Burning Crowns

Words by ML Strijdom

Art by Scott Tierney

I hadn’t heard from the Boers in a while, but the Lords at the Kimberley Club weren’t worried. War was something discussed over brandy or wagered on a hand of cards, while soldiers passed through town, their boots caked in dust the rich would never touch. They said Kimberley was surrounded, but talk was all the men at the Club were good for. The billiard room stank of cigars, sweat, and regret. As I always did at daybreak, I dragged my broom through the wreckage of the night before. The wooden floor was stickier than normal beneath my frayed boots. The Thurston & Co. billiard table’s brass sign shone under my rag, though nothing could scrub away the real mess this country was in. 

I belonged to the mornings. To a world that had already moved on, where only the scars of the night remained. To a world too busy with its make-believe joys to ever notice I was there. To a world where survival was the only story I was allowed to live. My childhood had been measured in work, not wonder, and even here, even now, I knew my days at the Club were numbered.

A rustle in the corner made me pause. Something darted, a blur of fur skimming past my boot. A mouse.

I twisted as someone chuckled behind me. 

A man in a tailored Blackline coat stood over his friend, who lay sprawled on a red velvet chaise longue. His waistcoat hung open, gold cufflinks catching the dim morning light as he snored through the haze of expensive whiskey. I recognized him as Lord Edward Cecil, the Prime Minister’s son. He’s made the Club his home, coordinating defence plans and trying to keep the town afloat.

 “Sight to see, isn’t it?” he said, pointing to his friend. 

I straightened, my broom a rifle at my side. “I’m sorry, my Lord. I’ll leave.” 

“No, no.” He glanced at the sleeper, grinning. “I came to check on him.” He turned towards me. “You’re the Pink Horse Girl?”

“Yes, sir.” My chin dipped, the name settling over me like a threadbare blanket—worn and unwanted. “Is he alright?”  

“He’ll live.” He gestured at the bottles. “Stared too long into the whiskey bottle last night.”  

 “My mother used to say no great story ever started with someone eating a salad.”  

He smiled. “Wise woman.”  

“Can I bring you something, my Lord?” I hesitated.

He waved me off. “No need.”  

A girl skipped in, her pink flowing dress and stockings too fine for Kimberley’s heat. A porcelain doll, dressed to match her, dangled from her grip. “Look, Father! I found her!”

Her father’s gaze softened, but his hands were firm as he guided her toward the door. “You’re not supposed to be here, Lily. This is the gentlemen’s room. You’re almost ten, you know better than to wander down here. And it’s way too early for you to be downstairs.” He turned towards me. “Look after my friend. Tell him I’ll be waiting for him at the Diamond Cuttery.”  The Lord pressed a coin into his daughter’s palm. “Hand it to the lady, Lily. To say thank you.”

She held it up, turning it between her fingers. “See? She wears a crown, just like me,” and pointed at the bow perched atop her head.  

“Who?” I asked.

“The Queen.” Lily pointed to the Queen’s crown.

“The lady on the coin?”  

“Yes!”

“Oh.” I smile. 

Lily twirled towards her father. “I’m your princess, Father?”

His voice softened. “Yes, you are, dear.”  

She spun toward me, the polished black leather of her buttoned boots clicking against the wooden floor. “All women are princesses. It’s our right.”

If only that were true. I worked the early shift, passing as one of the British. They were occupying Kimberley, and passing for one of them was the only way to survive, scrubbing floors to make ends meet.

The coin landed in my palm and then she was gone, silk ribbons of her bonnet fluttering behind her. 

The room grew quiet, the silence broken only by the soldier snoring in the corner. I stared at the coin. Queen Victoria’s crown glistened in gold. My mother never mentioned crowns.

I slid the coin into my apron and stared at the mess. The floor, the tables, the green velvet cushions still sunken with last night’s weight.

A flicker of light winked from the shadows beneath the gaming table, half-buried among playing cards and stray dice. 

Something smooth. 

Something solid. 

A stone.

I bent down, fingers grazing its rough surface. 

A diamond. A translucent, sharp-edged crystal the size of my palm, its core pulsing faintly with blue light. 

