Chapter 3: This definitely isn't home…

The young girl stirred gently as she began to awake from her unconscious state. A small moan escaped her lips as she sat up slowly and placed a hand on her throbbing temple. Her head was pounding painfully, and she felt sick and light-headed. Around her she could hear creaking noises, and what sounded like lapping water. Gradually the pain in her head subsided, and the girl finally opened her eyes as she sat silently on a cold floor. She scanned her surroundings, and her forehead furrowed with immediate concern as she saw where she was. Or rather, where she wasn't.

She was inside some kind of derelict building, with a thick metal frame and timber boards forming its main body. There were cracks and holes all along the walls, and the metal frame creaked worryingly as a strong wind whistled through the building. Her eyes wide with fear, the girl looked at the wooden floor to see that it too, had numerous fractures and gaps within it. These only encouraged her terror, as she saw that beneath the building ran a wide body of water.

As the girl looked uncertainly at the floor, a cold wind blew across her face, whipping her red-gold hair around her shoulders. Her green eyes swept their gaze across the wide room, and she trembled with fear and shivered from the cold. Suddenly becoming aware of something close by her on the floor, the girl looked down and saw a large piece of leather material. Picking it up cautiously, she realised that it was in fact a large coat. Relieved to have something to shelter her from the cold, the girl quickly put it on. It swamped her body, as she wasn't the largest of girls, but at least it kept the cold out.

Now that the cold wasn't an issue, the girl wanted to get out of the building and see just where in the world she was. But as she went to rise to her feet, a shooting pain blasted through her leg and caused her to crash to the floor with a yelp. Biting her lip in pain, the young girl curled up into a ball. She hadn't a clue where she was or what had happened to her, and now she couldn't move or get away.

Tears rolled down the girl's cheeks as she wept quietly into her knees, and the cold wind caused the coat to billow around her feet. In her mind she tried desperately to remember where she had last been before blacking out, to try and make some sense of her situation. Slowly images formed before her eyes, and a memory emerged from within her brain.

"Anouk!" A woman shouted shrilly with anger in her voice. "Anouk come back here!"

Groaning with frustration, the 16 year old girl rolled her green eyes and turned to look behind her. The wind blew her red-gold hair across her shoulders as she stared at the dumpy woman who had yelled her name.

"Oui Madame Voizin?" She replied wearily, her irritation obvious. She was in a hurry to get somewhere, and as usual the stubborn blonde nun had to stop her and complain about something. "You left the light on Anouk… You haven't got your coat Anouk… You haven't done the dishes Anouk… It's too late to go out Anouk… Whenever Anouk left the orphanage door, within a few seconds she would have that woman on her heels like at tracker dog, intent on delaying her. What is it this time? Anouk thought angrily.

Placing her hands on her wide hips, the nun raised an eyebrow and huffed crossly as she looked at the teenager. "Don't take that tone with me Mon Cheri," she snapped. "Otherwise you can come back in and stay in."

Clenching her fists, Anouk's body tensed as she fought back a snide remark. Oh how she wished she could wipe that sneer off the fat nun's face. However she forced a pleasant smile on her face instead, and bit her tongue. "Forgive me Madame," she replied sweetly. "I should not have spoken to you like that. What was it you wanted?" Not that I care, the thought bitterly, the fake smile still on her face.

The nun gave Anouk a suspicious look; however she shook her head and folded her arms. "What I wanted was to know where exactly it is that you're head," she replied flatly in an icy tone. "It is nearly the infant's bedtime, and once again you, the eldest orphan, are running off without my knowledge. Care to explain yourself?"

Furrowing her eyebrows in bafflement, Anouk frowned at Madame Voizin. "But, I told Madame Muscat where I was going, surely she told you?" She asked slowly. It was true, Anouk had told the younger nun where she was headed, in the hope that she would be able to tell Madame Voizin herself. Apparently not.

The nun's eyes flickered with anger as she stared at the impudent teenager. "Insolent girl!" She barked. "When will you learn! I am the head nun in this orphanage, not Madame Muscat. Therefore you tell me where you are going!" Her round body was shaking with fury at this point, and Anouk knew she would be lucky if Madame Voizin let her out at all now.

"I'm sorry Madame, I didn't realise…" She said defensively. "But if you must know, Monsieur Drou asked me to come by his shop and help him put away some of his new stock. So I'm not running away to join a brothel or a circus, despite what you may think of me!" She snapped back at the nun, face red with hostility.

Madame Voizin hated Anouk more than any other orphan in the village, she thought she was nothing but a waste of space. She wasn't the only person in the village to think so either, and Anouk was getting tired of all the negative treatment she received from other nuns and villagers. It seemed like Monsieur Drou was the only one who really liked her.

The problem was, Anouk couldn't understand what she had done to make almost everyone dislike her. She didn't try to make enemies out of anyone and was pleasant and respectful to anyone she met. She didn't act or dress differently to anyone else in the village, the only difference was that she spoke her mind.

Anouk wasn't the kind of girl to just back down and let someone take advantage of her. She retaliated and spoke back to defend herself, as she had done with Madame Voizin. But of course, this wasn't normal in her village, where everyone listened to each other and never had a bad word to say. So consequently Anouk was labelled rude and disrespectful, the wolf within a village of sheep.

But now Anouk had had enough, and something inside of her snapped. Glaring angrily at Madame Voizin, the teenager turned swiftly and strode away from the orphanage; deaf to the nun's cries of fury as she called her name.

Her fists clenched tightly, Anouk stormed though the winding streets of the village on her way to Monsieur Drou's shop. She knew she would have to return to the orphanage later on and face Madame Voizin's wrath, but for now she would just help the kind old man as she had promised.

However Anouk never reached the shop. She never got as far as the end of the alleyway before she was struck on the head by a heavy object, falling unconscious with a gentle thud onto the alley floor.