It would take a pretty stupid person to get caught outside a house that was just broken into with a bag full of coin and a dead body run through with a priceless relic, right? Wrong. Bjorn was smart, and he was still kicking himself about what had happened a week ago. To his mind, if anyone was stupid it was the guards. No matter how many times he told them, they just would not believe that an 8-foot-tall man that looked like he was 70 stabbed the victim and gave them some money before leaping onto the roofs like some giant, old, wealthy spider.

It didn't help much that the carriage was shaking like a chihuahua during an earthquake. It was hard to piece his thoughts together when they were rattling around inside his head. He brought it down to his cuffed hands to rub his temples and to try to stop thinking about his precious spellbook, likely thrown in a chest with confiscated items. When the guards had put it away, he heard bottles rattle. He prayed they were empty, but the way his luck had been like lately, they were full of ink and unproperly sealed.

⁠"Hey, don't pull on me, man." A coarse voice sounded to his left. He had to turn and check who it was that complained since both of his partners in misadventure spoke almost exactly alike, even if their appearances couldn't be any more different. It was Glock. She puzzled him. As far as tabaxis went, she was certainly unique. Her cat-like body wasn't covered in fur, for one. For another, she ate people. Not to death or anything, but still pretty weird. Bjorn was glad for the company, however. In a fight she'd be a good ally; in a pinch, an even better scapegoat.

He set his hands back down and looked to the rest of the cart. Surprisingly, Glock's rosy skin wasn't the most eye-catching thing inside the iron-lined transport. To his right, the gaudiest, pinkest tiefling he'd ever seen was taking a nap like this was the most comfortable of feather-stuffed mattresses and not a quaking, splintering cage. He was bound much more strictly than any other person there, which likely spoke to the severity of his crime. By the looks of it, this man had done something worse than steal from one noble and kill another one. Bjorn was glad the stranger was asleep, and hoped he'd stay that way awhile.

Finally, Cela sat across from him, cute as a button —and not much bigger, either. Stood up, she didn't reach past his waist. She had a healthy, rosy complexion, and behaved like a maiden in conversation. Her accent was characteristic of the Litabo desert, like Glock's. Also like Glock (and everyone else in this teeter-tottering doom bus) she had her wrists tied together. However, she had a leather belt wrapped several times around her forearms instead, presumably because the city guard could not find cuffs small enough that she could not simply slip out of them. As cute as she was, Bjorn knew not to underestimate the pointy-eared lady; a lesson one goblin had to learn by getting slapped so hard it died. He told himself it was better to not be on the receiving end of one of those knuckle sandwiches.

The carriage abruptly stopped, launching Bjorn straight into the tiefling's side and nearly impaling his arm in one of his ram-like horns. The pink man woke with a start and launched up, yelling "It's go time! To me, boys!" and promptly falling belly-first to the wooden floor of the carriage after a brave —and wobbly— attempt to stay upright. He struggled against the belts holding his arms and legs together for a long two seconds before noticing the deathly quiet. "Is it not yet go time? I must have gotten ahead of myself. Apologies." Now that the man wasn't screaming, Bjorn could make out his Ghittian accent easily enough. "Do you mind?" He extended his bound arms toward Bjorn, who hesitated. Glock, in an act of pink camaraderie, helped him back on the bench while yanking half of the occupants around like loose, criminal puppets.

"Menal, why is it we have stopped?" The horned man spoke to the back of the driver's head. "Shut it, you pest. Sit back and stay quiet before I sock you across the head again." The dwarvish driver had clearly dealt with him before, in this ride or otherwise. The tiefling's indignant response was interrupted by a voice coming from the brush by the road.

"You're driving the strong car today?"

"I'm taking some real troublemakers up north. Killed a noble."

"Have you got room for a few more?" Chains rattled outside.

"If you've got the coin."

"I'll pay double for these. They angered Reed proper." The voice was now close to the driver, but Bjorn could not see the man responsible for it. "He wants them taken all the way to the Rock."

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Menal scoffed, "Double? I'd cart them all the way to Marton and back for that much. Throw their things above with the rest, I'll open the back."

Bjorn heard the driver harrumph off the seat in the front and make his way around to the back of the cart. He struggled with the locks until the double iron doors creaked open. "Hop on, then. The rest of you, move over."

Everyone inside shuffled to the front, setting Bjorn awfully close to the tiefling, who was observing the procedure with an amused smile on his face. He realized, uneasy, that his teeth were jagged like those of a fairytale demon. Some coins changed hands outside the cart—quite a few, by the sound of it⁠— as three figures climbed into the back of the prison transport. All similarly chained to each other, and all looking like they'd had a positively crappy day.

