POV: Vernisha.

I change my hold on Ulah into a headlock.

Natasha then takes the rag out of his mouth, which results in him snapping like a wild dog, spreading his saliva and growling.

“Be careful,” Natasha says. “That could hurt his neck.”

“I know, I know,” I say through the pain of his nails trying to tear through my skin. Thankfully, his nails aren’t sharp.

Marvin walks over, nervousness in his eyes. He looks at Ulah’s sharp teeth and his spittle flying all over.

He stutters like Ulah is about to jump at him at any minute. “You’re holding him good, right?”

“Yes.”

Natasha wraps the rag around her hand like a glove and moves to my side.

She tells Ulah, “I am going to hold your mouth open. Okay?”

She does so, keeping it wide open, even if it means his teeth piercing through her fingers' skin and making her bleed.

Marvin moves fast, dumping all the green-brownish liquid into his mouth. Natasha removes her hand from his mouth and then clamp his mouth shut, applying pressure on his head and jaw.

Her blood leaks down Ulah’s head and jaw.

Marvin says, “He should fall asleep in a minute or two.”

I ask, “You are sure it’s potent enough to work that fast?”

“I am certain. And no, it wouldn’t kill him. ”

Like he said, after a minute, Ulah becomes sluggish. And after another minute, he falls asleep.

I think he is asleep.

I whisper in his ears, tickling him, poking him, squeezing his shoulder, and he still doesn’t wake up.

He still has a heartbeat and is breathing.

I ask, uncertain, “You are sure it wasn’t too potent? Sure, he’s alive, but he seems half dead.”

“He’s just really asleep.”

Caren is next and he’s done very fast. He doesn't fight or anything.

While Marvin is checking their temperatures, taking saliva and blood samples, Natasha gestures me over to the side of the house.

I go over. “Yes?”

Natasha whispers to me, “You weren’t malicious, right?”

I raise an eyebrow.

“With the stones to his head. That’s what I am asking about.”

“No. I already said what happened.”

She stares at me. Not with hate, but like she is judging me. “I see.”

She doesn’t believe me.

“I honestly didn’t. Sure, he pisses me off… and says stuff to you that pisses me the hell off, and you never reacting piss me even more off, but I didn’t really mean to hurt him more than I needed to.”

She nods. “Okay.”

“So… do you believe me or not?”

She casually looks into the darkness like there is a passing animal before answering me, “Of course I do. Besides, his skull isn’t even fractured. He must likely had a concussion, nothing more.”

I believe that too. His head wasn’t bleeding that much from the hit with the stone, so I wasn’t too concerned.

Natahsa puts her hand around my shoulders and we walk back to Marvin.

Natasha says, “Also, you shouldn’t worry yourself with what your father tells me.”

“That's bullshit.”

“If it doesn’t affect me, it doesn't matter.”

“You are just saying that. Everyone says that. But I am sure you are bothered by his words a bit, like when the fucker said,—"

“Be quiet. I could care less what he says. As long as you are okay, I am okay, happy even.”

I click my tongue and look away. “I know.”

“Remember our promise, little missy.”

“I think it’s a dumb-ass promise. The dude is abusive.”

“A couple of insults and loud rants isn’t abuse. It’s just annoying.”

You poor soul.

I sigh. “The man once called you a ‘vlandos cocksucker’ because you didn’t like how he was talking shit about vlandos.”

And he has said far worse things than that. When it comes to being gross, you have to give it to him, that bastard is really good at it.

“I told you to not say that disgusting word.”

“It’s two words.”

“See? You’re playing semantics with my words again.”

“My bad.”

She kisses my forehead and says, “I am messing with you.”

Being treated as a kid despite technically being over thirty mentally sure is something. It's cringy.

We go back to Marvin to see how it’s going.

Marvin is standing, watching Caren in bewilderment.

I ask, “What is it?”

“No idea. It’s not like I have the right equipment to analyze his blood, see how his cells are changing and all that. The best I can do, and did is observe what I can see with the naked eye. His blood is getting darker in shades. His fingernails are getting darker too.”

He clears his throat and says, “You need to bring him to a doctor in Sundawn. Someone with the right equipment to help them out.” He then muttered. “If they can be helped.”

Natasha asks, “How would we get to the capital? We are like… over two hundred and forty miles away from it.”

“Bahmos. Ask him.”

Natasha and I immediately show disgust in our expressions. It was the same guy that has been trying to get with Natasha and nearly broke Caren’s back.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

She asks, “There's no one else?”

“You’ve seen anyone else with a green lizard? Because I haven’t.”

She slowly nod. “I see.”

Palia exchanges gaze between Natasha and Marvin and then tells Natasha in somewhat of a rush, “I will come with you, to him.”

Natasha shakes her head. “No. It’s okay.”

