back grew, she remained small. Her long locks of wavy
blond hair and pale pink skin spelt perfection, small
features made for a pretty, yet powerful face. Her
flawless eyes, however, were odd, many had not
noticed, and those who did, never spoke of the
changing girl. The colour in her eyes changed daily,
different colours of amber, lilac, azure, emerald, and
hazel was enchanting to those who had noticed. At
such a young age a beauty already shone from her
eyes.
Spring was one of her favourite times of the year.
She had left her bunkhouse that morning, to collect
some small pebbles on the road, pebbles she found
interesting. The camp was dull to most, but to her it
was bright, it was home. Her eye was caught by a flitter
of a bird on the path. She stood silent on the path and
watched. The morning had brought a small rain,
puddles on the road had filled just enough for some of
the sparrows to bathe in.
“Good morning,” she greeted. Of course, they did
not reply, “it is a wonderful morning,” she seemed to
agree with unspoken words.
Her odd behaviour was noticed by some of the
older children. As the four-year-old child stood talking
to birds, they could not help themselves in their
cruelty. Stood in her tattered clothes, she was startled
to see a small pebble land beside her. “That’s odd,”
she said to herself, “I didn’t call you.” Baffled, she
leant down and plucked the stone from the ground.
As she stood a larger stone hit her on the chest. “Ow!
That hurt!” she complained. She looked around the
camp, a group of several older boys stared towards
her. Unlike the girl they wore small plimsole shoes,
their tattered trousers were covered with flour from
the mills they had returned from that morning.
She saw one of the older of the boys throw a large
stone at her. It landed at her feet. She did not even
flinch as another, much larger stone hurled through
the air towards her, the girl lifted her hand and caught
the stone, it forced her arm back slightly, it easily
could have cracked her head.
“Fucking freak!” shrieked the boy who had thrown
it.
He began a fast pace towards her. “I suggest you
stop,” she said in her delicate voice. Her words were
slightly muddled. “Or carry on, if you must,” her invite
forced him to walk quicker, a defiant smile appeared
on her face.
The boy scowled towards her as he called, “And
what are you gonna do?” His eyes were dark, bullying
was not on his mind, something much darker was, the
camps were a place of hardness, and he wanted to
show her how hard it could be. “I’ll break your neck,
freak!” he threatened as he came close. He was
followed by three other boys, who had witnessed the
stone being caught. They tended to stay away from the
strange girl.
The girl looked towards him from under her
brows, her chaotic white hair blew in the wind. A
storm seemed to brew in her deep green eyes. She was
not angry, but the girl felt something, deep down
inside, she knew she was capable of a power they had
never seen before. Lifting her hand towards him as he
thundered towards her, she watched as his left arm
snapped in two. The bottom of his arm, between his
elbow and wrist was completely in half.
The boy cried out in pain, “Oh fuck!”
She was at first shocked to see she had such power,
but as she saw him screaming her smile grew. She was
not finished with him; she took a step forward, “That,
is what I’m gonna do,” she mocked.
“I will fucking brain you!” he shouted to her, spit
fell from his mouth, it forced her to smile more, his
arm seemed to flail as he walked faster, even with a
look of pain plastered on his face.
“Not without legs,” she said with a low tone.
He fell to the floor and looked towards the girl; a
look of terror appeared in his eyes streaming with
tears, he screamed in agony as he looked to his legs,
both showed bone through skin, blood covered the
wounds.
The others watched on as the little girl turned and
proceeded to skip back towards her bunk house. The
boy remained on the damp ground, screaming in
agony.
The staff listened to the boy’s story, but they failed
to believe him, until a series of strange events started
to occur in the camp, always surrounding the strange,
Unknown Girl.
Taking a break from the chaos of the camp,
Nareena stepped out onto the cobbled path. The
camps were a form of income for people like
Nareena, she cared for the children to some extent.
Her age had seen many children move through the
camps. Usually, she would be alongside the work-
mills, which rolled out linens, woodwork, and flour.
The sound of beating anvils rang in the air as the older
children began their days work of making chainmail,
swords, and other delights which would soon adorn
the battlefields.
The dust of a dry autumn still hung in the air, the
smell of pine from the woodland seemed
overwhelming. Nareena was a heavy-set woman, she
did not take nonsense from the children she was there
to care for. As she watched the children from
bunkhouse twelve walk down the cobbled path
towards the work-mills, she heard a strange rumbling
from the bunkhouse at the side of her. Bunkhouse
thirteen seemed to be erupting.
