-Break-

Location: Dónal’s office

Φ Swinging on my chair, I say, “Today I was able to make those bastards work without throwing up. Look how far I have come, soon I will be able to tell them without feeling like I am going to die as well.”

Putting my hands up as I swing on the chair, I say, “I am amazing.”

But as I do this I start to fall back and scream, “NO!”

Before I hit the floor I am stopped by something, and turning around I see Charles.

“How are you here?”

Pushing my chair back to normal, he says, “I snuck in.”

“Again!”

“Yes!”

Moving over to him, I say, “I missed you too, but please don’t go around doing such dangerous things. A lot of people don’t really like me, and they might try to take such things out on you.”

“I just wanted to tell you something.”

“What is it.”

Charles seems sort of jittery then he says, “Do the beastkin, and you’re position mean a lot to you?”

“Why?”

“I was just wondering, if you were given the choice to throw it all away, the beastkin, this place, and run away somewhere to never be found. Would you?”

I stop and calm down, then say, “I was always putting my head down, I never had anything to raise it for, no I never had the strength to raise it that’s why I always kept my head down and just tried to pick up the crumbs of happiness that others dropped for me on the floor.

But right now I don’t have to do that anymore, I can hold my head up high. I can find joy in being alive every day, and I have hope for the future. For years I was just a corpse walking whose only purpose was taking care of you, but now I finally feel like a person. The place I am currently is the best I could have ever hoped for, I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

Charles puts his head down, and says, “I see.”

“Ehh please don’t be sad, just so you know you’re life will always fit into mine no matter what.”

“But aren’t I a dirty human?”

Panicking, I say, “No. but you’re special.”

“But I am still a dirty human.”

Falling to my knees, I say, “Charles, in all honesty, I don’t think you humans are really that dirty anymore. After seeing you all over these last few years, I can’t simply say you’re dirty anymore.”

Charles grabs me and says, “Really!?”

“Yes, yes, but this is a secret between you and me, no telling.”

“No telling?”

“No telling!”

“I see.”

“Now you should get back before soon, some of the spirits from Samhain might already be out.”

Walking to the balcony of the room, Charles says, “Dónal if you ever feel scared and need to run, come towards me and I will protect you.”

Confused, I say, “OK?”

“Bye Dónal, we will definitely meet again.”

“Of course, Charles.”

As Charles jumps down, I turn around and say, “That was strange, but it gave me some motivation.”

-Break-

Location: Íogair grassland

Walking through the fields with a smile on my face, I say, “Everything is just how it was back when I was just a worker. It seems my management has come a long way, maybe one day they might put multiple plantations under me.”

Beastkin in line, humans in line, no one to disrespect me, and Charles smiles a lot more. Dropping to my knees, I put my hands together and say, “THANK YOU DANU!”

Getting up, I walk over to the beastkin who are working and to my misfortune, I see Cian beating a human.

I stop at the sight of this. Just like before this is how things were, and still, it makes sure humans stay in line, it is necessary and important, but why do I feel like I should stop this?

Under my breath, I say, “Dammit.”

Moving over to Cian, I say, “Cease this at once.”

Cian looks at me with anger as if he is about to insult me, but he visibly swallows his pride and says, “For what reason? Because isn’t this simply what my job entails?”

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“You’re job entails following order, thought it wasted on one like you.”

He grits his teeth, then says, “If I am to effectively do my job from now on I would need to understand the reasoning behind this, so I can better understand when and when not to dish out punishment.”

“…”

“Nothing to say? Well maybe it is because the reason behind this decision may not be logical but emotional, maybe it is because you are a human lo-.”

Stopping Cian, I say, “This is an illogical decision made from pure emotion. You see if you kill this human today due to your over-aggressiveness, you will probably get a rather vengeful visitor from Samhain.

And I don’t want anyone to have the displeasure of having to bury your piss and shit-stained body, I might be part rat but I also am a refined gentleman. So please restrain from stupidity, do you understand?”

Some of the humans around giggle, which causes Cian to get embarrassed and say, “I understand.” Then walks away.

The human who was getting beaten looks at me and then says, “Thank you,” With a smile.

So I smile back, and say, “It isn’t a big deal, you human.”

As the human walks away I notice, that all the humans with the exception of a few are making smiling faces at me, and the few who aren’t are making worried faces.

Normally I wouldn’t notice this, but the faces that aren’t smiling are all familiar to me because they are from Charles's campsite. They seem shaking uneasy in all honesty.

Well to be honest if I had to see Nero all the damn time I would feel unease, but they also get to see Charles all the time. THOSE SELFISH BASTARDS!

Φ With a rage so intense that I can feel it covering me, I say, “How dare he talk to me, that fucking brat who can only use his family name as protection. You’re nothing but useless trash who any of us could dispose of nothing but trash!”

From my right, I hear, “Calm down Cian.”

Looking right, I see Ryan and say, “But you just saw what he did to me.”

Moving close to my face, Ryan says, “I clearly did, and if you want to get revenge you better calm down and not act like an idiot.”