“Are you sure? I know how he gets and if I am at your side, I will make sure the fucker knows his place.”

“I appreciate it, but trust me, I can handle myself. You worry too much.”

Before going, she tells me, “Get everything we would need.”

“Yeah.”

**

POV: Bahmos.

knock.

What the hell…?

Again, there is another knock.

I grunt and take the pillow to cover my ears, frustrated. Whoever that wants something with me can go fuck themselves.

There is movement on the bed. I feel Mary’s knee move down my back, she’s changing her sleeping position.

She makes sounds like a person waking up from a deep sleep. “Ain’t you going to check who’s at the door…?”

“No. They can go fuck themselves.” I say then press the pillow harder on my ears.

“You invited another woman over?”

“This late at night? The fuck do I look like, a sex maniac?”

She laughs, the type of laugh someone makes when they hear some bullshit. “I am still sore, so yeah, I would say so.”

“I didn't. ”

The person knocks again, pissing me even more.

I throw the pillow to the side of the wall, where I keep my shoes.

On the shelf at Mary’s side of the bed, the lamp lights up the room. She looks over the bed, taking her bra and underwear.

“You’re going?” I ask. “Thought you were spending the early morning too.”

She raises an eyebrow as she puts on her undergarments. “You paid for the night, not the wife's experience.”

“No bonuses for me?”

“Not for free.” She pins her bra, then tries to pat her long hair back. “Maybe this one will give you that experience.”

She stands and I see a couple of whip scars on her back. She had a crazy mother. The creep of a father started showing her a little more interest than normal. Her mother noticed that and instead of bringing it up to her husband, blamed her, saying she was trying to seduce her father by wearing light clothing in the house.

She was twelve by the way. Crazy family. When my aunt was being creepy towards me, I told my mother, and, man, my mother dragged that bitch through the streets.

The duality of life.

She puts on her dress, sari, then the thirty bronze pints on the shelf and fit it in her chest pocket.

Before taking the blu-fire lamp, she says with a crude smile, “Give me twenty more, and I will stay ove—”

“Good night, Mary. Sleep well and tell your husband I said hi.”

She rolls her eyes. “See you tomorrow.”

“Same time?”

“Same time.”

She takes her fake earrings from the shelf and puts them on. Three on the right ear and two on the left, a family culture.

The knocking continues. I get up, put a tunic on, and was about to make my way to the door, but stop.

I take a look at Mary’s ass and shake my head, smiling. I know for certain Paul (her husband) can’t handle all that ass, not with his cripple ass.

With everything done, she walks past me and I just have to slap her ass, feel and watch it jiggle.

Like always, it's perfect.

I put my hand on my waist and watch the ceiling as it falls in darkness ‘cause she has the lamp.

I love having money.

I grab a cigar from my tunic’s pocket. I always keeps one in it, I spit in it, wait for the blu-dust to catch on fire for the Jile leaf in it to burn. I make my way to the front door.

Mary opens it, and then says with a huge smile before hugging the individual. “Holy shit. You told me you weren’t interested!”

Mary pulls back and then points at me. “You better pay my friend right.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I ask. I was even going for a knife, but now I am confused.

Then I hear the person’s voice. “I am not here for anything like that.”

Natasha…?

Mary gives her a look, showing she doesn’t buy it. “Sure. I will keep your little thing a secret. What made you change your mind anyway? Ah, that fat fuck was being an asshole again, wasn’t he? The audacity of these ungrateful men. He should be glad that you didn’t decide to fuck some guy and make him watch. I would do it. I would have made the bastard eat the nu—”

“Mary. I am here because I need to head to the capital Immediately.”

Mary's eyes widen in surprise. You can see the embarrassment on her face as she nervously licks her lips.

She asks, “Oh… Money reasons? Job opportunity?”

“Doctor. Family’s sick”

“Oh…” Mary turns to look at me then back at her. “Sorry. When you get back, tell me everything.” She makes a shoulder-patting motion and then goes on her own business.

Emergency huh? That’s a nice lie.

That Caren bastard must not have made enough money this time around. Not enough food on the table, starving kids, stress.

Desperate times always call for desperate measures. That’s how the world is.

I smile and then enter the kitchen, and ignore the sink that’s filled with dirty dishes, with red, yellow, and blue sauce on them.

There is even the foul smell of monkeygoat meat in one of those metal cups. A cup my father gave me after coming home from his Holvious expenditure. Shit’s light as a feather.

I tried to make goaumi, a dish the lavish restaurants in Laskdar love to serve. Bake the four-horned monkeygoat, cut the meat into pieces, then put it into a spinner, let it get turned into liquid-like, and drink it.

I messed it up somehow since it tastes horrible.

I open the cabinet and grab some canned snailcrabs. It’s preserved with a ton of salt and enough to sustain her family for about six days.

