Scypha had always known that she would be freed from the cage on the creaky wooden cart someday, and after her meeting with the knight in shining armor, her hopes had grown even stronger.

However, she hadn’t dared imagine that it would happen so soon, nor had she considered that it might unfold in such an unexpected way.

After weeks of sitting behind the metal bars, the slavers simply opened the door of the cage and began shouting at her, Niss, and her twin brother Nass to get off the cart and join them on the ground.

They obliged, gazing at each other in shock and looking around warily, but received little explanation. The slavers began talking amongst themselves, watching them out suspiciously, looking for signs that they might try to escape.

“Well, Amzev?” the slaver named Vrelyen shouted a little while later, holding a wooden cudgel. “Will these three do? They’re the only humans we’ve got to lose.”

Amzev, another one of the slavers, lounged on the edge of a cart that stood up ahead. He was eating a ripe apple that glistened in the sunlight, but he tossed it away, half-finished, and plod over to them, grimacing.

“These two are green,” he said, pointing at Niss and Nass. “You call them human?”

“Half-human, then. They’re all we’ve got if you’re going to insist on using our kind.”

Amzev muttered a curse. “It’s not my damned preference. Chi’orat. They’re a little small.”

Scypha winced. Suddenly, she noticed that the man was wearing a fur pelt—a wolf pelt. It was small and gray, and she recognized the patchy pattern of black and white on one of the ends: Darko.

A dark, bloody thought crept into her mind, quietly laughing and tempting her to surrender to unconsciousness.

“Resist,” then came the voice of the knight in shining armor, whispering in her ear. “It’s not time yet. Just a little longer.”

Slowly, she nodded, whispering a prayer. “Vifafey, preserve me … and let justice be done.”

She had been quiet, but the slaver called Amzev must have heard her anyway. He stalked over toward her. Niss shuddered slightly by her side, while Scypha’s arm began to twitch, despite her hard-won focus.

“What did you say?” Amzev asked.

“You have to resist,” the knight said. “I know it’s difficult, but do try. Take this as a learning opportunity.”

“She’s the weird one,” Vrelyen said, his quiet voice seeming to come from a million miles away. “Ignore her. It’s nothing.”

Amzev narrowed his gaze.

“I said … I’m glad to be free again,” she murmured, looking the slaver in the eye. “Thank you for letting us out of the cage.”

Amzev grimaced. “Free?” he asked. “You are not free. You are our convoy. You will walk beside the caravan, watching for danger. Before you get any funny ideas – if one of you runs, the other two die. And one from each cart.”

He eyed Niss and Nass. “Damned pukes.”

Vrelyen grimaced, walking over and shaking his head. “Best if we split you up,” he said.

A little while later, Scypha walked along the road, accompanied by Nass. She’d never talked to him directly before, only to his sister, so things were a little awkward … especially because of the way he kept nervously pacing and flinching toward the forest.

“You keep forgetting the safe word, Niss…” he kept muttering. Scypha didn’t know exactly what he meant.

They walked at the front of the caravan, flanked by slavers and the three horse-drawn carts full of goblins. As she and Nass led the column, Niss was left behind at the back, likely to ensure they couldn't coordinate a plan of escape. It’d be hopeless, anyway. There was nowhere to go, nothing in sight but an endless snowy forest, and the goblins still trapped in their cages would suffer if they abandoned them.

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Suddenly, a figure appeared right beside Scypha, tall, with strong features and kind, discerning eyes. A ray of sunlight bounced off his gilded armor.

Scypha looked at him briefly and smiled, then gazed straight ahead again before anyone could notice her staring at things that weren’t really there.

“So that one is gone, too,” Nass muttered, distracting her.

“Pardon?” Scypha asked.

The half-goblin glanced at her. He was a few inches shorter, sharing the same height, pointy ears, and olive-green skin as Niss. They were startlingly similar, Scypha noticed, though with certain obvious differences due to their genders.

Nass shook his head. “Nothing, I’m just counting slavers. Have you got a count?”

“A … count?”

“How many of them bastards can you spot right now?”

“Um … I think there were about ten of them, in all. But I’m not sure.”

“There are six remaining,” the knight in shining armor said. “My preparations are nearly complete. My god beckons us to move forward. The time for your escape is approaching.”

Nass grimaced, unable to see or hear the knight. He turned back to look towards the caravan.

“I was looking for an exact number,” he said. “There were eleven, in the beginning. We lost one just before Lyerateh, and then another later, but that was all long ago. Only the god Gromph knows where they got lost. This morning, there should have still been nine – but I only spotted eight. Now I can’t even find six … no, never mind. There’s blondie over there, so there are six. But I can’t find seven.”

