Chapter 2

My father glared at me for a long time. In the end, my mother snatched the knife away.

"This time we'll take you back ourselves. If you can't fix that rotten temper, you can stay there for the rest of your life!"

I sat nearby without speaking.

After we boarded the plane, my mother actually sighed and reached for my hand.

I dodged her.

She froze, then put on that same look of bitter parental concern.

"Clara, I never thought you'd hate us this much.

"You and Claire are our biological daughters. Your father and I only did this because we wanted better for you.

"Jenna lost both her parents. If you two could've gotten along with her, that would've been fine. But you were spoiled from childhood and couldn't stand to have anyone else around."

I gave a smile uglier than crying.

"Did you ever catch Claire and me bullying her? Did you ever have proof?

"You sent us to the mountains to study, but before we even got there, someone knocked us out and sold us to traffickers. We barely escaped and begged you to save us, and you refused!

"Tell me, how were we supposed to take the exams after being abducted?"

My mother looked at me with reproach and said nothing.

My father supplied what she was thinking.

"You'd say anything to frame Jenna.

"Your story is full of holes. If you were really abducted by traffickers, how could someone like you possibly escape?

"Once we send you back, you'll behave. Still lying through your teeth, even now!"

Bitterness spread through me. At last, I asked the question I had never been able to make sense of.

"Why would you rather believe Jenna than your own daughters?"

After I said it, I walked to the emergency exit and put my hand on the handle.

"I'd rather die than go back there."

After Claire and I were abducted, we were sold to a village full of lonely men.

The price of resisting was a beating, stripped bare and whipped with switches.

To protect me, Claire had no choice but to give herself up.

And even when her body was already ruined, Claire still knelt on the ground and bowed her head to them for my sake.

"Please let my sister go. Please don't hurt her anymore.

"She's still little. I'm already like this. Please, just don't touch her, okay?"

Again and again, Claire pressed her forehead to the ground until tiny stones embedded themselves in her skin.

The traffickers didn't spare her.

They didn't go easy on me either.

Claire couldn't survive eventually.

I held on until the police found us during an anti-trafficking operation.

Then I took Claire's ashes and went to the farthest city from home.

The only reason my parents came for me this time was probably to defend Jenna.

"If you force me back there, I'll open this door right now."

I looked at them calmly. In that moment, I truly felt the urge to take them down with me.

After all, the only person in the world who loved me was already gone.

My parents' faces changed in terror, and they immediately had the plane turn back.

From the moment the plane landed, I was back inside that cage.

On the plane, they hadn't dared make a move.

Now that we were home, my father pulled out the bamboo switch without another word.

He pointed at the floor.

"Kneel."