Just as he was about to open his mouth to speak, Flo came to an abrupt halt and gestured towards a thick, towering tree trunk a few feet ahead. There was nothing so remarkable or unique about it, aside from maybe it was wider than its surrounding counterparts. Even so, Ross wouldn’t have been able to pick it out. It wasn’t memorable in any way.
“What?” he wondered out loud, squinting as he stared ahead, following Flo’s small, pointed forefinger.
“Annie is hiding behind that tree,” she informed him, innocently tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear.
He looked down at her, an eyebrow raised. “How do you know that?”
“Look!” she chirped enthusiastically, grabbing his hand and pulling him with surprising force towards the moist bark. As they got nearer, she jabbed her finger towards a small, almost unintelligible carving embedded low down in the tree trunk.
“A…F…” Ross read underneath his breath
“Yes,” said Flo, “for Annie and Flo.”
His lip crept upwards then, a wave of relief coming down on him as he remembered carving initials into the trees down at Oakwood back when he was a boy.
“It can also mean, AS FUCK,” Flo went on. She said it matter-of-factly, oblivious to how her sudden swearing smashed through Ross’s brief, calm demeanour like a wrecking ball through a pane of cheap glass.
“Annie?” he called again, almost stumbling over his own feet as she scrambled around the tree trunk, awkward feet crunching through leaves on the forest floor. “An-“ he froze.
It felt as though his heart, his soul, and every other vital organ within his skeleton simultaneously plummeted, stealing away his breath and ability to even move in one swift motion. He tried to open his mouth, but his lips were stuck. His head screamed at him to move, to say something, to do something. But every part of him was rigid. Numb. Cold death engulfing him from the inside.
“I read online,” came Flo’s voice, clear as day and as sharp as razor blades, despite feeling like it was coming from a mile away. “That this was a genuine form of torture, back in medieval times. Kings and queens could literally kill off anyone they didn’t like, and they could make it as gnarly and painful as they wanted.”
She laughed a horrible, shrill, tinny sound that sent chills into Ross’s bones. “In our game, I was the queen, and Annie was my prisoner.”
Slowly, he felt warmth return to his veins as his blood started pumping hard and fast through his body, fuelled by fury that was so intense that it made his head spin. Tears that he could not feel but only see as they blurred, his vision started streaming down his cheeks.
Through the blurry glass of his pain, the horrific image of gore lay ahead of him, propped up against the foot of the tree trunk.
Annie faced upwards, her eyes bulging from her skull, almost rolling back into her head.
The lower half of her face, her neck, and torso were saturated in blood, slits around her lips and mouth still trickling crimson fluid.
Her jaw hung open at an awkward, inhuman angle as if something larger had been forced down it.
“I didn’t think it would actually work,” continued Flo, coming into view as she knelt down beside Annie’s body and pointed to a swollen and bruised wound on her side. The material of her clothes appeared to have been ripped, exposing the damaged skin beneath.
There was a sudden movement, a twitch, and a high-pitched squeak that was so earth-shattering that it broke Ross out of his trance and sent him reeling backwards with shock.
Gnawing the inside of his daughter’s stomach, beady black eyes gleaming, tiny, furry face hungrily chomping on her flesh and peeking through her skin, was a blood-drenched rat.
A horrific scream erupted from Ross’s lips as he finally blinked away his tears and became aware of the pained sound erupting from within him. He clutched his chest, unable to breathe as he stared at the grisly image of his sweet, innocent little girl being eaten from the inside.
“Yeah, turns out it's true,” said Flo, her voice now louder and clearer. “Rats will eat just about anything.”
“YOU LITTLE BITCH!” snarled Ross, lunging himself forward at the small girl, every part of him ablaze with anger. He pinned her down by her shoulders, her small, easily breakable bones digging into the palms of his hands. “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?” he shrieked, tightening his grip on her shoulders, shaking her so vigorously that he thought he might break her. To his surprise, her smile never faltered. In fact, the more he shook her and hit her against the hard tree roots, the louder she seemed to laugh.
Blinded by his rage, he let go of her shoulders and began to smack and punch the little girl in the face as hard as he could until her snowy white cheeks were purple and blackened with bruises, and blood poured from the corners of her lips.
“HOW COULD YOU? HOW COULD YOU?” he screamed, over and over, until his voice was reduced to nothing but a tinny, gravelly croak echoing pathetically through the woods. He scratched and slapped until the small, helpless child who lay like a broken china doll in front of him was unconscious.
Then, he sank back on his knees and looked from one child to the other, his entire body heaving as his world felt as though it were crashing down all around him.
He sobbed and cried, his agonised
