It was the gossip on everyone's lips, how the King and Queen got murdered. She couldn't deal with hearing it any longer and continued moving, faster and farther, until the lands were no longer familiar and she could hide more easily in plain sight than needing to duck each time a cart rolled by.
The young girl hid herself in filthy rags so that if she sat as still as possible and held her breath, she could easily be mistaken for a pile of garbage thrown from someone's house to the street corner. She would sneak behind people into various establishments and hide under tables to feed off the scraps and crumbs that people would haphazardly drop on the floor. She slept on the side of the road or, if she was lucky, in a barn.
And this was her life for an incredible length of time. From town to town, village to village, the girl traveled far and wide, not knowing what she was doing, what she was looking for. She knew, by the way her family spoke when they thought she wasn't looking that she had a different mother out there somewhere. It wasn't as if anyone who ever knew her would recognize her, though. She was born with a very defining birthmark, a gorgeous vine work that clung to the entire left side of her body looking much like a tattoo. Replacing that birthmark were huge bubbling scars that made her look as though she were a leper. Her fingers were gnarled and twisted. Her foot was worthless and she was forced to limp everywhere she went. Her eye was forever forced shut and her lips were pulled into the most hideous of grins. It was why she hid underneath filthy rags and slept in the garbage being bitten by rats. Children ran in terror seeing her and adults thought she was ridden with disease and skirted her in a wide berth.
No. No one would recognize her. Her life was terribly lonely never having a place to call home or a soul to call friend. All she had was an equally filthy doll that she lovingly called 'bunny'. She could remember the time she was given the doll.
Her life had been nightmare after daily nightmare as her father, dead in the eyes, allowed people to pay money so they could beat the demon child that has been devastating crops, killing the cows, making their children ill, and any other silly excuse. When no excuse could be thought of, they were to release their own evils into the child in order to keep faithful to their wives and keep their eyes from roaming.
One day a stranger came to town and asked to have the child to himself for a month. No one knew who he was, but he paid a hefty price and was given to his wishes. Not knowing what to expect, she was the most surprised when the man only wished to teach her to speak. But after seven years, much of language was hopeless to the girl. He gave the girl the gift of her stuffed rabbit to help her through the pain of life before it was necessary for him to go. He did everything he was able.
As with most things, there were consequences. When she cried out 'no' one day to her normal beatings, her family decided it was time to try and cut out her tongue. She was escaped out of the house not long after by her sister Violet's decree and with her help. No one ever knew that it was Violet that helped her sister disappear that day. Since then, she has been on the road. Traveling. Forever traveling. Not believing the gossip of the dead King and Queen and wondering if her sister was still alive.