I grit my teeth, so Ryan says, “Good, now just rest and relax, because the letter has already been placed on his desk. Only a few more hours till we flood the moat, and then we can even mess with those humans he loves so much right after.”

“You're right,” I say with a smile.

-Break-

A few hours later

Location: Campsite

Φ As they all get back to the campsite, countless voices start to talk.

“Today is the day.”

“We are finally going to leave.”

“I can’t believe this is happening.”

“Don’t raise your spirits just yet, we will need to be in constant motion from here on out.”

“But we still have some time.”

“We leave while they flood the moat, and when they come to get us for Samhain we are already gone.”

“And they won’t chase after us straight away because of their fear of the spirits.”

“We got this.”

“I am going to see my home again.”

“I can finally eat when I want.”

“We can finally sleep when we want.”

“We're going to make it, we are going to do this.”

Looking over towards me, Sandra says, “Are you alright, you look down?”

“Nothing it is just that I am feeling a little bit nervous.”

“I know today is a big day, but don’t feel nervous you guys have worked really hard.”

“No, it is not that, I just had a nightmare last night.”

“A lot of us do, but don’t worry when we get out of here no more will be had.”

“Oh, it is not a bad thing. You see most of my nightmares till recently were about the days I had lost my people, but recently it has been about you guys instead. So it just made me realize that the hole I had in my heart has been filled, so I feel just a little bit nervous about this realization, I guess I am a bad son now.”

Putting her baby in my hands, Sandra says, “We can still care about each other and our original families equally, so don’t worry about such things, especially since to Jupio you’re the hero who saved her from this hell.”

“I see,” I say holding Jupio.

“Hero?” Sandra says. Then she makes a loud noise as if she had thought of something.

“Is something wrong?”

“Hey since you three discovered the beastkin song, why don’t we rename it to the heroes' song, just like how we call our language the saviour's song.”

“I guess that is fine, but why song? I thought it was called the tongue of the saviour.”

“Well where I am from we usually learn language throw singing to our babies, so we call it the saviour song, hence the heroes' song.”

I laugh a bit, and say, “How do you feel about this Jupio?”

She makes a bright smile back, so I say, “Heroes song it is?”

Looking at Jupio, I say, “Hey Sandra, would it be ok if we let Charles carry her during our escape.”

“Why?”

“Because if worst comes to worst I am sure Charles will be fast enough to get away, and maybe if he has something to protect like Jupio he might be willing to break some of his lines.”

After waiting for a moment, Sandra says, “I understand, but where is Charles?”

“What do you mean, he should be here with everyone.”

Looking around, I notice that Charles is nowhere to be found, but another person who is missing is Mariana. What, I am sure they were with us as we were leaving.

“WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU TWO.”

“Hey Nero,” I hear Statilia say.

“What is it!”

“Don’t be rude, I just wanted to tell you that Charles and Mariana told me earlier they went to go get that Omega owl, apparently Charles knew you would complain if he told you.”

“THAT IDIOT!”

-Break-

Location: Far east of the River Lúide, inside a nearby forest

Φ In front of me, Charles sneezes, so I say, “Someone must be talking about you.”

“I see, people really love me.”

Patting his head, I say, “Well I do. Now please go get your owl so we can leave.”

“Ok,” Charles says right before he runs off.

Sitting down, I say, “Well I better get comfortable.”

A little time passes, and from down words in the forest, I hear someone say, “What did you call me here from.”

Instantly I am shocked into motion, but then I completely go still. That voice was in the beastkin language.

This is really bad, in all the years we have been here they have never once come here, and now they are. This is really bad if they find us it might ruin our whole plan.

But wasn’t that voice, Dónal’s?

Φ Looking around, I see Ryan in front of me, and say, “Did I not just ask you a question, reply or is you’re brain too tiny to reply.”

“Hey, what a horrible thing to say to someone who wrote you a note, just like a maiden I have asked you to meet with me, so I can tell you my heart.”

“Your jokes are as funny as you are beautiful, so get to the point or I will leave, we have a moat to flood.”

“You see that, you’re big fucking mouth is not something I can deal with anymore, so right now I am putting an end to it.”

From my back, I feel an impact that brings me to my knees, and then looking I see Cian, and from the forest, a bunch of other beastkin emerge.

“What is this? Do you fools understand what will happen to you if you do anything to me?" I say while panicking inside.

Walking up to me Ryan kicks me in the face, then says, “Shut the hell up breastmilk, today is the last time you will ever take such a tone with me. You see we wrote to Liam to come back quickly.

So, when he arrives and finds that you’re dead, as a high-ranking official now he will do an investigation. But the fun part is that his investigation will rule you’re death a suicide, and your body will be right at the bottom of River Lúide.”

Feeling fear throughout my body, I say, “You wouldn’t.”

Kicking me again, he says, “Did I say you could speak breastmilk?”

Grabbing me by my head, he says, “Let’s go.”

Φ Hearing everything that has just taken place, I say, “What should I do?”