I wake up to a bunch of excited jabbering in my ear, which is an entirely new and decidedly unwelcome experience. I jolt up from the mat, for a moment having a hard time trying to remember where I am. I wrench my head to the side, only to find the source to be a little boy about half Mairi’s age, who’s excitedly chattering at me. Two similarly aged kids, a boy and a girl, are hiding behind him, shuffling their feet, but following what he says with great interest.
I can’t follow a thing of what he’s saying. It’s not that I don’t recognize the words, it’s that the end result is nonsense. What are a “Great big bear“, a “spiky ball”, and a “nasty carrot” doing in what is ostensibly the same sentence? It’s even more baffling that the two kids behind him seem to know what he’s talking about perfectly well. At least they don’t show any of the incomprehension that must be visible on my face, and instead nod at all the appropriate moments.
Eventually his stream of thought runs dry or is interrupted by something, and he just turns on the spot and runs off. I can’t help but stare after the kid in bewilderment. The other boy immediately takes off after him, but the girl throws me the barest apologetic glance, says "Mar sin leat, a Mhaighstir Emma” and is off after them too. “Bye Miss Emma?” How do they even know my name?
Well, I’m certainly awake now, that’s for sure.
It looks like all the younger kids have awoken like some sort of human wave. A kid will start getting restless on their mat, clearly starting to wake up, and this triggers the same in the others that were previously peacefully sleeping next to them.
I find Calum still sleeping somewhere on the opposite side of me, but Rhona, Iain and Eilidth are already awake. The former is, again, cooking, and I wonder if that’s one of her main tasks. Iain and Eilidth seem to be somehow trying to contain the horde of smaller kids, and for the first time it occurs to me to count exactly how many there are.
Getting an exact count of the milling horde proves more challenging than anticipated, but after arriving at the same figures thrice, I feel reasonably confident in my tally. There’s ten kids that seem like that boy from before, no exact ages, but definitely around five or below. The youngest of them is still all chubby and stuff, and I guess they’re barely more than a baby. All the kids, especially the younger ones, take care of them very carefully. A cluster of four children falls within Mairi’s age bracket, over 6 but under 10, and there’s a solitary older girl, whom I estimate to be around 10 or 11 years old, who was instructing one of the younger girls in stitching yesterday. Lastly, there’s the four ‘teenagers’ whom I already know the names of.
All in all, that’s 19 children living on a space barely twice as large as my living room back home. I guess it must be especially hard for the teenagers who get zero privacy, and are constantly in high demand. They’re the closest thing these kids have to role-models or authority figures.
I make my way over to Rhona, who’s crouched by the fire pit, stirring something in a large pot. The aroma wafting from it makes my stomach growl, reminding me how little I’ve eaten yesterday. As I approach, Rhona glances up at me, her green eyes questioning.
“An urrainn dhomh cuideachadh?” I ask in her language, gesturing towards the pot. Can I help? I’m still somewhat amazed that simple phrases like this now come to me with relative ease. Rhona’s expression softens slightly, and she nods, scooting over to make room for me.
I kneel beside her, taking in the makeshift kitchen area. It’s rudimentary at best - just a fire pit surrounded by a few worn pots, pans, and utensils. Yet, it’s clearly set up for exactly the purpose they’re using it for. As she showed me yesterday, she’s got preparing food for a large group down to a perfected art.
Rhona hands me the long wooden spoon, motioning for me to stir the contents of the pot. As I do so, I observe her methodically chopping what looks like some kind of root vegetable. Her movements are quick and practiced, like she’s been doing this for years. She already has a variety of different vegetables floating in the soup, stew, or whatever it is. I wonder where all these vegetables come from. Rhona pulled these from a large chest to the side of this kitchen area, and it seemed pretty well filled.
I guess it needs to be if you want it to last with 19 growing mouths to feed.
The stew bubbles gently, and I catch whiffs of some unfamiliar vegetables together with the more recognizable scents of onion and something meat-like. There’s something oddly comforting about preparing food for others. I guess that’s because it implies there are others you care enough about to cook for.
