Girl of Iron and Magic

9.

9.
10 YEARS BEFORE THE WAR

Things started to change for Lotte after the strange girl had given her the drawing pad. Ever since leaving the orphanage, she focused all her energy on just surviving. She had clean forgotten about drawing, as if it hadn't meant the world to her.

Surviving was nice and everything, but without something to survive for, it was made all the harder. Now she remembered that living had a purpose, and that purpose involved creating. Thus she searched for ways to draw.

On street corners, tower steps, park benches, in the light of street-lamps, the moon or sun, Lotte drew.

Light and shadow mixed together creating shapes so real they looked like they could pop out of the page. Sometimes, her drawings looked so real, they could be confused with photographs. She sketched in grey and white the things she saw around her.

For the first time in her short life, Lotte was unafraid. She didn't fear the constables or Loureen's street gang. Drawing made it seem like nothing could touch her, as if the sheer determination of her pencil marring the perfect whiteness of the page was the power she'd never had before.

"'Scuse me, miss," said a voice, interrupting her drawing. Lotte looked up.

A well-dressed gentleman stood over her with a lady in a lacy dress hanging on his arm. "How much for the drawing of the river?"

He gestured towards a sheet Lotte had discarded on the bench by her side. It was the one she had just finished before starting the next. She no longer cared about drawings once they were done. All she cared about was to never stop drawing.

The lady on the man's arm let go of him and crouched down before Lotte, her mouth a round O. "My goodness," she whispered. "What a beautiful child. Would you look at her eyes, Henri?" She placed a hand to her chest. "Why, it breaks my heart."

Lotte had no idea why her eyes should break hearts. But, clearly, neither of these people knew what she was. Her hair grew fast, and was so long by now, it sat as steadily on her head as a hat of straw, covering the points of her ears.

The woman reached over—Lotte flinched—and moved aside the sheets of paper on the bench next to her. "Did you draw all these yourself?" she asked in a voice as soft as bird's feathers.

Lotte nodded, a glint of pride sparking in her heart.

"Oh, Henri, look at these flowers. Look at the detail. This is extraordinary. How old are you, my dear?"

Lotte put her pencil down so she could put up seven fingers.

At least, she thought that was her age. She wasn't sure since she didn't ever have a birthday.

"I can't believe it."

"I'll buy them from you," said the man. "The whole lot."

"Where are your parents, little dove?" asked the woman.

"I will pay two daies for each," said the man.

Lotte's eyes widened. Two whole daies for...for each? With just one daie, she could live for a month. With all that money, she could... she could buy paints!

Lotte nodded enthusiastically and gathered the drawings into a neat pile.

Henri took them and looked them over together with his companion.

Lotte's face grew hot and then hotter as she listened to them gasp, exclaim and praise her. Her chest felt tight, ready to explode, but it was a glorious kind of pain.

"So that's twelve daies altogether for six drawings," the man said, handing her the fortune.

Lotte was trembling when she took the paper money. It felt oddly unreal.