Suddenly she heard a loud cracking from the old
wooden door to her side, a strange trickle of water
appeared. She leant down and looked towards it,
instantly she was swept from her feet by a cascade of
flooding water, knocked to the ground she flowed out
with a boy beside her, Robb tumbled along the
cobbled ground as the strange girl stepped into the
doorway.
The girl shouted to him, “That, is what happens!”
“Agh!” screamed Nareena, she flew to her feet and
darted towards the girl. Taking her by her tattered
clothes, she marched the small girl to the warden’s
hut.
Throwing the door open, Nareena threw the girl
inside, the grey wooden floorboards thudded as the
girl fell to the floor, dust flew from the boards, the
bookcases surrounding wobbled as the tiny child was
thrown in.
Sat at his desk, surrounded by chaotic masses of
papers, Madoc sifted through his work. Lifting his
large brown eyes towards the chaos that had entered
his room, he removed his small, rimmed glasses. His
aging eyes showed the lifetime of terror he had seen,
his grey brows hurled over his eyes connoting power
and presence. He peered towards the girl with raised
brows.
Nareena stood, out of breath, by her side. “Can I
help?” he mockingly asked.
“I bloody hope so,” scowled Nareena, “this, little,
shit,” she said with her mouth curling unable to hold
her anger. “Again, the bunks are in chaos because of
her.”
Madoc stood. He did not approve of what
Nareena was saying, given the child’s age. “She’s a
child, Nareena.” He came to the front of his old
wooden desk, towering over the young girl as he did.
His thick woollen robes of grey hung from him. She
looked up towards him seemingly frightened.
In a calm voice he asked, “What has she done?”
Nareena pulled on the young girls tattered clothes,
tugging her up to stand. “What hasn’t she done?” she
shrieked. “She is chaos!” she shouted, “I can’t cope
with it, the creature is evil, in the purest terms.”
Madoc took a dislike to her speaking in such a way
about a child. “No child is evil,” he grumbled. Slowly
he leant down towards the young girl. His brows
raised. “Perhaps you could explain this to me?”
He seemed kind, the girl’s eyes flickered, she
seemed to be reading him, gauging whether he could
be trusted.
“The boy,” she slowly began, “he was being
punished,” she nodded.
Madoc seemed intrigued, “Punished for what?”
The girl’s eyes widened as she looked from the
corner of her eyes to Nareena. She whispered, “For
touching me,” Madoc felt his heart sink, “the boy who
I broke, he was throwing rocks at me, so I broke him,”
she explained, “that’s when I knew, I knew I could do
these things.” Her excitement confused Madoc and
Nareena, they both paid closer attention to the girl.
Like a broken bucket the girl began to spill everything.
“The boy in the woods, he kept kicking me, so I
broke his ankle, that stopped him. Then there was the
girl who kept taking my food, I made her fat,” she gave
a hearty giggle. She could see a slight laugh from
Madoc. “But the boy in thirteen, he touched me,” her
voice softened, her excitement died; “in a place I don’t
want to be touched.” Her face became a look of
innocent sadness.
Madoc could feel his blood boil, but he did not
want her to see his rage. “What do you mean?”
“It wasn’t the first time,” she said with a soft,
broken voice. “The first time he tried, a big girl came
into the room, he stopped, but this time no one was
there, so I had to get him out, I didn’t want him
touching me there,” her miserable eyes flickered with
a loss of innocence, “it hurts.”
Madoc tried, with all his might to hold his temper.
“I need to know, where did he touch you,” he
crouched towards her, softly, he asked, “point to
where it was?”
The girl looked into his eyes, she knew he could
be trusted, she did not know how she knew, but she
did. She pointed to her crotch. Madoc stood, holding
a hand to his mouth he looked to Nareena with wide
eyes. Rage began to show in his eyes, “You knew of
this?”
“Robb…” she slowly tried to find her words,
looking for any excuse, “he’s been warned before,
many times,” she tried to explain, “he can be
overbearing, he’s a difficult one.”
“Take him to the workhouse,” grumbled Madoc,
“twenty lashings.”
Shaking her head Nareena stepped forward, she
placed a hand on his shoulder, begging him, but he
turned his shoulder away from her. “You knew about
this!” he shouted to her, “take the little bastard or I
will!”
Trembling, Nareena ran from the warden’s hut.
She searched for Robb. Nareena heard a laugh from
inside bunkhouse nine, it was Robb’s voice. She made
her way to the bunkhouse, looking through a window,
she saw him, sat at the edge of his bed. Nareena took a
deep breath, she calmed herself before making her
way into the bunkhouse. Slowly she opened the door.