As the stew finishes cooking, Rhona and I begin ladling it into an assortment of mismatched bowls and cups, adding equally mismatched spoons. The children, sensing that food is ready, start to gather around us. There’s a level of anxiety in their eyes that bothers me, and I wonder what it is they are worried about. Whether there will be a similar meal tomorrow?
I find myself seated on the floor, cross-legged, with a warm bowl cradled in my hands. There’s no chairs or anything, and everyone seems entirely used to just sitting down on the packed dirt that constitutes the floor here. The younger kids crowd around, some practically pressed against me, their own bowls balanced precariously on their laps. The older ones hang back a bit, but their attention is just as focused on the food.
As I take my first spoonful, I’m surprised by how good it tastes. The vegetables are tender, the broth is rich, and there’s a depth of flavor I wasn’t expecting from something prepared in this hodgepodge of a kitchen. I glance around and see the children eating with gusto, some of the younger ones abandoning their spoons altogether in favor of drinking directly from their bowls. I nearly shout at them to keep hold of their damn spoons, but then remember that I’m a guest here, and that they’re barely five years old.
Mairi actually jumps up when she sees it happen, and gathers both the spoons from the kids that just dropped them on the floor, as well as the ones that aren’t using them any more, and brings them back to the kitchen to dump them in a bucket with water.
Eilidh’s eyes lock with mine from across the group, and I notice a subtle smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. She seems briefly caught off balance at my notice, and quickly schools her face back to a neutral expression.
It’s nice to eat like this. I might not really know these kids yet, but they’ve accepted me in a way nobody else has. Sure, they clearly aren’t entirely comfortable yet, but that’s to be expected. I’d say it’s because I tower over them, but Calum and Rhona are nearly my height, and I suspect their substandard diet is the only thing that allows me to win.
It comes as somewhat of a surprise to me, but the rest of the day is equally nice. Without a specific job to do, I get to spend it learning about what everyone else is doing. Rhona, Calum and oddly enough, Mairi, all leave at some point during the day to go do whatever it is they do, while I get to know the younger kids.
They all have their own work to do, but they’re all equally happy to show off what they’re doing to me. The youngest are just happy to have anyone older around to pay attention to them. While Eilidh and Iain are there, they are busy with their own jobs. Well, jobs, Eilidh is practicing with a bunch of throwing knives with a focus that scares me, and Iain is immersed in writing on a small slate, referring to a stack of wooden plates with different characters on them every so often. I’m curious what he’s doing, but not quite confident I’d understand the explanation even if I did.
My first day in their company goes by quickly. We have dinner again in the evening, which Rhona and I prepare, and then it’s back to sleep again for everyone. The fact there’s no light aside from the fire means nobody stays awake long past sundown. Except the few children chosen for guard duty that night. I’m surprised the younger ones seem part of the rotation, but it must be working for them.
The days blend together, marked by the steady rhythm of children’s chatter and the gradual improvement in my comprehension. What started as incomprehensible noise has slowly transformed into distinct words, then simple phrases. The younger ones, particularly, have become my favourite teachers. Their simple vocabulary and repetitive speech makes it easier to grasp the fundamentals. I never have to feel like they don’t understand me either. Half the time they don’t understand themselves, and it’s blessedly free from stress.
I spend most of my time at the hideout, taking care of the children while everyone else moves about. Initially, I suspected they kept me here due to lingering mistrust, but that couldn’t be the case, given how protective Rhona is of these kids. These days, I suspect Rhona saw what I couldn’t: that the children’s endless questions would teach me more effectively than anything else could.
Rhona, Calum, and Mairi maintain their daily excursions, returning with bags of bread, dried meat, or occasionally something more substantial. I’ve stopped pretending I don’t know where it comes from, though the thought still makes me uncomfortable. Hunger has this funny way of silencing moral objections though, and I accept the food without question.