Yeah, that’s a good trade. I got no sex drive, but what the fuck, mind over body. If I got to stab it awake, then so be it.

I show up at the door, lean on the frame, and smile at the beautiful Natasha. Her long black hair, brown eyes, and pristine white skin.

Her eyes show disinterest, but I mentally shrug it off. I ask, “What’s a beautiful lady like you doing here in the middle of the night?”

“Get me to the capital. My family is sick, they need a doctor urgently.

“Please.”

… Is that supposed to be a code word?

I ask, confused, “I don’t understand.”

“What’s not to understand? I need your help. Well, transportation.”

Oh. She’s literal. Man, what the fuck? I got excited over nothing?

I let out a single laugh and shake my head. It’s like what Uncle Joe always said:

"Never get too excited to get ya dick wet. You could invite her over, and she shows up and doesn’t wanna do anything. Instead, she starts talking about her mother abusing her and shit. So you are just there with her on the couch, ‘listening’ to her rants, feeling stupid."

I ask, “So what? When do you need the help.”

“Now.”

“N–n–now?! Are you out of your fu— mind?! Now?! Do you….” I take in a deep breath and touch my temple in frustration.

Right now she hates me. If I am going to get a shot at her, I need to get on her good side.

I struggle to put on a fake smile, “Absolutely… I would love to help a beautiful mountain fairy like you.”

“But,” I say, looking up and down at her fine body, her nice size tits, perfect hips, and the thighs that are trying to be shielded by her dress. I am not certain of their size, but I can imagine it. I’ve no idea how the fuck she maintains all that fat(the sexy amount) on their family’s diet. But her husband exists. I swear, they gotta be eating that diabetic shitty plant to maintain all that weight.

She asks, annoyed, “What? But what?”

“What is it for me.”

“Get us to the capital and we can decide afterwards. I don’t have time now, as you can imagine.”

I nod. “That can work.”

Yeah, that can work very well.

I round my shoulders and tell her, “Give me a minute. I’m going to get dressed and call over my boys.”

“I see. But for what? Your boys.”

“You are not the only person that got business to do in the capital,” I reply.

“Oh. Drugs.”

I crack a smile at her. “Drug money is divine money.”

My version of what those money-loving goblins say. “All money is divine money.”

Things move fast. I cover my hair with bright green headscarf; it matches with my pants, and then I don a simple knee-length tunic black shirt.

To finish it, some white stylish gloves. Brand name, ‘Fairy Hands.’ Expensive as hell for no real reason other than gatekeeping, trying to keep the prestige.

I knock on three small houses around me, waking those inside them up. They complain and crap.

I just twirl my finger into a circle at the sky. “Make haste. Make haste.”

The youngest of them really annoyed me.

The little shit has the nerve to come out of the door with his hand around his girl’s shoulder, both half naked, trying to convince me that he’s ‘sick.’

“Uncle, my stomach hurts like hell. I was running in the toilet like it was my lifesaver.”

His Julioes girlfriend adds (with her shitty, barely understandable accent) while rubbing his back, “He nearly even shat himself.”

I ignore her and tell him, “We move in ten. Be by me before then.”

‘Sick’. As if I wasn’t hearing the moaning sounds when I knocked on the door.

Loud as hell. The little fuckers exaggerated it when I knocked on the door.

“But—”

“In ten or less,” I say before leaving. Got stomach pain but can afford to be moaning like an ogamsing woman?

My green lizard is pulled from its stable and a carriage is lined behind it. I point at it, getting Natasha’s attention. “You know, they don’t make them no more.”

“Oh.”

“Yep. Some animal government department thingy. Apparently, their heart is too close to their lungs or something.

“They don’t get tired like that. A damn Fermuia breed, the guy that named was actually a far away relative of mine. When my father told me that, I believed it. Genius runs in the family.”

“Good to hear. So, you are done preparing?”

She didn’t believe that relative part. Damn.

I answer, “Yeah.”

Julan, the same young guy who tried lying, sat behind the carriage and look at Natasha in a confused way.

He gestures at her with his finger, “Yo, Miss Natasha.”

She nods at him.

“Why’re you so calm? If Bahmos was wasting my time and my family was dying, I think I would be livid.”

His cousin, who’s near him, elbows him. “Man, shut up. You know you would be waiting patiently like a little pup.”

“Just because I play it smart doesn’t mean I wouldn’t get serious when I have to.”

I look at him in the eye. He smiles and says, “I mean that in a cool way.”

Whatever.

Natasha waited for them to stop talking before answering, “That’s just the way I am.”

Julan and Merkerthy, both nod.

Julan says, “I respect that.”

I wipe my nose and say, “Let’s get on board. We will go to Natasha’s home, collect them then we move.”