A blonde-haired girl is sitting under a large oak tree. She is accompanied by her little sister. They both lean against the tree and each other and read a children's book. Her sister points to her favourite character,
"I want to be just like that princess. I'm never going to marry and help my country instead.", she said, fully inspired by the character in the book.
The older girl, however, sympathises with her knight, who, in the story, is in love with the princess and does anything to protect her, knowing that she doesn't feel the same. The knight goes on to fight some bandits who try to kill the devoted princess. However, the knight is defeated and the princess is killed. The knight, however, is spared and continues to go on a rampage and fight anyone who mentions the princess. A tragic tale where the knight is made out to be the villain.
The two girls fantasise about this fantasy world in the book for as long as they can.
"Maya, Sasha, where are you?" a child's voice calls out to them playfully.
The two girls close their book and stand up.
"Coming!!" they both yell back and run towards the voice.
They find their friend who had been playing by a river, skipping rocks by himself. He sees the two girls, and his face brightens. They skip rocks together. The boy starts to splash the water at the two girls playfully. The river glistens beautifully under the sun. Sasha splashes the boy back.
"You'll get all wet and won't dry off before dinner", Maya says, trying to lecture her younger sister.
Eventually, she gives up and joins in. The three friends are having the time of their lives.
They have had so much fun that they have lost track of time. It was now nearly dark. The boy had waved them goodbye and went home. The sisters, upon realising how late it was, quickly became scared. Not by the dark, but by what their family would do.
They hurried on home, running. Maya held Sasha's hand while they ran so as not to lose her.
They stood outside the door. Both of them were scared to open it, but Maya didn't want Sasha to be punished. She went in ahead of her,
"Wait here for a moment", Maya said to her sister.
She opened the door, hurried inside and closed it rapidly, so Sasha could not follow her.
Immediately, Sasha had heard screaming and the sounds of fighting. She clung tightly to the book, and her tears began to well up.
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE SO LATE!" the father screams, slapping Maya's face before ultimately punching her over and over until an answer fell out.
"W-we were p-playing, s-sir"
She could barely speak. She was coughing up blood and out of breath.
Their mother was in a rocking chair in the corner of the room facing the wall. She was holding a wooden doll in her arms, singing a lullaby. Whenever Maya had screamed, her mother would hush the doll gently as if trying to calm it.
"From - now - on", her father said calmly, beating Maya between every word, "You're - going - to - go - to - town - and - sell - yourself.".
As if the beatings were not bad enough, she could hardly take what her father had just said.
I'll do it if I have to, to keep Sasha safe, she thought.
Her father stopped.
A scream came from outside but was quickly silenced. It was the scream of a little girl.
"I needed to sell one of you to get out of debt. You can pay the rest off yourself, since you're 12 years old, you can be of use to some strange men."
Maya had quickly rushed to open the door, completely ignoring her injuries.
Sasha was gone. All Maya could see was a carriage, covered, heading away from the house. Maya had tried to run after it, but before long, she could no longer ignore her injuries and fell to the ground. She tried to use all of her strength to get up again, but to no avail. All she could do was sob for her sister. Quickly, those sobs turned to screams. She reached her hand out towards the carriage as if trying to reach for some impossible goal, because in the end, it was impossible for her to catch up.
She fell unconscious.