The coins that are still in my bag feel like they must be burning a hole through it, but I don’t want these children to start relying on money that can’t possibly last. Or maybe I’m just worried about what’ll happen if they throw me out again, but I don’t want to think about that possibility.
The one thing that stands out of me in these past few weeks was Eilidh’s lone venture. She departed one morning alongside Rhona, appearing outwardly normal, though I noticed an unusual stiffness in her movements. Then when she returned that evening, something had changed. She was always quiet, but she would always have a few words for the other kids—perhaps a playful observation about their sand drawings resembling grumpy Iain—but that night she withdrew to her corner of the hideout without a word. Even now, weeks later, she hasn’t spoken of what happened, though I sometimes catch her staring into space, absently running her fingers along the edge of her shiv. As curious as I am, I don’t think she’s ready to tell me, or anyone else for that matter.
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One day, as we’re all finishing up our morning bowl, Iain stands up, and signals for attention. It amuses me how he doesn’t even really do anything. He just stands, and then waits. Not a minute later, all the kids are looking at him expectantly. He didn’t say a single word.
When he has the attention, Iain glances at Rhona, as if asking for confirmation, and she gives him a small nod, at which he starts to speak. He’s trying to keep it all simple for the younger kids, so I’m mostly able to follow everything too, and I silently rejoice at my improved understanding.
They’re going to the east market. With everyone. His hands move as he talks, sketching out what must be the layout of the streets. As he speaks, a restless energy takes hold of everyone, a current of excitement running through the other children as they lean forward, hanging on his every word. Mairi, usually so fidgety, sits perfectly still, her eyes wide and focused. I notice Calum nodding slowly, his usual stern expression expressing a hint of approval, while Eilidh nervously twists the end of her pale ponytail around her finger. Whatever this plan is, it’s clearly bigger than their usual operations, bigger than any I’ve been around for, and it’s clear that everyone recognizes the importance.
I shift my weight, studying the faces around me with a growing sense of disquiet. My initial surprise at the methodical planning gives way to a creeping sense something being wrong. The older children’s expressions are intent, focused, but the little ones react differently. While some bounce with barely contained excitement, others, most, seem to shrink into themselves, their small shoulders hunched and faces falling. One particularly young boy, probably no more than six, stares at his worn shoes, occasionally stealing glances at Iain before quickly looking away again.
I’ve become familiar enough with their expressions to recognize when something’s wrong, but the exact emotions in the room elude my understanding. Is it fear of what might happen if things go wrong? Or perhaps it’s something deeper - some aspect of this plan that my basic grasp of their language hasn’t allowed me to comprehend. I try to catch Mairi’s eye, hoping for some clue, but she’s too caught up in Iain’s words to notice my questioning gaze.
A shadow falls across my lap, and I look up to find Rhona standing beside me. Her eyes, usually sharp and commanding, have softened slightly as she takes in my befuddled expression. She settles down next to me with a grace that belies her surroundings, and I suddenly wonder where this girl comes from, what her history is. Before I can give it any thought though, she begins to speak in carefully measured words she knows I’ll understand.
Her fingers absently trace patterns in the dust on the floor as she explains the younger children’s reluctance. There’s something haunting in the way her voice drops, becoming almost hollow. “Na pàistean ùra,” she murmurs, nodding toward the small boy with his downcast eyes, “they still think…” she struggles to find the words in my limited vocabulary, “…that stealing is wrong.”
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A harsh, bitter laugh bursts from her throat, jarring me with its abruptness. The sound carries no mirth, only disbelief mixed with anguish. Her eyes grow distant even as she looks me in the eyes, as if gazing through my eyes into some darker place. “After everything…” she whispers, her words heavy with meaning that crosses any language divide. There’s more, but I can’t grasp every word. The raw pain in her voice needs no translation though. “Tha e iongantach gu bheil iad fhathast a’ cumail ri riaghailtean agus moraltachd nach tug dìon dhaibh…”
I watch as Rhona’s fingers still their restless tracing in the dust, her hand curling into a loose fist. The hollow look in her eyes deepens, and I can tell she’s looking even further beyond the cramped confines of our hideout. Her voice, when it comes, is barely more than a whisper, each word seeming to cost her something.