Her voice was calm. “Robb, with me.”
Robb looked up; he was still dripping from the
water. “It was so strange,” said Robb as he walked
towards Nareena, his eyes were wide and filled with
excitement, “I don’t know where she got the water
from, she just held up her hands, and that was it, I was
flooded.” He saw the plain look on Nareena’s face,
she did not reply, she did not say a single word. “What
is it?” he asked as he came closer.
Nareena stood silent propping the door open with
her arm. “With me, Robb.” Robb walked towards her.
She stepped into the bunk house, taking a rope which
was hanging on the wall at the side. His eyes began to
widen, his smile withered, and died. “Don’t make this
any harder,” she softly said, “I have my orders, now
take yours.”
“I didn’t do anything!” Tears instantly streamed
down his face. At fourteen years old, he had been
hardened by the camps, but he knew that the rope
meant a lashing, the last lashing was over three years
ago. “Please!” he begged with a broken voice.
“Robb, just come with me,” she softly said, she
knew there was a chance he could run, and if he did, it
would be worse than twenty lashings. She took the
rope and tied his arms behind his back, Robb
struggled, but her weight overpowered the scrawny
boy.
struggle hard. His eyes became wild, his muddy brown
hair became filled with fearful sweat, flailing his tied
arms he screamed, “No!” his voice had broken to a
terrified squeal. Nareena said nothing as she dragged
him from the bunkhouse. Forcing him across the
cobbled streets towards the workhouses.
Robb continued to scream, “No! No! I didn’t do
anything!” His squealing voice carried through the
camp, children began to peer through the windows of
the mills and bunkhouses, anvils stopped working as
they dropped tools and looked towards the noise.
Nareena struggled to drag him across the cobbles,
his trousers were bloodied by the stones as they grazed
his legs and knees.
“I have my orders, Robb,” his squeals disturbed
her, “you’ll be getting twenty, you’ll be lucky to live so
I suggest you make it quick.”
Robb was wet with sweat as she dragged him into
the work yard, a post was set up, a cross bar at the top
showed years of disuse, it was grey and weathered
wood. A large man, charged with such duties ran
towards Nareena who still struggled with Robb, he
heard the wailing and screaming as he ran into the
yard.
“He’s to have twenty,” she ordered. She passed the
rope to him. He tied Robb around the post, keeping
the skin on his back tight, he left his shirt closed,
knowing that the first few lashings woul
d rip his
clothes.
Slowly, he made his way towards his hut at the side
of the workhouse. He took a long rope, nine ropes
hung from a central point of the handle of the rope.
Six ropes were bound with wire, three ropes had tiny
hooks weaved into them, designed to rip through cloth
and skin.
His duty was clear, he knew Madoc was a fair man,
and would give no such order, unless it was deserved.
Robb continued to beg; his calls of screaming
anguish was heard throughout the camp as the lashings
began. Some of the children began to count.
One…two…three, they whispered. With each lashing
came a scream of pain, birds were sent from the trees,
as they reached ten, the screaming stopped, it became
a dull moan.
Nareena watched on, she did not expect to be
taking Robb back to his bunkhouse. His scars would
soon heal, but his mind would forever be broken, if he
were lucky enough to survive twenty lashings.
Alone in the hut, the girl stood silent. Madoc
slowly made his way back towards his chair. He was
still horrified.
“Child,” he looked to the girl. “Please sit,” he
offered. Slowly the girl walked to the chair at his desk,
awkwardly she climbed up and took a seat. “What is
your name?”
“I don’t have one,” she innocently replied, “I’ve
not been given one yet.”
Madoc sat back, he pointed his fingers and held
them to his lips. ‘How could the world have become
this?’ he thought. “What name would you like?” he
opened his hands palm up.
Shaking her head, the girl looked towards him.
“I’m not ready for my name yet.”
Her innocence troubled him. “My dear, you can
decide on whatever name you wish, all you need to do
is choose.”
The little girl sat up in her chair, she held a tiny
power and presence. “One day, I will be known by
many names, for now I am happy being called the
Unknown Girl,” her smile was wide and proud, “one
day, I will earn my name.”
He admired the child, she looked too young to
even speak, but her mind seemed older than that of a
willow tree.
Madoc shook his head. “Then, how old are you?”
Shaking her head, the girl replied, “I think I’m
nearly five, I was four at the last end, so when the trees