Kaitlyn O'Connor by Enslaved III: The Gladiators

to break her in half.
    She was just going to have to focus on making them really happy and hope they didn ‟ t lose interest—or if they did, that she could find other protectors that were equally formidable. She didn ‟ t think she was going survive long in captivity without protectors.

     
    * * * *
     
    Lecur hadn ‟ t bothered to lay down any rules for her, or the other women either, she supposed, but he remedied that shortly after her incarceration. She was sitting in the middle of her bed swaddled in her blanket when he suddenly appeared at the door of her cage in a rage.
    Unlocking it, he stalked (waddled) across the room, snatched the blanket from her, threw it on the floor, and stomped it. “Stupid dyrk ! You tink I pay good money have you…cover everyting up? You here make fighters horny, gods damn it! Dey fight better get to fuck woman after!”
    Loren gaped at him in stunned surprise. He ‟ d seemed almost amiable when he ‟ d bought her, but then again, she ‟ d realized at the time that she had no idea what might ‟ ve put him in a good humor. She supposed that answered that!
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    “I was cold,” she muttered uneasily. “I won ‟ t do it again.”
    He narrowed his eyes at her. Swiveling around, he studied the privacy tent she ‟ d made for herself and Loren felt a mixture of anger and anxiety surge through her. “You show dem what dey get or I come back and take dat! Understand?”
    Loren nodded shakily, relieved at the reprieve. When he ‟ d slammed out again, she stared at the bars, struggling to calm herself. Thankfully, he hadn ‟ t seemed to notice the loincloth Kael had made for her!
    She debated whether or not to take it off and finally decided not to. She ‟ d told Kael that she ‟ d wear it to cover up „his ‟ tup and she would, by damn! If the bastard wanted it, he was going to have to take it!
    She didn ‟ t know if the gladiators had narced on her and knew what Lecur had come down for or if they ‟ d just overheard the entire tirade, but as soon as Lecur disappeared, they began to parade past her door again. Sighing, she ignored them the best she could and focused on combing the tangles from her hair with the comb Balen had given her.
    Kael had been right. There was no real way to count the passing time and she found that distressing in itself. They were brought food twice a day, but she suspected that there was no dependable schedule to it, no way to use it to actually keep time. Throughout the „day ‟ artificial lights produced a stingy amount of light that was more like an overcast day than a day of sunshine and then there was the sleep period where the lights were shut off, leaving them in an inky, cave-like darkness.
    Apparently the bastard didn ‟ t see any point in warning anybody either. She ‟ d been on the toilet when the lights went out during the first sleep period and she ‟ d had to feel her way to the damned bed. The only thing the fish-man didn ‟ t seem to be stingy with was the food, but she was sure that was only because he wanted to keep his fighters bulked up. They left the „dungeon ‟ , as she ‟ d begun to think of the place, shortly after the first feeding and returned shortly before the second, sweaty and often bloody from training.
    She shuddered to think what they ‟ d look like after an actual „game ‟ .
    She had no idea when the next games might be held. She could hear the men talking among themselves, but they tended to segregate themselves by species and they spoke their native language unless they wanted to communicate with someone who didn ‟ t speak it.
    Her second day, counted according to the sleep period, was marked by Lecur ‟ s arrival with a different sort of collar than the one the trader ‟ s robot had put on her. Naturally, she didn ‟ t have any idea that that was what was about to happen when he told her to get up and present her back to him. Not that she could ‟ ve done a damned thing about it, but she didn