I’m not sure why she’s decided to tell me this, but I’m starting to feel like this is always on her mind, and it needs just the barest hint of a reason to come out.
“They were…” she starts, then pauses, searching for simple words I might understand. “In the alleys. Behind the fishmonger’s stalls.” Her jaw tightens, and I can see her struggling to maintain her composure. I don’t know who she’s talking about, but I can guess. “Like broken dolls, some of them. No food. No warmth.” She gestures toward the boy with the downcast eyes, then to two other children huddled in the corner. “Dòmhnall there… he was holding his sister’s hand. She was…” Rhona swallows hard, leaving the sentence unfinished. The pain etched across her face tells me enough about what she found that day.
Her hand uncurls slowly, fingers splaying against her knee as if reaching for something - or someone - long gone. “They talk about right and wrong,” she continues, her voice taking on an edge of bitterness sharp enough to cut diamond, “but where was ‘right’ when their parents couldn’t feed them? Where was ‘wrong’ when the guards turned them away?” She blinks rapidly, but her gaze remains fixed on something distant, something I can’t see. “Sometimes I think… I think the real wrong was teaching them these rules at all. Rules that only protect the ones who already have everything they need.”
I sit in stunned silence, my throat tight as I process Rhona’s words. I can’t but agree with her words, but… My eyes drift to Dòmhnall, really seeing him now - he was always more quiet than the others, but no more so than I’d expect. He’s lived through something unimaginable. He’s hunched over his knees, small fingers picking at a loose thread in his worn trousers, and I wonder how I missed the weight he carries.
Before I can form any response - not that I know what to say to that - a choked sob cuts through the heavy atmosphere.
The sound draws my attention to a tiny figure I hadn’t properly noticed before - a small girl with wild red hair, probably no more than five or six, who had been partially hidden behind some crates. Her crumpled as tears start streaming down her dirt-streaked cheeks, her small shoulders shaking with barely contained sobs. Without thinking, I find myself moving toward her, only to realize Rhona has done the same. We both reach her at the same time, cradling her from either side of her trembling form. Our eyes meet over her head, and I see my own surprise mirrored in Rhona’s expression - this instinctive, simultaneous impulse to comfort the crying girl seems to have caught not just myself, but her off guard too.
It’s a strangely intimate moment somehow, and I think something shifts in the way Rhona looks at me. A slight loosening of a tension that I could see until it disappeared. The sight stirs something in my chest - a mix of protectiveness and mild indignation.
Did Rhona really think I could spend weeks here, learning their names, wiping their noses, sharing their meals, and remain untouched? That I could listen to their nighttime terrors and morning laughter without letting that affect me? These children, with their dirty faces and far-too-old eyes, have become more to me than just… just a bunch of orphans living on the street?
A ghost of a smile appears on my face as I watch the little girl’s hesitate, her small body swaying slightly between us as she tries to decide who she wants to lean into more, before eventually settling on Rhona.
I lift my gaze to meet Rhona’s, my jaw set with determination. It takes me a while to formulate what I want to say, but the conviction behind them needs no translation. “Cha leig mi dad tachairt dhaibh. Chan e fhad 's a tha mi an seo.” I gesture to encompass all the children, including the little redhead who’s finally settled between us, her sobs reduced to quiet sniffles, but I’m really thinking of Dòmhnall. The idea just turns my stomach. The promise feels almost reckless given my circumstances in this world—I’m not really in a position to make good on such a thing—but I know with absolute certainty that I mean every single word.
Rhona’s response is characteristically guarded - a noncommittal “Chi sinn” - but I catch a slight upturn at the corner of her mouth, the way her shoulders tense, then relax just a fraction. Her fingers absently stroke the red-headed girl’s wild curls as she studies my face, perhaps searching for any hint of insincerity. Whatever she finds there seems to satisfy her, at least for now.
