A/N:Bet you weren't expecting an update, were you? That's right, the Ella Chronicles part 1 is here. I have some other Ella&theBasterds stuff in progress but for now, I have a few Chronicles that I can give you guys. Enjoy.

August 1938

Ella was reading by the fire when she heard his boots on the front porch. She got up and threw another log on the fire. The nights were beginning to get cold near the mountains and her father would be grateful.

"Little one, are you here?"

"I'm here, papa," she called to the entryway. Even though she was almost fifteen, she loved to hear him call her 'little one.' She could hear the bourbon in his voice but was not alarmed - she heard stories of men that drank and beat their children and wives, but Andrew Demski was not and had never been that kind of man. He saved his violence for the men he despised.

"Come to the table. I have something to tell you."

She obediently made her way to the dining room, finding her father already in one of the chairs. His auburn hair was tousled, the sleeves of his shirt rolled up and his forearms dirty. When she looked a little closer, she saw a brand new bruise over her father's eye, the flesh starting to swell. She went to the ice box and took a pack of ground chuck, wrapped in butcher's paper, and brought it to him. He pressed it to his eye with a grunt.

"Do you remember when I told you about a man named Hitler?"

"Yes, Papa." Ella sat down at the table, lighting a candle. "I remember that he is trying to turn his country into a hateful place. Trying to gain power."

"And do you remember where your grandparents are? My mother and father?"

"Yes. Warsaw."

"Good." He pulled out his flask and took a sip, wincing. He looked at it for a moment, and then offered it to her. Ella took it slowly, suspiciously.

"Go ahead. You can have some," Andrew said, gesturing to her. "You might want it."

She sniffed it first, and the smell was familiar. The liquid tasted slightly foul, and burned her throat going down, but a moment later she felt lighter, like her chair was floating.

"Ella," Andrew started again. "This man named Hitler has done worse than start a war. He has gathered certain kinds of people and put them in camps. The Nazis starve them and make them work until they are dead. They may be doing more but we don't know."

Ella stared at him, unable to comprehend why a person would do any of this. "What kinds of people?"

"People who are mentally retarded. Old people who can't work. Mostly Jewish people." Andrew drank from the flask again. "Now he has officially started a war. Three days ago, this man invaded Poland."

Ella's eyes widened. "That's where Warsaw is."

He nodded. "I'm not trying to scare you, Ella. I know I am, though. It scares me too. The thought of my parents in a…" His words failed and he took a long drag of bourbon. "Ella, those Nazis are the worst kind of people in the world. They spread their hate and they hurt anyone who protests against them. Your mother taught you different. I tried to teach you different."

"Of course, Papa," Ella said quietly. Her heart hurt for those people. At that moment, she had no idea of the true horror that was happening in Europe, but she would get a taste sooner than she knew.

"I want you to know the things that happen in this world, Ella. Sometimes those things are awful. What they're doing makes me sick, but I'm too old to go to war. America hasn't gotten involved yet, but she will. And we'll punish those Germans for what they're doing. Goodness has to win, El. We have to win this, or the world will turn black with hate. Do you understand?"

She hesitated, then nodded slowly. Her father was a vengeful person, she knew that. If someone wronged him, he would let them know, either verbally or physically. He had been the one to help her tone down that particular quality in herself.

"I've hurt people. I had to hurt a man tonight, or he would have hurt me worse."

That Ella understood. Growing up on a Kentucky farm in the wilderness, she learned very quickly that when it came to your life, you kill or be killed.

"I didn't want to. A German man tried to cheat me at poker, and he tried to take my money. The money that puts food on the table for you, my girl. I couldn't let him, and so I had to hurt him. But I want to hurt the people that are doing this in Europe. Sometimes if someone has done something very, very bad, they deserve to die."

"Like Hitler."

"Hitler, and all his underlings, and those that support him."

Ella nodded, fiercer this time. Later on, she'd discover the meaning of the word genocide, and think back to this conversation. It was a bit more complicated than her father made it out to be, but deep down, she felt the same way.

"How much did you read?" Andrew abruptly changed the subject. His cheeks were slightly red and he slouched back in his chair.

