Fair.

Aella felt herself being shaken, drowsy, she opened her eyes to see a large, bald, bearded man in her face.

“Wake the hell up girl! I don’t pay you to sleep on the job!”

Aella thought to herself “you barely pay me at all”.

he then shook her forcefully a second time,

“Ok… ok already! I’m up, fuck Ssa!”

“Don’t give me any of that lip, serve the customers and then take the trash.”

Aella picked herself up from the sacks of potatoes she was using as a bed and straightened out her outfit, pulling her apron back into place. As she did this she noticed her mother’s bracelet, the one thing she had to remember her by, was showing. She quickly covered it with her sleeve.

Who knows what the assholes who came to the bar would do if they saw something that looked that valuable, especially if they saw that one of the 26 glass beads that was embedded in it… glowed. Aella didn’t want to risk losing the last connection she had with her mother.

Picking up a tray and a cloth Aella stepped out of the kitchen and into the bar to clear the tables. As usual, the bar was totally full. Aella heard that ever since the white event times have been hard for everyone. She looked at all the men drowning themselves in beer across the bar and thought them all cowards. If times are hard all they do is drink themselves stupid so they don’t have to think about it.

“Hey tits! Our table needs some attention!”

this was her life ever since her mother died, cleaning up after rude drunken assholes who can barely make it to the toilet, and even when they do they make a god awful mess for her to clean up. And for what? So she could earn enough to stay alive and keep doing this?

“My name’s Aella, asshole.” she took the (substantial number of) glasses from the table and wiped it down.

“no need to be rude kid, it was a friendly gesture!”

Aella looked at the man’s face, she could see right past it like it was invisible and his thoughts were painted out all to clear, he was being too friendly for her liking.

“Whatever I don’t like it. Don’t talk to me like that.”

Aella cleared up the rest of the tables in the bar, received many similar interactions with the other customers and by the time she was done she was ready to put someone’s face inside out.

She dumped the glasses in the sink and grabbed the bags of trash.

“Make sure you put them in the skip at the end of the alleyway this time, don’t just dump them next to it” Ssa called at her from the other side of the kitchen.

“Hey that was because the skip was full! The garbage guys are too busy drinking in there to do their jobs!”

“Times are hard girl, and they need their cheer if they are to get back to work. And their cheer is paying for your room and food, don’t forget it!”

stepping out the kitchen and into the alley Aella cursed Ssa, she saw how much money came into the bar and she knew how much the beer cost, he could lecture her all he wanted, she knew he was ripping her off something rotten.

“Well hello there tits, fancy seeing you here.”

It was the asshole from the bar, blocking the end of the alley, Aella knew the trash wasn’t worth the trouble of going past some horny customer alone so she turned back. Only to find someone had been waiting behind the door, to stop her getting back to safety.

“now now girl, don’t try and leave us just yet, you said some pretty mean things back there, you have a cruel mouth.”

Aella turned to face the gobby one walking toward her down the alley.

“I’m sure we can find better things to do with that pretty mouth of yours, much better thi-”

“if its raping me you’re after I’m not going down without a fight”

before she knew it the man behind her had Aella in his grip, he held her arms over her and she dropped the trash bags to the ground.

“well that wasn’t much of a fight was it girl? But you look much nicer in that pose, it shows off your figure.”

the first man reached towards her chest but hesitated.

“what is this now, looks like you have a very nice bracelet there,”

Aella saw red, her sleeve must have come down being held by the goon behind.

“I think pretty as you are its a bit too good for you. Lets take that before we start shall we…”

Aella tensed up, not in fear but in determination and said;

“That’s one wrong move too many dickheads.”

She pulled her hands down in front of her full strength, throwing the goon holding her over both Aella and the man in front.

The first man turned in shock to see his friend smash into the skip and be knocked out cold.

As he turned around to face Aella her foot was already passing through where his head was and he was knocked against the wall with a bigger headache than he had ever had in his life.

“What the fuck do you think you are doing girl?”

Aella turned around to see Ssa fuming from the kitchen doorway.

“These assholes tried to rape me!”

