the tip of her tongue like a piece of paper. She wanted to react, however, how could she if her preservation instinct told her to keep still?