I had never held one before, but I knew what it meant. Men in the mines spoke of nothing else, how it could turn a man into a king or bury him beneath his debts. It made men reckless. 

Desperate. 

That diamond rush carved this town from dust. In ten years, the earth had bled enough diamonds to build a city, its wealth stitched into British rule. Now, war loomed between the British and the Boers, both ready to claim this town as theirs. 

The men at the Club bartered with diamonds the way others did with coins. Some lost fortunes over a hand of cards, crystals vanishing into waistcoats, slipping between fingers slick with bourbon.  

This one must have fallen. 

Forgotten.  

Not anymore.

I slipped the heavy stone into my pocket.  

My empty stomach growled. Platters littered the tables, half-eaten cuts of meat, slivers of cheese, sticky puddings melting in the heat.

I glanced over to where the man lay snoring. I hesitated, then reached for a brown squared bite, something I haven’t seen before. Sweetness flooded my tongue, thick and rich. My breath hitched and my eyes closed. I swallowed, then glanced at the crumpled wrapper. Faded letters, half-torn.

Chocolate.

My mother had spoken of it. Whispered of it, really. A thing from another world. Sadness pressed my chest. She would’ve loved to taste this.

My fingers closed around another block from the table, but I froze, hand hovering, as familiar voices drifted in from the verandah. 

“It’s getting closer. We’ll have to intervene.” I recognized the voice as Lily’s father. 

“But my Lord, I’ve heard they’ve got this new gun with big shells. With no warning, it can bury this town,” another man answered.

“The Long Tom, the Boers call it?” The Lord scoffed. “Ours is on its way by locomotive from the Cape. George Labram’s going to build a cannon Cecil Rhodes organized. They’re calling it the Long Cecil.”

“Hope it gets here soon. Before it’s too late.” 

One of the men at the Club had joked that if Churchill could slip past the Boers, perhaps Kimberley would soon be free, too.

The voices faded as Lily slipped through the doorway, her chin barely reaching the brass handle. Her eyes locked onto the lion’s head mounted on the wall. A trophy of conquest.  

“Do you think he still remembers running? Father has killed a few too. Once he brought me a giraffe head as a present. I didn’t like it much, but I like the blocks it has for a pelt.”

She drifted to the table I’d cleaned, pulled a folded newspaper from under her arm, and laid it open on the table. Her fingers brushed over the paper, lost in thought, scanning the words. 

I kept scrubbing at a stain. 

“Why did my father call you the Pink Horse Girl?” she asked. 

The cloth stilled in my hand. “Well … when my mother was alive, she spoke English. Learned it from her British mother. She fell in love with a Boer, my father. He wanted us to only speak Afrikaans. But my mother didn’t care and taught me, in case I needed it.”

Lily’s eyes were as wide as the Royal Doulton tea plates laid out whenever Cecil John Rhodes visited. But I continued with my story. “The Boer war was upon us. We had only one horse, a white one. My father dyed it brown so it would blend in when he had to leave to fight for the Boers.” 

Lily’s head tilted. “And?”

I smiled at the thought. “The horse came out pink.”

Lily snickered.

I dipped my head. “The Boers raided our farm and killed my parents, mistaking us for British because they had heard my mom spoke English.” 

“Rumors.” She glanced at the newspaper.

I nodded and bent to gather playing cards scattered on the floor.

“And then?” Her face brightened with a brief spark of hope. 

I thought of a way to explain it to Lily. A fun version. Not in the real one where I nearly died of thirst and was captured by a group of Khoisan men. I escaped and stole my horse back. Somehow, half dead on the saddle, I found my way here. I had nothing left. Only memories that still felt like open wounds.

I had seen her before, playing something they called make-believe with the other children in the lobby, a world I had never learned the rules for. So, I stood and swung a leg over the broom, gripping the handle like reins, and bounced lightly, pretending to ride as she watched. “Nowhere to go, I fled to Kimberley on my father’s pink-stained horse. I only spoke English, hiding my identity as a Boer by heart. People laughed, whispering behind my back, and soon, I became the Pink Horse Girl. The Club owner took pity on me, offering me a job.”

Her eyes widened. “Was the horse as pink as my dress?”

“Even brighter,” I giggled.

She unbuckled her pink bow belt and handed it to me. “Now you’re wearing pink like me.”

