Authors pov

The house in Bihar was eerily silent, the kind of silence that presses against your chest. In the center of the dimly lit room, a girl lay sprawled on the floor, her wrists bound with rough ropes, her body limp, her breaths shallow. Dust particles floated lazily in the pale sunlight that sneaked through the cracks in the wooden shutters. Every second stretched endlessly, until the heavy creak of the door made her heart—or what little of it was alive—tremble.