"Almost forty pages."

"Good girl. Put this back in the icebox. It's time for bed. You have school starting soon." Both of Ella's parents had insisted that she go to school as long as physically possible.

"Yes, Papa." Ella took the chuck and put it away, her mind buzzing. She placed a kiss on the side of her father's head. "Enoyi," she said. It was the way her mother had said goodnight to her every night. It was a shortened version of the traditional Cherokee words for goodnight.

"Enoyi, girl. Now go."

Ella padded down the hallway to her room, placing her book back on its shelf and climbing into bed. Her father's words kept repeating in her head. She had never met her grandparents, at least on her father's side, but he had shown her pictures and told her stories about them, describing Warsaw before he left at 17 to make a living in America. She had painted pictures in her mind, this couple that raised her father, a loving woman and a harsh but caring and intelligent man. Ella knew that without them, her father wouldn't be the man she dearly loved, and that made her love them, too.

The thoughts were too loud in her head, and after a while, Ella got up and made her way through the almost silent house. Andrew snored the most when he had a lot to drink, but tonight, he had simply put his head down on the table and fallen asleep there. Ella crept by him and went outside to the barn. There was a spot along the west-facing wall that Ella would sit in the mornings, the light from the rising sun perfect for reading. There was even a stump next to the spot that she would lean on, and sometimes the cats that roamed between the neighboring barns would come and bask in the sun with her. She nestled into the spot that night, comforted by the noises of her horse on the other side of the wall.

It was a long time before she moved again. The sliver of moon that she could see had passed overhead and started going down. Ella could guess that it was two o'clock in the morning, but she couldn't really tell. When she stood up, her knees popped a little, and she looked around the corner of the barn towards her house.

Ella stayed frozen in place, processing what she saw. There were two men at her door, one very clearly drunk and the other fiddling with the handle. A second later it broke, the door opening a crack. Ella was motionless, afraid to even breathe. She watched them go inside and she crept to the corner of the house, peeking in the dining room window. She pulled her hair, long and black, around her face, hiding in the dark. Her father was still asleep on the table and she knocked on the window, trying to wake him. Suddenly the men entered the room, the drunk one leaning on the doorframe. Ella could hear them speak through the open kitchen window, but she couldn't understand what they were saying. She wouldn't begin to learn German until three years later.

"This is him, right?"

"Of course it is. Now do it. I'll find the money." The one that appeared more sober had a swollen nose and black eye, and he walked with a slight limp.

The drunk one pulled out a knife, huge and dull with rust. He wobbled a little and the other man huffed, taking it from him.

"Useless," he said, grasping the knife in both hands and plunging it into the back of Andrew Demski's neck. Andrew jerked, his throat gurgling once, and then he was still again.

Ella gasped, falling back against the wall of the house and covering her mouth with her hand. It clicked in her mind: this was the man that her father had to hurt earlier. He had just killed her father. She started to hyperventilate into her hand, tears of anger and pain welling up.

The front door creaked and Ella heard the men speaking again in harsh whispers. Taking a deep breath, she looked around the corner of the house to see them sneaking to the road and heading south. She looked back in the window, where she could see her father's blood darkening the table, and then back at the men. The decision was clear to her. Andrew wasn't going anywhere.

She followed them at a distance for nearly two miles while they berated each other. They finally made their way to a house, the more sober of the two going inside while the other laid down on the porch. Ella stood hidden in the trees for a little while afterwards, taking note of everything she could see. The house wasn't maintained well, and that generally meant no wife or female children. The barn and the fence were like new, though, and that probably meant at least one son. The drunk man snored on the porch, signaling a friend that didn't have anywhere else to go when he was that intoxicated.

As dawn started to break, Ella went back home, her mind racing even faster than before. For a while, she sat at the table with her father, thinking. Then she went to stand next to him. Summoning all her strength, she pulled the knife from her father's spine with a sob, throwing it across the room. It took her half an hour to move him to his chair, every muscle in her body straining to move almost 200 pounds of dead weight. When she was finished, she closed his eyes and sat on the floor in front of the fireplace with two pieces of paper and a pen, crying quietly. She wrote two copies of the letter, one addressed to the Bell County Sheriff and the other to the Douglases, the couple that ran the wheat farm next to the Demski property.