I tied it around my apron, the satin soft against my fingers more used to rough cloth and broken leather. I wasn’t raised in opulence. There were no silk ribbons or porcelain toys on the farm. My parents gave me all they could, but survival was the only gift that lasted. But I embraced it.

“I lost my mommy, too. Last year. From the red sand cough,” Lily murmured. 

“I’m sorry.” I shifted, clearing my throat. “What do the headlines say?”

She pointed at the leaf spread across the table. “They say the Boers are getting closer.”  

“Where are they now?”  

“I don’t know.” She shrugged.  

“No news is probably good news.”  

“Probably.” She stared into the distance. “Father will place us on the train back to the Cape if they come.” 

A train.

A way out.

If the Boers came, they’ll put me in a camp. Think I’m one of the British, mingling with them. Working for them. A traitor. No train would take me anywhere.  

“What else does it say?” I asked, forcing lightness into my voice.  

“I don’t know. I cut the rest.”  

I turned to her, fingers tightening around the broom. “What do you mean?”  

She unfolded a scrap piece, smoothing its creases. A crown emerged, its edges carefully folded.  

“I made it for you. Like mine.” She pointed to her own satin bow tying her golden curls. “I couldn’t find my others. Father packed my things last night. So, I made you one.” Her eyes shone. “Put it on. Now you can be a princess too.”  

I set the broom aside and crouched and let myself pretend.

Lily placed the paper crown on my head.  

I turned to the bar’s mirror. My reflection stared back. Ash-brown hair touching my shoulders, a folded paper crown resting above my brow.  

“Like the Queen on the coin,” Lily said.

I smiled. “Thanks.”

Lily beamed. 

It had been years since anyone had offered me anything, let alone something so foolish as kindness. I was an only child. Alone, even when the farmhouse was full. We had just enough to fill our bellies each night and patch our boots before the winter came. Play was not something we did; imagination belonged to those who could afford to waste the day. Dreams were something that happened to other people. My days were filled with chores so that there was no room left for wonder. 

Lily’s attention drifted to my broom and picked it up. She ran her fingers over its rough wooden handle, curiosity flickering. “I’ve never used one of these. Can you show me?”  

I couldn’t believe that she didn’t know how to use one. It made sense, though, The wealthy needed us to keep their world running

I stepped beside her, wrapping my hands around hers. Together, we moved—slow at first, then sweeping, circling, swirling dust into patterns on the floor. 

We stopped at a table, half-covered with platters of strange, glistening shells cracked open, their insides pale and slick, resting on crushed ice. 

“What’s this?” I asked.

Lily leaned in. “It’s an oyster. Try it.”

I turned it, tracing the jagged edges of the rough, ridged shell scraping my fingertips. 

“Don’t chew it. Just gulp it down,” she instructed.

I hesitated, then swallowed. “Ooh, slimy!”

Lily laughed, clapping her hands. “Yes, Father loves that. It comes from the sea.”

“The sea …” I murmured. “I’ve never been.”

She tilted her head. “Why not? Didn’t you come by boat from England like me?”

I blinked. “The farm was too far from the sea. I grew up there.”

Her brow furrowed. I could almost see her mind working, puzzling out a world where people didn’t arrive by star vessels to this empire.

Then, a spark. “Oh! But you must go see the boats someday! The big white sails, the cannons, and the deck for Father’s stallion.”

I was in awe of this girl’s imagination. It was like watching a key turn, unlocking doors in her mind that I had never known existed. I understood now why children were allowed to believe in make-believe. Why they were told stories of dolls traveling to faraway places. It was a way to escape reality. I twisted a strand of hair between my fingers and tried to imagine what she saw. The muscle was stiff from disuse, but I stretched it anyway. “Wow. How big were the sails?”

“Bigger than the curtains.” She stretched her arms high. “Three times!”

Her gaze drifted to the gramophone on the side table. She spun the dial. The needle crackled, then music poured into the room.

“I loved dancing with my mother on the boat,” Lily whispered, eyes fixed on something beyond the ceiling. “Under the stars and moon.”

I followed her gaze. I could almost see it. The deck of a grand vessel, the sky vast and endless above her.

