Damien and his Brothers apologized for lying to me during Lunch. It had never been their intention to cause me pain; they only wanted to protect me.

“The sadness the breeding caused you was too strong and we feared you would break again,” Christof said solemnly.

“We wanted to protect you.”

I shook my head and picked at my plate absently.

“The truth is important between us,” I told him. “You can’t tell me I’m free and still make all my decisions for me.”

They didn’t understand and I knew the root of their confusion. In their hearts they didn’t believe I was strong enough to be free the way they were. My family still had my position caught somewhere between slave and free, but not entirely either.

E L A ‘s

their mentors had to leave for a time, but Damien had promised to return. He asked the young men to continue to do extra work and gain

them leaked out. They

them some women could be trusted. The boys had been right and the world was not what it seemed. He’d told them if a young woman named “Hannah” or “Kennedy” wanted them to go somewhere, they should go. There was a life beyond these walls and

other things they Liked to have. Those things were packed up to take with us to

in the sleeping area of our

could burn and made me swear to throw it

told them. “Some things must be kept in the family. I would not

not go blabbing about. The family came before everything else. This

pregnancy, but I knew my family had done this out of love. It was a misguided attempt to protect me from the pain of a forced conception. I mourned the larger problem and wrestled internally with how to handle it. They still did not see me as

Damien and his Brothers cared deeply for me. I cared for them, too. I wished that one day we could love one another equally. It seemed that time was a long while

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