I don’t think it’s trust, not completely, but it feels different from the time we first met. It’s been growing over the past weeks too, as we’ve worked together in our shared task of taking care of these children. But, I’m struck by the notion that she didn’t quite believe that I actually cared. That I was maybe just around because it benefitted me?
I gaze around at the kids around me, Rhona, absently stroking the little girls’ hair, Calum, who is trying to calm down some of the children while being told by some of the older boys how amazing they’ll do their job, Eilidh, whom is quietly watching everything going on with the gaze of a hawk, Mairi, whom somehow manages to get kids laughing instead of crying by sheer force of will, Iain, whom has paused the explanation of his grand plan to let everyone get used to the idea. All of them, at some point over the past week, have become my family.
It’s bizarre that I’d say that considering how long I’ve known them, but… they’re -without question- the closest thing I’ve found in this world. I look at little Dòmhnall, and imagine him sitting silently in the alley behind the fishmonger, holding the cold, waxy hand of a girl that shares his features, and it fills me with fury. Pure, burning rage. This child, that comes to me every morning and gives me one of the few small smiles of his day as I fill his bowl once again, had to go through that.
I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be angry at some person that did it to him, or at the world itself, but I find that it doesn’t make much of a difference. There’s a deep wrongness to the idea that it could ever happen, and I desire to excise it from reality. The sheer thought should be anathema.
A small voice tells me that it must have happened in my world too. By the thousands, by the hundreds of thousands, did children die of hunger, in camps, all over the world. But never near me. Never in a place where I felt I had any power to affect the outcome, or was directly impacted by the result. It shames me, but in the end they truly were just statistics to me.
Rhona must catch that my gaze lingers on Dòmhnall, because she leans closer and murmurs, “Aon sgeulachd.” One story. Her eyes sweep across the room, touching briefly on each child before returning to meet mine. “Tha aon aig a h-uile duine.” Everyone has one.
I feel the blood drain from my face as understanding dawns. Every single child here - from towering Calum to upbeat Mairi, from silent Eilidh to grumpy Iain - has suffered through their own version of such horror. Each one has their own alley, their own moment when the world revealed its utter indifference to their fate.
The revelation leaves me feeling hollow, as if someone has scooped out my insides with a rusty spoon. I look around the room again, seeing their faces in a new light, and I find my mind rebels against the implications. How many now empty hands were once clasped around smaller, colder ones? How many last breaths were witnessed by these young eyes? The magnitude of it threatens to overwhelm me, and I have to close my eyes for a moment, fighting back the surge of nausea that rises in my throat.
I think back to the fancy houses in the center of the city, at the bustling market stalls and elegant clothing. The blacksmith’s strong, rounded arms as he worked his hammer, crafting what might have been a tool or perhaps jewelry. It was all like a dream come true, to see a whole medieval world, a whole city like that for real. But- I take in the tiny space these kids live in. That wasn’t the only thing that was real, was it?
I know this, it interested me to hell and back, but just trying to survive, and later my excitement, meant I didn’t actually think about it. The middle ages sucked massive balls. It was a time when most kids didn’t make it past their fifth birthday. Between malnutrition, infectious diseases, poor sanitation, limited medical knowledge and complications during childbirth, it’s a miracle any survived at all.
Not for the first time, I wonder if I can’t make a larger difference. Surely, surely there must be something I can do with the knowledge I bring from the future. Just getting these kids clean would do much for their chances of survival. My inability to express myself, and my experiences since coming here, have made me too damn passive.
In a way, I’ve been luxuriating here. Just enjoying the experience of being with people, with children, that don’t hate me. And… I haven’t done shit for them. No, fuck that thought. I did plenty, and I’m still here, but let’s be real - I’m sitting on a goldmine of future knowledge and I’ve barely tapped it. Not nearly as much as I could have. I tell Rhona that I’ll protect these kids, yet I haven’t taken the most straightforward path available to do so. I may not be able to heal their trauma, but I can damn well make sure they survive long enough to work through it themselves.