“Show me how you danced?” I asked. 

She stepped forward, placing her feet with care. 

A twirl. 

A sway.

The broom spun beside her with her tracing patterns in the dust. It felt wrong to dance while shells waited on the horizon. But for once, I chose not to listen to the world screaming outside the walls.

I moved too, a step, a swirl—until my apron snagged on the billiard table’s edge and the fabric tore. The crown slipped from my head, fluttering to the floor. I clutched the torn apron, and my heart sank.

Lily held the broom, her voice hushed. “Don’t worry, I’m sure you have more.”

I shook my head, staring at the frayed cloth. “I … don’t.”

“Lily!” The Lord’s shout jolted us. He yanked Lily’s arm, thrusting the broom back into my hands. His fingers dug into his friend’s shoulder, dragging him upright. “We must go. Now!”

I stood there, gripping my torn apron, the rip hidden behind my palm.

The Lord scooped Lily into his arms.

“Father, no! What is going on?” she cried.

The Lord’s one hand held his daughter, the other his drunk friend. “Go find shelter, Pink Horse Girl.” 

They stormed out of the Club.

I was alone again.

I bent down and lifted the paper crown. I stared at its crumpled edges soft beneath my calloused hands. 

The first strike hit the verandah and the walls shook. It knocked me to the floor. My hands found the ground, steadying against the rolling earth. Bottles shattered with a crash of glass and liquor. Dust spilled from the ceiling in lazy swirls.

The second hit. The billiard table trembled, the Thurston & Co. sign, polished by my own hand hours ago, lay in splinters. Smoke slithered in, curling through the wreckage.

Then the final blast. The crown slipped from my grasp, landing in a puddle of champagne. The flames found it with greedy tongues licking at the crown. 

At hope.

At make-believe. 

I did not reach for it. To save it. I stared as it shrank, curled, then vanished.

I knelt there, breathing smoke, watching embers flicker and die. What was a crown to me, anyway? A title stitched from silk and satin, or the mark of those left behind in war’s cruel waltz? 

No one is coming to save me.

I stared at the dusty pink bow tied around my waist, its color faded, its meaning hollow. The Pink Horse Girl had survived another day.

I wiped the soot from my face and stepped into the morning sun.  

Something heavy pressed against my leg. My fingers slipped into my pocket, closing around the forgotten stone’s edges.  

The diamond. 

I turned toward the Diamond Cuttery, still standing, untouched by the Long Tom’s shells, its windows glittering with a promise that wasn’t meant for me. The stone warmed against my calloused fingers, earned through toil, through hands scrubbed raw. A reminder of labor, of a place that was never mine.

I glanced once at the blackened floor, where the paper crown had burned. A princess only in stories.

I pulled at the pink bow, letting it fall without a sound. 

I had no horse. 

No crown. 

No place left in make-believe. 

This was a world of burning crowns. 

But I had a diamond from the Club’s floor, and perhaps, beyond the dust and war, a boat waited with sails wide enough to take me somewhere new.

And for the first time, I believed it wasn’t a trick. I wasn’t a princess. I wasn’t a dreamer. I was the girl who walked out of fire with a diamond in her pocket and the will to survive.

About the author

ML Strijdom is a South African medical professional, emerging writer and newbie photographer, crafting stories in her second language. She draws inspiration from untamed landscapes and African sunsets, often found on safari. Her work was recently recognized with an Honourable Mention in the Tenth Writers Playground Competition. Published in Livina Press, Sci-Fi Shorts, Instant Noodles, WestWord, Starspun Lit, Flash Phantoms and Zoetic Press’s 4LPH4NUM3R1C Podcast. Forthcoming in Tiger Moth Review and Ratbag Lit. 

Find her on Instagram @ml_strijdom and Bluesky @mlstrijdom.bsky.social.

About the artist

Scott Tierney's writings include the ongoing Neobook series The Adventures of Crumpet-Hands Man, the novella Kin, and the comic book series Pointless Conversations. His short-stories have been published in Bristol Noir, After Dinner Conversation, HumourMe, and read out loud at Liar's League. Examples of his art can be found on his Instagram page (instagram.com/scotttierneycreative) with more on his website (www.scotttierneycreative.com).