“So what? My customers expect certain benefits and the cost of the beer covers that, you think I pay you so much just to walk around carrying stuff back and forth!?! when these guys come to you will damn well do what they want!”

“Screw you Ssa! This isn’t what I signed up for, I quit!”

“Fine, there’s plenty of women who would kill for the li9fe you are throwing away, I hope you enjoy the gutter bitch”

at that Ssa slammed the door.

Fuming, Aella picked up the trash and threw it at the kitchen door.

“ASSHOLE!”

Aella marched out the alley towards the street, she knew a place she could go to clear her head for now.

“you should have let them do it.”

Aella turned round to see a child with pigtails in a dress, carrying what seemed to be an unreasonably large backpack.

“Trust me girl, when you’re a little older you’ll take my side on this.”

“hey, I’m not a girl!”

“…you look like a girl”

“No, I look beautiful, I’m going to be the most beautiful person in the whole land when I’m older, and I’m not going to let the fact I’m a boy hold me back!”

“great, I’m almost mugged and raped, I lose my job and now I’m being pestered by some cross-dressing little brat.”

At that Aella turned away and started walking off along the street.

She heard the boy’s footsteps behind her.

“what now?”

“well, its just that… they couldn’t have taken it, your bracelet I mean”

“and you know that how?”

“well it says right here see,” the boy pulled a huge book out of his backpack and flicked through the pages, Aella stopped walking and looked at the book, it seemed to be almost half the size of the boy, and his backpack seemed to still be full.

‘this kids stronger than he looks’ thought Aella.

“Ah! Here it is see, items forged in the white event cannot be taken from their owner unless the owner dies.”

Aella looked at what the boy was pointing too and all the words seemed alien to her,

“what do you mean ‘forged in the white event’ this was my mother’s bracelet.”

“Your mother’s? Are you not Anemone?”

Aella hung her head.

“no… that was my mother”

“…I- I’m sorry, so you never knew anything about the bracelet? Did it not seem weird to you that it glows?”

“Hey! How did you know it did that? And more importantly, how did you know my mother? She must have died before you were out of nappies kid!”

“well, cant you tell I’m a scholar?”

“what?”

“I’d have thought the glasses gave it away… whatever, the thing is my dad knew your mum, they used to work together studying white event phenomena, so that’s how I know about her. I actually came looking for her so I could study stuff like that in the real world, instead of just reading about it, its the right of all scholars to explore the world!”

“well like I said, my mum’s dead now, sorry you wasted your trip kid”

at that Aella turned and carried on down the street.

“don’t you want to know about her? About your bracelet? About why she died?”

Aella paused for a moment.

“you can follow me for a while if you want kid, its not safe round here for girls”

“I already told you I’m not a girl!”

“yeah, but you look like one and that makes it not safe for you.”

“…”

“come on.”

“hey, I still don’t know your name!”

“I’m Aella.”

“nice to meetcha! I’m Claire.”

“Claire?”

“what’s wrong with that? Its more beautiful than the one my parents gave me!”

“…”

–

“what is this place?”

Claire asked, though Aella could only really see his head over the top of the long grass. With the sun setting soon she wouldn’t be able to see even that much of him.

“this is the town’s orchard, its supposed to be off-limits, but I used to help the picker out so he lets me come here as long as I keep quiet, and he looks the other way if a couple of Benapples go missing.”

“its huge! Its like as big as ten fields!”

“yeah, the benapples help to go into the beer, as well as most of the towns baking, apparently they only grow round here since the white event.”

The pair sat down at the edge of some woods, looking down the sloped orchard, over the town and at the sunset falling behind the mountains on the horizon.

“This is kind of my spot, we’ll be staying here tonight.”

“You don’t have any other place to go?”

“That bar was where I slept before, but to be honest I think being homeless is better. What about you, why are you sleeping outside tonight?”

“I told you, I’m a scholar on my world stud-”

“save it kid, last scholar I saw on world study was three times your age, I know you aren’t supposed to leave the library till then.”

“…”

“runaway huh?”

“…yes.”

“… I’ll get a fire started.”