Chapter Forty-five

She woke up in a dimly lit room that smelled like it had been sprayed with gallons of floral perfume. There was some sort of incense burning on a high stool beside the doorway. Erin was surprised to find herself alone in this strange room. She had expected that at least one of the other women would be here with her, but now she didn’t know what to do. Should she just lay there and wait for someone to come into the room to tell her what to do, or should she go outside and find out what was going on.

The latter option seemed more appealing to her, so she got up and tiptoed to the doorway to lift the flap and look outside. To her disappointment, the door led to the place where she and Nikjin had shared a meal earlier. The place was empty but there were torches everywhere, lighting the place up at full blaze. She heard muffled male voices outside but she couldn’t make out the words of their conversation.

Determined to find out what was going on, she made her way across the room to the oth