The Devil's Warrior Queen
Chapter 228: Slave Traders

Chapter 228: Slave Traders

Rama looked at Draco with raised eyebrows, questioning him on his silence.

"I can hear the screams too." He blurted out, but he was rather nonchalant about batting an eyelid.

"Let’s check if they need help." She reasoned out.

"They don’t matter, let’s go Rama." He said in a low, cold tone as he extended his hand to her.

Fluttering her lashes, she scoffed, shaking her head before turning around as she moved in the opposite direction, following the trail of the screams without caring to know whether he was behind or not.

"Rama." He called out but she gave no reply as she continued treading into the dark path, with or without him.

With a defeated sigh, he followed her lead, strolling behind in silence. Meanwhile, she was trying to focus on the screams which were slightly a hassle to do since she could hear sounds erupting from within different houses.

Once or twice she took the wrong path while Draco merely followed without the slightest hint of helping.

Turning around in frustration, she glared subtly at him "Are you enjoying my plight?"

"What do you mean love?" He asked with a neutral facade.

"I’m obviously trying to find the location of where the screams are coming from and as you can see, the background noises from the other houses are distracting." She complained with creased brows, not that he wasn’t aware of that anyway.

"Ahh, I see." He simply said in a flat tone.

"Draco." She called with angry eyes as she stood akimbo.

"Yes love." He replied with a charming smile.

"They’re people probably getting hurt, please help me find them, it’s not too much to ask, is it?" She pleaded, her large doe eyes twinkling with plea.

Staring at her for a second, he breathed out a sigh as a smile clawed its way to his red lips "Anything for you love."

Confusion hit her for a split moment on how easily he had agreed to help her, but she didn’t have the luxury of time to ponder too much about it.

"This way." He announced as he took quick strides down a narrow, dark path.

She followed behind him and as they delved deeper, taking turns, they moved through a lone alley with snuffed out torches hanging from poles, sating the quiet air with squeaking noises as they swung back and forth.

The soft screams and cries elevated as they trod down the dark path until Draco finally halted in front of a small wooden door attached to a house. As they arrived, she could hear the screams clearer as they stemmed from beneath the door.

She tensed on what was going on behind the door, her breath hitched as she touched the knob, ready to turn it over but Draco came to stand in front of her instead as he took hold of the door handle.

Turning it over, it refused to budge, indicating that the door was locked. Slamming his foot against the door, with one hard kick, it came crashing down with wood splinters flying in the air.

Entering the dark area, with her heightened senses, she could make out the dark room with nothing of use occupying the room except for the numerous boxes stacked up all over the place.

But when she listened carefully, she could hear the cries stemming loudly. "They’re under us." She breathed out in a low whisper.

Scrutinizing the area keenly, she couldn’t find any entrance that would lead them underground, it was a dead end.

Her observations were disrupted by Draco as he pulled her toward a dark corner of the room concealed with a thick curtain. Pushing the curtain aside, a plain door was revealed to sight.

"How did..." She trailed off, impressed by his keen observative trait.

"Humans are always so predictable." He smirked as he proceeded to slam his foot against the door, but she pulled him back, stopping him.

"Don’t slam the door, you might scare them." Rama suggested.

"They’re already scared." Draco said and before she could say another word, his feet came crashing against the door with a loud thud and she heard the loud whimpers spurring from the people, hearts racing in dread, the stench of fear oozing from pertrified individuals pulverizing the air.

As the door crashed down, a wooden stairs leading to a dimly lit room came to their sight, but Rama’s mouth fell agape and her eys widened in sheer stunner when she saw the people cramming the space.

She gasped in shock as her eyes traveled to the girls with ages ranging approximately from six to eighteen sitting on the cold, damp floor with hands and feet shackled to a chain connected to the wall.

No one needed to tell her what was happening, it was undoubtedly the handwork of slave traders. She had heard about them, but never truly seen and at that moment she realized that there were vile and inhumane cruelty that she never saw until that day.

