Slave to the Empire (Historical Erotic Romance Novella Book 1) by Lilly Fey Page A

she yelped and yanked her hand back like she had been burnt. Upon further inspection she realized her hand just landed in what was supposed to be food.  She thought. She hoped.
    Hoping that the person who just gave her food might still be outside her door, she yelled again, “Hello! Please, are you still out there? Please, help me! Please open the door! Please!”  She heard her pleading becoming more frantic.  She was then startled by a loud bang on the door.
    “Shut up in there! Keep your mouth shut! No one is going to help you, so shut it,” a loud gruff voice from the other side of the door yelled back.
    Lucilla was taken aback by that response and pulled back from the door. She was in a state of shock by the person’s coldness and confused that they didn’t care that she was so scared.
    “Please…someone… help…” she whispered quietly, but only to herself.  Lucilla was beginning to realize that no help was coming and things were probably going to be getting a lot worse.
    Up until this point, Lucilla had mostly felt shock and fea r, but now the gravity of her situation and the powerlessness she felt all came rushing to her at once. Hot tears began streaming down her cheeks.  She couldn’t help it and she didn’t see the harm in it.  She felt a few large drops land on her bare arms.  She was scared. She was confused. She was hungry and she was fairly certain that something really bad was going to happen to her.  But out of all the emotions she was feeling, she felt confusion the most. 
    Why would anyone do this to her? She did nothing wrong to anyone.  She was just a simple person who lived a simple life while trying to support herself and her sick mother.
    Instantly her thoughts moved to her mother.  Who was going to take care of her mother? Who was going to tell her that she had gone missing in the market? Did anyone even notice? Then she realized these were the least of her concerns right now.  She had bigger issues to deal with.
    Always the practical person, she decided to inspect the food they threw into her cell.  She wasn’t entirely sure how long she had been in the cell, but her stomach was telling her that she had missed at least a few meals.  She crawled her way back to the middle of the room and tried to feel for the plate of slime that she fell into a little bit ago, but found a metal pale instead.  She quickly realized the pale was something to be used later, after she consumed the slime.
    “Great, they are a thoughtful bunch, aren’t they?” she yelled out at the door, hoping to be heard by someone.
    The plate of food was only a few feet away from the pale and after a somewhat general inspection in the dark, Lucilla deemed the food to be edible enough.  After she finished the food, she quickly retreated back to her corner.  Her mind was reeling with questions, but ultimately she came to the conclusion that if they wanted her dead they wouldn’t have given her food.  That brought her a very tiny bit of comfort.  And with that, her exhausted mind finally forced her to doze off to sleep.
    It wasn’t until several hours later that Lucilla was startled awake by a harsh kick to the leg.
    “Ge t up, girl.”
    Once Lucilla remembered where she was, she instantly scurried further into her corner.  She only saw a large shadowy figure looming over her, but couldn’t make anything else out.  The light from the open door offered no help.
    “I said, get up!” The figure then grabbed her by her neck and hair and dragged her to her feet.  Her legs were asleep from not being able to walk while in the cell, so she instantly fell back to the ground.  Unfortunately, the man still had a hold of her hair.  She screamed from the pain and thrashed at him out of instinct.
    “Oh! We got us a little temper, do we?” he laughed. “Well, that will get taken care of soon enough.”
    Lucilla blinked back the tears in her eyes from the pain. “Who are you? What do you want from