Swiping away the menu with my horn, I sigh a breath of relief, knowing that the charade is about to come to an end. That soon only one color of the rainbow will remain. All of this nonsense, all of this spiel taking place here, it’ll finally come to an end now that the hero-party is here. Out of their group, only one would be welcome here. Only the hero, perfect as he is, would be welcome here. But the rest of them, the rest of them are flawed creatures. Human. Elf. All of them are filled and covered with imperfections and red and goo and viscera and bile. All of them are flawed, all of them are disgusting. Just wretched, twisting slabs of meat that come together to build the shapes of a man, of women. That’s all adventurers are.

  A single, large, disembodied eye belonging to a flower floats over the river emerging out from the hatch of the miller’s mill. It bobs in the gentle current, staring up at me before vanishing beneath the bridge. A small pool of red trickles out around it, staining the water, before it disappears out of my sight. Goodbye Missus Buttercup. Goodbye Mr. Blue-bird. Goodbye Jelly-jelly. Turning away, I cross over the bridge and return down the way instinctively to continue on my route, to continue to deliver any who are too tired to keep up the charade to the miller. To return them to the darkness, where nobody can see them anymore.

  That is my role here, we all know it. We all know what happens in the mill. But none of us say it. None of us talk about it, because even if we know, we’ll still tell the miller if someone else isn’t beautiful. Because it’s better them, than us. Even if we are ourselves fueling the cycle that will destroy us too eventually, we’ll still play the game until then. Because that’s what you’re supposed to do. Because even if we do, the truth is that we don’t want to, the truth is that we’re too afraid to do anything else. Or to do anything about it to begin with. It’s a self-feeding machine that any of us could have tried to stop at any time.

  When someone is too tired to keep going, when someone loses faith, when someone becomes imperfect, when they stop dancing, smiling, laughing or singing along to the song of the miller’s calliope; that’s when it ends. That’s when you go to the mill, even if you don’t really want to. You’re in so deep at that point that to not go to the mill would seem absurd. Besides, if you don’t go you’ll end up making a scene. Wouldn’t want that, it would be rude to upset people by letting them see your flaws. So we all go. Everyone goes to the mill. Nobody stops and says, hey, why are we doing this again? No. No, the machine has been running like this for so long that nobody bothers to question it. It seems like too much for just one creature to be able to stop anyways, so nobody tries. Nobody bothers to try. It’s beautiful, isn’t it?

  I don’t know what happens inside of the mill. I don’t know what the miller looks like or what his machinations entail. I just know that I’m secretly glad that he didn’t let me inside today. Even if it means I’m the only one who gets to come back. Even if I myself hand-delivered the others to the miller, which makes me complicit. I’m still glad I get to come back. They knew what would happen to them there, so in my mind at least, my guilt is lessened. That’s fair, right? Right? Where am I going?

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  I stop in my tracks on the road, now inside of the blue forest again. Looking up, I look at the now entirely empty nest of Mr. Blue-bird. It was full a week ago. Then slowly, but surely, the whistling stopped. The calliope kept churning out more noise, but the forest became quieter and quieter every day. And every day I would walk past here and take another tiny blue-bird down to the miller’s mill. Hand-delivered. Until one day there was just the one left. Just Mr. Blue-bird on his own. His entire family is gone, because he didn’t fight. Because he accepted the system and let it swallow his family, let it swallow himself; perhaps out of guilt. But swallowed he was, nonetheless.

  Is that my fault? Am I in the wrong here because I help the machine to turn? I’m just trying to survive, aren’t I? Just trying not to be ground up by the mill as well, aren’t I? Isn’t this what I have to do for that to not happen? I hate this place. This is hell. This is a hell that I’ve helped create. I hate it here. I hate this floor. I hate the miller. I hate the mill. I hate every last one of those dancing, singing idiots who aren't brave enough to break forward on their own. Who isn’t brave enough to stop the song and the dance. To stop the music. That includes myself. I feel lonely, but that’s good. The thing that I am deserves to be lonely, right?

I keep walking forward through the forest, averting my eyes from the nest.

  A voice calls out from the side, breaking the silence. I turn my head and look at the thief standing under the shade of a swaying blue tree. She is waving to me with a happy smile. Ah. There’s that word again. Happy. But I believe it when I see her. It’s real. That smile. There’s no song and dance or any of that. No bobbing or jigs or skipping. No flowers and rainbows and magic. No. It’s just a smile. She sees me and she smiles and she waves. Ah. I still feel a bit of panic when I see her though, just between you and me, guy. Some old instincts taking over telling me to run. But I stay where I am and tell them that those feelings are from times past now. Look at that smile, would you? Ah, I’m so jealous! Could you imagine what life must be like if you could just look at someone and smile because of that, every time you see them? It must be so much easier.

  She jogs closer towards me, her eyes bright and wide as she looks at me bedazzled. I can’t understand her words today, I guess unicorn’s can’t speak elf, or is she speaking human? Hmm. Dunno. But I don’t need to understand her words. The astounded look in her eyes as she runs towards me and wraps her arms around my thick neck says enough. I stand still, feeling awkward and undeserving of such attention. Though I also still don’t want it. But I think we’re past what I want at this point, tell you what. Her expression is like that of a child’s though, as she pets my sleek, white coat which shimmers with each stroke of her hand. I guess she likes unicorns. Fair enough. Somebody has to.

  She buries her face in my side and takes a long whiff. Ah. There it is. I was wondering when she was going to start acting weird today. Pulling her face back, she scrunches her nose and lets out a sneeze, a puff of inhaled glitter flying from her face. Much of it is still sticking to her cheeks. She laughs and looks back at me and for the first time I recall seeing, her obsessed stare is interrupted by a single blink. She pats me on the side and then jumps up onto my back. Uh, sure. Okay. I feel like I’m not being asked nearly enough though if it’s okay for someone to mount me. No, not like that. But whatever. I guess I’m not big on personal space anymore these days anyways.

Leaning forward, she wraps one arm around my neck and with the other points past my face in a direction that I suppose that I am meant to go towards. So I turn and head down the way she shows me, doing as I’m told. What else is there to do?