Gwynplaine had been abducted by the King's men, his father gone and the young boy's world turned upside down, and had been roughly handled and brought to where he was currently. He was tightly tied down to a wooden table in a dim and downtrodden room with an unfamiliar man leaning over him as Gwynplaine stared back at him in terror, a blade clutched in the man's hand.
"I am Hardquanonne," the man grinned as he introduced himself, leaning down over Gwynplaine's trembling form with the sharp blade held in his hand glinting in the light cast from a lantern somewhere behind Gwynplaine's head, "and I would like you to know that I am a Comprachico surgeon."
"Comprachico!" Gwynplaine cried out in fear at the title, everyone - even the children like himself - in England knew of the horrific mutilation that came from the wicked hands of Comprachico surgeons, the men and woman who bought children to carve up like pieces of meat to be sold as playthings and laughingstock for lords and ladies, the surgeons that utilitized torturous methods to disfigure children by dislocating their joints, deforming their faces, constraining their spines, "please, leave me alone, Comprachico!"
Gwynplaine's father, the Lord Clancharlie, had always told him to run as far as the young boy could if he ever saw a Comprachico, to run and hide until his father could come save him.
Gwynplaine could not run or hide from Hardquanonne, and his father would not be coming to save him.
"Don't fear, little boy," Hardquanonne leaned closer, his breath hot and wet upon Gwynplaine's small face as the boy shrunk as far back into the table he was bound upon as he could, "the King himself has decided what will be done with you. This will be a quick procedure, you won't even need any pain relief," as Hardquanonne spoke Gwynplaine was rendered mute with fear, his shoulders shaking like leaves in a gale and his heartbeat beating louder than a drum in his ears, almost drowning out the surgeon's words, "oh, no, frowns are ugly. Won't you give me a smile, dear boy?"
Gwynplaine didn't move, his features frozen in an expression of fear. His limbs were shaking against the table, the buttons on his shirt loudly clattering against the wood as terror and despair took control of his young form.
"No?" Hardquanonne's face lit up in delight rather than anger, which confused Gwynplaine, "well then, I suppose there are... other ways of drawing forth a smile, no?"
Hardquanonne winked, as if he was privy to a joke that Gwynplaine was not. He brought the knife closer to Gwynplaine's face, trailing the tip gently across his skin without enough force to split the skin. The blade tickled as it trailed a path from the edge of his lips to the corners of his ears, marking a wide and unnatural smile upon his smooth skin.
Gwynplaine trembled even harder, his eyes wider than a saucer. His breathes were shaky, his chest shuddering as he watched Hardquanonne press the knife against the right edge of his mouth. Hardquanonne rested his hand against the side of Gwynplaine's head - his hand was large enough to grip Gwynplaine's head - and held him in place as the sharp tip of the blade drew first blood. Gwynplaine whined, tears filling his eyes as pain consumed his world, but Hardquanonne held him still as he tried to turn his face away. The knife broke through to the other side of his lip, knocking against his teeth and allowing blood to flood Gwynplaine's mouth. The young boy choked, coughing and sending a spray of blood onto the Comprachico surgeon who was carving away him. Hardquanonne simply laughed, his tounge darting out to lick away the dots of Gwynplaine's blood that has landed on his own lips.
"Good boy," Hardquanonne smirked and mockingly patted Gwynplaine's cheek, before gripping him tightly again by gripping his jaw hard enough to bruise, "now stay still. We wouldn't want me to take off more than what is needed..."
Gwynplaine simply gurgled, blood and spiritual frothing and bubbling out of his mouth as he choked and gasped for air.
Hardquanonne returned his knife to the cut he had made, and began to widen it, dragging the knife in jagged motions up to Gwynplaine's ear. He sliced Gwynplaine's small face open, widening the cut to display both rows of his baby teeth to the air. As tears spilled from Gwynplaine's eyes, the Comprachico surgeon turned to replicate the cut on the other side of the boy's mouth.
As Hardquanonne drug his blade through his skin Gwynplaine felt liquid drip down his cheek and trail into his ear, muffling the sound of his cries and the tears of his flesh giving way to the sharpened blade, and he knew it was blood. The strong scent of iron filled his nostrils and blood was smeared across his face and dripped from his jaw to spill across the table and down onto the floor. Pieces of flesh were being hacked off and tossed aside, pieces of himself were lying on the table beside his trembling form.
It was a horrific scene of blood and gore, of violence that no child should have ever experienced.
The world was going blurry around Gwynplaine, Hardquanonne's delighted face wavering in and out of focus as he put the finishing touches on Gwynplaine's new grin.
Gwynplaine didn't feel the pain anymore, he only felt numb.
He felt empty, he felt ruined.
When Hardquanonne was done, his hands and clothing soaked with blood and his eyes bright with feverish glee, the Comprachico surgeon cut Gwynplaine free and left him crumpled on the floor, rivers of blood flowing from his mouth and rivers of tears from his eyes.
But Gwynplaine did not frown, his lips did not quiver downwards in a pained grimace from the mutilation and agony he had endured.
Instead, Gwynplaine smiled, a wide smile full of bloody teeth and ripped flesh, of too much teeth and jagged edges.