Rhona’s quiet voice breaks into my thoughts. “Carson…” she begins hesitantly, then pauses, choosing her words carefully. “Why are you so…” she gestures vaguely with one hand, searching for the right expression. “Different? Others, they see, they…” she shrugs dismissively, mimicking the indifference she’s encountered. Her eyes lock onto mine, and there’s an intensity there that makes me shift uncomfortably. “But you… you look like you could kill someone.” It’s not really a question, more of an observation, but I find myself trying to answer anyway.
I let out a slow breath, trying to organize the storm of thoughts and emotions that explodes into being as that statement into something coherent. “Yeah,” I finally manage, my voice rough. “Because I do.” I gesture at the cramped space, at the worn clothes, at the haunted looks in the kids’s eyes. “This… this shouldn’t be. None of this should be.” The words come out in a mix of broken mix of her language and frustrated English where words fail me, but I can’t seem to stop them now that they’ve started.
My hands clench into fists in my lap, and I have to consciously relax them. “There’s enough. Enough food, enough… everything. I know, because I’ve seen it. I’ve walked the streets, and there’s plenty. But some have so much they throw it away, while others…” I glance at Dòmhnall again, my throat tightening. “While others hold their sister’s hand as she…” I can’t finish the sentence, but Rhona’s sharp intake of breath tells me she understands.
The feeling of wrongness simmering beneath my surface threatens to boil over, and I force myself to take another deep breath to keep my voice steady. “It’s all so… pointless. So needless. Where I come from, in my…” I search for the right words in her language before settling on, “In my place, we’d solved these problems, we had more, more than enough to feed everyone…”
I can’t meet Rhona’s eyes anymore. “I had a… warm home, good food, clean water. I complained when the internet was slow, when my coffee wasn’t perfect, when…” I shake my head, realizing I’ve switched to English, but I can’t bring myself to care, “But then here, there’s all… this! I knew this happened, but it was just history, just statistics to me.” The last words come out as barely more than a whisper.
On some level there’s still that voice telling me that my world wasn’t as perfect as I make it out to be. Even in my country, children were still abused, driven from their homes, and hurt in a thousand other different ways. But it never felt as systemic as this. I know it wasn’t as systemic as this since we’ve had roughly a thousand years to grow out of it, and it still felt bad!
Then of course there’s the ones that were left behind, the third world, war-torn countries where things were a hundred times worse, but that never felt like my world. Besides, this country doesn’t have any such excuse, I’m fairly certain I’d have heard of war if it was on my fucking doorstep.
The little redhead in Rhona’s lap begins to squirm, no longer content to be still during my heavy monologue.
I force myself to unclench my hands, notice tiny crescents of blood well up where my nails broke the skin. Getting worked up like this isn’t helping anyone. These kids don’t need my guilt or my rage - they need help, practical help that keeps them from getting killed. I take a deep breath, trying to ground myself in the present moment: the musty smell of our hideout, the distant sound of cart wheels on cobblestones, the way the afternoon light reflects off the cracked wooden walls of the surrounding buildings.
Suddenly the storm of energy that is Mairi bounces into our little group, grabbing the little red haired girl out of Rhona’s lap and launching her up into the sky, eliciting a surprised squeal of laughter from her, and a choked noise from Rhona. As she catches the girl she notices the serious expression on mine and Rhona’s face, and scowls.
“Nobody died yet, so get going already!”, she turns away, bringing the girl with her. “You made little Aileen miss all of Iain’s explanation!”
I whirl to face the other children, and indeed, Iain must have continued explaining the plan while I was ranting at Rhona. Mairi has been here for a grand total of three seconds but is already back next to the other kids, putting Aileen down, and gently placing Aileens hand in the one of the girl beside her, telling them both to be brave.
I glance at Rhona with some embarrassment, and she returns with a bemused expression, but there’s relief there too. “That’s Mairi,” she half shrugs. She extends her hand to me - something she’s never done before. I take it, feeling slightly odd about it, but also thankful.
She guides me back to the other children with no further word about our earlier conversation.