Nikos

Finally, when I walked a little bit more, I saw the sea. It meant that my home wasn’t that far from me!

The sea! I got closer to the coast, for me to breathe in the fresh air. I thought it would put me in good heart.

Suddenly, I heard two voices. Men’s voices. They were speaking the language that I couldn’t understand in any way. The Turks…!

I hid behind the tree standing on the beach. The men didn’t see me. They were coming closer to the tree and talking loudly. Judging by their voices, they were quite young. I looked out from the tree. The men were soldiers – they were wearing the uniform and boots.

One of them began heehawing, the other one following his example. Were they drunk…? If they were, I would better not betray myself and wait for them to go away.

But the matter was that they didn’t want to go away. They sat by my tree and started a fire. I couldn’t wait for the moment I’d go for the whole night!

I was afraid.

Maybe, they would fall asleep sooner or later?

I hoped so. Anyway, now, it was definitely not time to spread panic inside myself!

Could I run away so that the men wouldn’t catch sight of me? I still had to go along the beach to reach my home! My relatives were waiting for me!

I had to make an effort and try to escape. So, I already took the first step when I… tripped over the root that was sticking out of the ground and fell down.

Both the men turned their heads.

“Bah!” said the first man in Greek. “Who’s that? Look who’s here!”

“It’s a little girl!” the other man grinned. “She’s appeared here not in vain. We can do something with her.”

“Yes! What a pretty one!” the first man stood up and started approaching. I was still lying down. I had to get up as fast as I could and run away.

I began raising myself onto my knees and elbows. But it was already late. The first man came up to me and seized me by the arm.

“Here you are, pretty girl,” he broke into a grin. “You’ll come with us!”

“No!” I shouted and tried to free myself out of his grasp. The man was holding me tightly. “What do you need from me?”

“What do we need from you?” he broke into laughter. “A lot of things, my pretty young girl. A lot of things.”

I hoped that they wouldn’t do something they meant to.

Then, the first man picked me up in his arms. I squirmed, trying to free myself.

“Calm down, little girl! You’ll go with us!”

What? I wanted to go home! I wanted to be with Mummy!

Why did I go away in the afternoon? I could have got back home as soon as I took the goats into the shed!

“I won’t go with you! You’re bad!” I cried.

The two men laughed even more.

“And what? We’re bad, but you’re pretty! We could keep you an amazing company, my dear!” a nasty smile appeared on the other man’s face.

I was scared. I didn’t know what to do.

“Well, my beauty,” the first man smirked, “we’ll give you a lot of pleasure! We’ll take you with us.”

“No-o-o!” I cried louder. “Please, let me go! I want to see Mummy! They are looking for me!”

“Who do you want to see? Who’s looking for you?” the second man asked sarcastically and then said: “You won’t see your family anymore! You’ll go with us.” With these words, he turned to his mate and said: “Ramazan, tie her hands! And shut her mouth! We don’t want to be noticed! Quickly! Be quick! Be quick!”

I tried to distract them somehow. I said, “Hey, and don’t you have any relatives?”

Both the men laughed coarsely.

“Of course, we have! But it’s none of your […][7 - The square brackets are used to denote sworn language.] business, you baby doll!”

“But…” I tried to squeeze something out of myself. “But do you want to please them? Don’t you want to make them happy?”

“Well, how to say that?” the second man squinted. “They’ll be happy if we finish off the girl like you! Ramazan! Have her done! And quickly! We can’t waste our time here on this island anymore!”

Ramazan tied some rag around my mouth. At least, I could breathe through my nose.

I tried to call for help, but in vain. There was nobody but us on the beach. Besides, even if I screeched through the rag on my mouth, nothing worked. I only had to put up with my situation.

Then, Ramazan got me on his shoulder and carried me somewhere. His friend followed us.

“Shut up, you […]! We’ve hit the jackpot today!”

“You’re bad! Let me go!” I begged. “Please! Let me go!”

But it seemed like they didn’t even listen to me. I started to think that I would die sooner or later. Die in their hands.

“Are you dumb or what? Can’t you hear us?” Ramazan’s friend said. “We told you to shut up your […]! Ramazan, kick this […] in the muzzle! Someone will finally hear us!”

“But…” Ramazan stuttered, “she’s only a little girl! We’ll just get her to our boss, I think.”

“What boss? Don’t you want to play with her?”

“Well, let’s see. First, we’ll deliver her to Cyprus and then decide what we’ll do next,” Ramazan said. “We can’t waste our time here anymore. And then,” he grinned at me, “we’ll do something with you, little chick.”

What? Cyprus? By what means would they take me there? It was so far away from Rhodes!

I wanted to be with Mum and Dad. They would have protected me from the two villains. My parents wouldn’t have let them treat me like this. What a fool I was! I must have stayed at home that afternoon!

I thought, “What is to become of me? What should I do now?”

I tried to struggle. Ramazan didn’t pay attention to my movements. Suddenly, I was about to fall off Ramazan’s shoulder.