Dear Jimmy and Dotty,

I have sad news. My father, Andrew Demski, was killed the night of August 12. Do not worry about him, because I am writing a letter to the Sheriff as well. Please make sure that they bury him in the hills behind our home like I specified. I am writing to you because there is no one to take care of our home now. I know my father would want someone to take good care of this place and help distribute his last orders in town. I trust you to take ownership of our land and either take care of it or sell it. I will be taking my own horse with me, but there are two more that need masters. The black gelding belonged to my father and is only 6 years old and strong. The palomino mare was my mother's, and I hope you take good care of her since she is starting to age.

I am leaving. By the time you read this I will be gone. I have nothing here now and I feel that I must move on. Thank you for everything you have done for my family over the years, and I hope you and your children have a prosperous crop this year and every year.

Sincerely,

Ella Demski

At sunset, Ella had her mare Winnie tacked up and saddlebags packed.

"You wait here," she said to the horse. Ella took their sharpest kitchen knife and hatchet, strapping them both to her belt. "I'll be back, and then we go."

With dark clothes and hair, Ella blended in with the forest. It was dark, but she waited until the lights in the house went out to even move, scoping out the property. Both of the men were there, the drunk one arriving after supper. Ella watched and waited, thinking again. Once, after she hit a boy at school for making fun of her hair, her father sat her down for a talk.

"There are demons inside the Demskis, Ella, and it looks like you got them. They show themselves in our anger. We have to be careful that those demons don't jump out all the time. We can control them. Only let them out when we need them. Those demons have saved my life, little one, but they could ruin it in a second."

Ella had been thinking a lot about those demons over the last few hours. They had been fighting to get out since she first saw those men break into her house, but she had to be smart about it. Two men could overpower her without a second thought. Getting the better of them would be tricky, but Ella had no doubt that she could do it.

The drunk man fell asleep on the porch again and the light inside the house finally went off. Ella shook out her nervous hands. There was no room for being timid here. She stayed low and made her way to the house, listening. All that she heard was the snoring of the drunkard. The front door was locked when Ella pulled on it, but she knew that the window beside it was open. She slid it upwards with a creak. Her heart pounded, waiting for someone to come and catch her, but no one did. There was no dog to raise the alarm and everyone was asleep.

She slipped through the window. Her bare feet were silent on the wooden floor. The house was dark, but Ella's eyes were already adjusted. She explored, finding the man's bedroom easily. She had been right - there was one son that lived with him. The thought of making another orphan made her hesitate for a moment, but not for long.

The man slept on a straw mattress on the floor. Ella's first move was to kick the man in the ribs as hard as she could, pulling the hatchet from her belt. Before he could shout she was kneeling over him, stuffing a cloth into his mouth. She was counting on a combination of drunkenness and surprise to keep the advantage over him, so her speech was short.

"My father's name was Andrew Demski. I don't know your name, but mine is Ella Demski, and I came to kill you."

She raised the hatchet and brought it down with all the force she could muster, putting all her weight behind it. The hatchet lodged in the front of the man's skull and his eyes stared up at her, empty. Ella stared down at her handiwork, a little surprised at her lack of emotion. It was as if she had just cut the head off of a chicken for dinner - it was just the way of things.

Her task wasn't complete. Snapping out of the daze, Ella grabbed the hatchet and pulled it out of the man's head after a bit of a struggle. The blood on her hands and shoes began to get sticky, drying as she fought to dislodge the hatchet. She snuck back out the front window, almost stepping on the other man. This man didn't have nearly as much to do with her father's death, but he was certainly in on it. Thinking of the pigs that she had helped her father kill, she grabbed his hair and pulled his head back, using the kitchen knife to open his throat in a deep arc. The man didn't even wake from his drunken stupor before he was dead.

The rest of the plan was the easier part. Ella collected her bag and delivered the letters, pinning the one for the Sheriff on the door to the jailhouse. By dawn, Ella and Winnie were at the border of Bell County, heading south into the mountains of Tennessee, where Ella's life would change forever.