What had she been subjected to? How was this done? But worse, why was this considered normal? Why did seeing someone so brutally scarred not shock me?

Then I thought back to her words, as anxiety once again tried to hold me in its clutches. Drugs? The drugs? Opening my mouth, I whispered, “Drugs? You said … drugs?”

After a brief pause, the chiri replied, “Yes, miss.”

“Please,” I asked. “Explain. I … I find myself confused. My mind is a jumble of thoughts. I can’t pin anything down.”

The chiri paled. She shook her head. “I am not authorized to speak of such things. I’ve been sent to care for you, nothing more.”

“Please,” I begged. “Why am I here? How am I here? I need something to make sense.” My head pounded as I grew silent.

It was several seconds before the chiri replied. “You were with Mistress Arziani for a long time. You were not in the Blood Pit. But Master called you back. So you returned. That’s as much as I know.”

I closed my eyes, trying to remember something, anything, but nothing was there. “I don’t remember,” I whispered.

“The drugs,” the chiri repeated. Opening my eyes, I waited for her to explain. After rolling her lips together nervously, she said, “You were on the monebi drug. You have been subjected to it for years. When Master called you home, he ordered you be taken off it and instead put onto the High Mona formula.”

“Why?”

“I do not know why, miss. I was simply brought in as your chiri. I have been assigned to your care while you are High Mona. Every High Mona is assisted. It’s part of your privileges.”

A million questions clogged my fuzzy mind, but I picked out one to ask. “High Mona?” I shook my head slightly. “Can you explain? I don’t understand? What is a High Mona?”

The chiri looked up and with a deep breath stated, “Miss, you are Master’s new personal consort. You have been elevated to be his. And only his. You are no longer the property of other males, as you were before.”

All of the blood drained from my face as her words reached my ears. Releasing her arms, I stared down at my hands and saw them shaking. I searched my mind for why the news that I was Master’s High Mona was a bad thing, but I couldn’t remember. It was as though a high wall shielded my past from my mind’s eye. Obscuring the answers to the many questions I had.

“Why am I shaking?” I asked nervously. “Why does this cause me to feel fear?” I clenched my hands together into fists, gritting my teeth through the aching pain. My eyes then scanned the room, at the luxury and the opulence. Nothing looked familiar. Instinctively, I just knew that I did not belong.

As that thought passed through my mind, another took its place. I felt the soft bed beneath me, breathed in the clean fragrant air, and asked, “If I am the new High Mona, what happened to the last?”

The air seemed to fill with tension. As I glanced up to the chiri, I pushed, “Tell me.”

“She was killed, miss.”

My heart dropped. “How?”

“I do not know, miss. She was disobedient. I don’t know how or why, but Master put her to death. Publicly. In the pit.”

“The pit?”

“The pit is where Master’s fighters have their matches, miss.”

Lifting my hand to my head, I gripped my hair. “I don’t remember anything. Yet everything seems so familiar, if that makes any sense at all. It’s like I hold the answers to all of my questions, but they are lost somewhere in my mind and I can’t access them.”

“You will remember them again, someday,” the chiri informed. “The new High Mona drug you have been put on brings with it a clarity you were missing on the Type B drug. It takes awhile, but hopefully sooner rather than later you will remember things that seem out of reach now. The weaker drug is a better drug to be on, miss. Believe me. It shields you from pregnancy, yet it still gives you the need to be taken for Master’s benefit. Though it will not hurt you and drive you insane like before. Master likes his High Monas to be aware of his touch. He likes you to be aware of him at all times. He wants you to feel every single second of being with him. He wants you to remember exactly who you are servicing.”

“How do you know this?” I asked.

The chiri paused nervously, then said, “It is common knowledge among the slaves, miss. Master does not hide much.”

Freeing my hair from my hands, I let them drop as fear began climbing back up my spine. Fear of being the solo consort to Master. A male I had no conscious memory of, but a male that my mind told me I already knew. Well.

Silence filled the room, then I asked, “Why me? Why have I been chosen? Has Master … taken me before? I feel like he may have. I feel like he has touched me before now.”

The chiri’s shoulders stiffened, but she eventually whispered, “Yes, miss. He was the only male servicing you here in the first few weeks when the monebi drug still held you in its grasp. Since your initial need for his release calmed, he has been eagerly waiting for you to wake fully, with a clear mind.” Her eyes flitted to mine, then quickly looked away.

“What?” I asked with dread. The chiri didn’t add anything, so I shook her arm and pushed harder, “What? Tell me.”

“You have caught his eye, miss. More than I’ve seen before. He has been visiting you every day, waiting for you to open your eyes. That is … that is not normal for him. He is Master, he can have anyone he desires, but he is solely focused on you.”

“He is?” I asked, swallowing down my apprehension.

“Yes, miss. He will be very happy you’re awake. He’s been getting agitated. He hasn’t even taken another mona. He wants only you.”

Feeling my body aching, I slumped back against the pillows. The chiri hovered by, building up the courage to continue. “Miss, I’ve worked for the monebi all my life. Though you don’t remember what you have been through yet, you should eventually. If you remember, you will be thankful that you have been elevated to this new status.” She glanced down, then sighed. “The monebi life is one of violence and servitude. We are all owned and controlled by Master, but even though I am the lowest of the low, I would willingly take my chiri status over being a mona … the things they make you do.” She swallowed, cheeks flushing with red, and quickly added, “If you submit and obey every command asked of you by Master, you will find yourself much better off.”

The chiri then seized the opportunity to rush from the bed and commence her duties. I watched as she efficiently gathered fresh bed linens and put them in a dresser. Then she moved to a large bathtub and began filling it with water. She added some kind of liquid to the water, and the room quickly filled with the most beautiful perfumed scent.

I closed my eyes as the aroma washed over me. When I opened my eyes, the chiri was walking to the side of the room with a red dress in her hands. She laid it out on a table, then moved back toward the tub. She turned off the faucet and walked my way.

When she stood at the side of my bed, she said, “Miss, I have orders to bathe you. I was instructed by Master that the moment you wake I am to cleanse you, dress you and prepare you, then inform him.”

Panic blossomed inside me again, but I held it back. I knew there was no way out of this. Something, some unknown voice inside my head, told me that I could not fight this fate, whatever it was. Pushing myself to sit up, I accepted the chiri’s offer of help to walk. I leaned heavily on her until I reached the tub. The chiri undressed me and helped me slip into the hot water.

As my body was enveloped in warmth, I sighed as my muscles relaxed, my pain evaporating with the rising steam. I closed my eyes, my eyelids pulled down by tiredness. As I did, the image of a dark-haired female towering over me came to mind. The vision was blurred, but I could see her ordering a male to take me as I writhed in pain on the floor. In the vision, I also saw the scarred male from my previous memory being restrained in the corner of a small room, a metal collar tightly fastened around his thick neck. And he was fighting to be free while I was on the hard floor, a deep, unbearable pain tearing me apart from inside. He was being forced to watch me being ravaged. And at the sight, his huge, built body radiated rage.