“Okay,” Scypha said. “I did hear something about them not being able to find Vrelyen … so there are a few slavers missing?”

“Yeah. Looks like it. By the way, have you seen Niss, in the last little while?”

“No,” Scypha said. She looked towards the knight in shining armor, who smiled at her warmly and gave her a nod. “But I think she’s fine,” she continued. “The gods are on our side, and I’m sure she can take care of herself.”

“Oh? Have you two already become best friends? Is that how you know that?”

Scypha shrugged. “Well, she’s currently my only friend, so you could say she’s my best one, too.”

“Not counting you, sir knight,” she added in her mind.

Nass stopped and stared at her for a moment, then turned away again. “Hm. How would you like a second? Friend, I mean.”

“I’d … love one,” Scypha replied.

“My name is Nass.”

“I know. Niss told me. I’m Scypha.”

“I know. Niss told me, too.”

Scypha smiled. “Niss must have been busy.”

“You’ve got that right,” Nass said. As he walked backward, looking over at the caravan, his eyes suddenly lit up. “Oh, there she is. Found her. She’s still alive, thank Gromph.”

Niss nodded.

“Eyes up ahead, you two!” shouted a slaver, coming up behind them and glaring. “Or you won’t be getting any meals tonight! There’s something in these damned woods…”

Scypha shivered and obeyed the man. Nass did so far more reluctantly, apparently silently mouthing a curse, but eventually, he did turn his head, as she had.

“So, how did you come to be a slave, Scypha?” he muttered a little later. “It’s not often we get to see a pink-skin in the cage with us. Niss and I were chasing after a shard of the divine. What about you?”

For a mere moment, a vision appeared before Scypha. A vision of that little bird she had murdered. The cute, beady, little eyes, the feathery head, rolling off its shoulders … she began trembling.

“I, um … I got ambushed, in the woods,” she said, shaking her head. “When I was on my coming-of-age journey to Lyerateh. Those men kidnapped me and forced me into the cage. They … killed my wolf, Darko.”

“Oh. That sucks. I hate it when they do that.”

“Yeah … Um, me too.”

The knight in shining armor sped up his gait and walked over a little distance in front of Scypha. “My preparations are done,” he said, his voice echoing in her mind. “Are you ready, Scypha?”

She glanced at him and swallowed hard, then nodded.

“Like I said, I won’t be able to focus on protecting you when it all starts. I’ll be too busy handling everything else. I need you to take care of yourself.”

“Okay. I think I remember what you taught me, but I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hold it—”

“Hey, Scypha?” Nass asked, distracting her again.

She turned to him, plastering on a smile. “What is it?”

“I can see him, too.”

Her eyes widened. What? “You … you can? You can see him? B-But—”

The half-goblin smiled widely. “Ha. Gotcha! I knew there was still something going on.”

Scypha glanced back at the knight for a moment, then at Nass. The knight’s form began to fade into a white mist, disappearing from sight. Her thoughts began to race in a thousand directions, and her heart beat hard and fast.

“How did you…”

Her entire body began to tremble and shake.

“So, you mind telling me what’s really wrong with you?” Nass asked. “Because I don’t believe—”

Scypha’s mind quickly began growing fuzzy. Her eyes vibrated, distorting the world around her impossibly, and she found her lips moving on their own. “Why would I tell you anything?” she asked. “You hate me.”

Nass looked stunned. “What?”

“Talking to me disgusts you, Nassilyan Velarin. Because my skin is pink, and you wish yours and Niss’s was, too.”

Nass stopped and stared at her, a furious expression on his face. “I do not. Who am I talking to, right now?”

Scypha felt herself smiling. “Come now, Nassilyan. None of that really matters. It’s lunacy, all of it. Come and join us, help us tear it down—”

A sharp pain pierced into Scypha’s brain. Fighting back agony and tears, she wrestled back control of her body, crumbling onto her knees and hitting the cold, rocky ground.

“Sorry,” she breathed, her mind pulsing with pain. “I don’t know … This hurts so much –”

“Keep walking!” shouted a slaver, somewhere behind them.

Scypha stumbled forward, trying to keep moving but instead slipping on a wet stone and grazing her hands. The pain was growing. Her vision flickered and clouded, and she knew it was only a matter of time.

“Please, my lord god Vifafey,” she prayed. “Spare the innocent. I don’t know if I have the strength…”