She froze on the steps of the stairs, staring at the children and teenage girls that had been undoubtedly subjected to abuse and assaults their entire life.

"Rama." Draco called her in that familiar soft voice, snapping her immediately back to reality as she whipped her face in his direction.

"Yes, right sorry. We need to help these girls." She stuttered as she paced down the stairs.

The chains rattled noisily as the girls moved back away from the strange people. She could feel the sense of alarm and terror on their faces, merely imagining what they had gone through at the hands of those vile monsters who called themselves humans.

"It’s alright, we won’t hurt you." Rama said with a low voice as she took slow, steady steps towards the girls.

The girls didn’t seem to believe her words as they trembled with fear, their scared eyes harboring doubts as they exchanged glances with each other.

"We won’t hurt you, I promise." She said with a smile, trying to calm the captives.

Silence waltzed through the air until a girl ranging from ten to twelve spoke up "They told us the same thing and then they hurt us." Her eyes welled up with tears, devoid of a hopeful soul.

"Everyday." She added in a broken whisper.

"We won’t..." Rama was abruptly interrupted by Draco.

"They made their choice to stay, so have a nice night and forget we came here." Draco remarked in a flat tone and an empty smile cutting through his face as he turned to leave, until Rama grabbed him by the arm, making him halt.

"They’re only scared, you have no idea what they’ve been through." Rama whispered while stealing glances at the confused girls.

"Only a fool would overrun their luck like that and refuse help. They have no hope for survival, so let them be." Draco stated with a tepid countenance, but when he narrowed his gaze to the girls and his eyes dropped to a toddler sitting among them, an unfathomable gleam flickered in his eyes.

"Please." Rama pleaded with teary eyes, it pierced a vulnerable core in his heart to see her in such a state.

Smacking his lips, he immediately said "Fine." He growked softly underneath his breath, unable to resist her spellbinding charms.

Marching down the stairs as he approached the shackled girls, he spoke "If you all behave, you’ll be safe. As it is, you have no choice but to come with us and escape this hellhole, now you can either stay or leave." He pointed out.

"We’ll unshackle you now." Draco said and they nodded in silence, they didn’t have a choice anyway other than complying with the strangers who had come to help them.

As soon as they took a step closer to the girls, a gruff voice resonated from behind them "What are you sneaky bastards doing here?!"

Veering around to catch a glimpse of who it was, Rama saw a bulky, middle aged man standing by the doorway, his rigid face etched with a deep scar running from his eyebrows to his mouth which held a cigar.

The girls whimpered and shrieked in fear, thinking there was no escape for them anymore.

"You’ve just walked right into your deaths." The man said as he approached Rama, unsheathing a dagger from its scabbard as he lunged it at Rama. Plunging the dagger down on her, she caught his arm before the blade could graze her flesh, while Draco merely watched with keen interest, not making a move to interrupt her.

The bulky man tried to peel his arm from her grasp, but her grip was unimaginably strong, it wouldn’t budge not even in the slightest.

The man’s calm heart suddenly paced intensely as he looked at her with fear stricken eyes "What are you?" He queried in a low whisper as he watched her jade eyes turn red.

Without replying, she wrung his arm with immense force, his bones snapped in two and it impaled his flesh with blood jetting out of it.

Before the man could open his mouth for a scream to erupt, she moved with an inhumane precision as she clasped his head and twisted it with brute pressure, making his neck snap as his bone pierced through his flesh.

She could hear gasps leaving the girls as they watched her viciously murder the man in front of them, but their heart paces seemed to decrease drastically compared to when the man had arrived.

"You won’t hurt us, right?" A toddler cuddled in an older girl’s arms asked.

Rama turned to face her and crouched down to her level "I won’t, I promise. I hurt only the bad people, right?" She said with an assuring, gentle tone and the girl nodded.