Bjorn looked them up and down as they hopped in. Their outfits were caked in several amounts of dried blood and they were all filthy with soot. First to step in was a stern-looking half-elven man. His skin looked brown and cracked in places, like it were tree bark instead. He was barefoot and dressed in rags. He sat down quietly without saying a word. He had better things to do than get to know his wagon buddies.

The other two figures climbed in together, and Bjorn was startled to see one of them was a child. He could be no older than twelve, if his time among humans had given him a good intuition for age. The hair on his head was a deep red, but it had been singed in some places and looked nowhere near as good as it might've in other conditions. Holding him upright was an exhausted-looking woman in her twenties. Her cloak looked to be black but, then again, perhaps the soot was to blame for that. Her blond hair spilled out of her hood and onto her shoulders. After darting her eyes through the interior, she settled on an empty bench where she set the child down next to herself.

"What an interesting ensemble! So, what are you in for?" The tiefling leaned forward.

"We attacked some guy." The child was the first to speak up, to Bjorn's surprise. "He had a crocodile."

Bjorn snorted, "I'm sure the guards believed you, too."

"I don't think they were guards. I think they were criminals."

"Aren't we all?" The tiefling smiled.

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence at that. It was Cela that broke it, in her usual cheery tone.

"So, like, what are your names? I only know Bjorn and Glock here." She happily pointed to each as she spoke, swinging her short legs from the edge of the bench.

"Ya'ar." The half-elf didn't even open his eyes to participate.

"I'm Ana, and this here is Jun." The woman spoke up for the first time. She, too, had some of Litabo in her voice. Bjorn wasn't too surprised at that: They were, after all, just south of the desert. Bjorn thought back to the first time he crossed the Iron Crests going down toward the valley, just over a week back. He'd been so glad to see some greenery after trekking through the dunes for days on end. He wasn't looking forward to that landscape again.

"And I am your humble servant Tvslt." The pink menace (the one on his right) did as much of a flourish as he could given the circumstances. "It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance in the brief moments our lives intersect."

"Yo you're stuck here with us, demon boy." Jun said.

"Oh, but I am not." Tvslt looked through the bars of the front window to make sure Menal wasn't eavesdropping and grinned a sharp, mischievous grin. "You see, I am going to escape."

Bjorn looked the man up and down: there was very little pink that could be seen through the leather belts holding him together, bound like a kinky cocoon. This man was definitely crazy.

"And how are you going to do that, then?" Ana asked before Bjorn could stop her from unleashing more crazy rambling.

Tvslt scoffed. "Pah! I am not telling you, that's for sure! It is going to be hard enough to escape on my own. I will not babysit the lot of you on top of that." He turned his back as best he could, yanking Bjorn's wrists to him. "You can stay here and ride with Menal all the way to Mesa Rock."

Glock picked at her teeth with one of her claws. "Is that where we're headed? That's a prison, isn't it?" She seemed unbothered at the idea.

"Indeed! I hope you enjoy wearing iron cuffs because you'll have them on until you die."

Bjorn looked at his arms. He didn't like the idea of wearing those things for the next five hundred years. They'd already started to dig into his skin after only a few bumpy hours. 'If only I had my spellbook on me,' he thought, 'getting out of this place would be no problem. I'd chant a few words and turn the whole thing into a pumpkin.'

"Hold on a second..." Bjorn's pointed ears twitched at the realization: He couldn't deal with the cart, but if it was something as small as handcuffs, perhaps it could be done. A few deep breaths helped him drown out the bickering inside the wagon as he started to focus on the metal around his arms, and felt it slowly grow less rigid and cold.

It could be done.

Focusing on the material, as well as what you wanted it to turn into, was quite challenging under the circumstances. However, eyes shut, he persevered. He imagined the metal becoming alive and turning fibrous around him. He hadn't noticed when he started, but he was panting now. Finally, with his forehead covered in sweat, he ventured a look at them again. Where impossibly tough metal once stood, there was now a finely crafted set of wooden cuffs. He couldn't help but smile at his own accomplishment.

With another quick burst of mental power, he sent a wisp of flame into them and watched them burn right off his wrists. "Now that's better." He rubbed them for a moment and looked around. Everyone was looking back at him, awestruck.

"Why didn't you say you could do that?" Glock elbowed him, sounding either happy or angry. He could never quite tell when it came to her.

"I only just realized it was an option." He stood and stretched a bit, feeling every bone in his body settle back into place. He took a quick, resolute sigh and his gaze hardened. He stepped over towards Tvslt and held his hand in front of his face, watching flames dance on his palm.

"So, about your escape plan."