The grass whipped at his thighs as he ran. Blackthorne sought to keep pace with the invisible girl who'd been taunting him, but it proved to be a nearly impossible task. All he could do was follow the trail in the grass in the hopes of staying in her proximity.

His movements were roundabout as she led him on a merry chase, and yet no onions or other wildlife threatened him during that time. It was as though the monsters knew better than to interfere.

After what felt like an hour of jogging endlessly through the grass, Blackthorne abruptly reached the end of the grassland and found himself standing on the edge of a ditch. The road was just beyond.

"Dammit," muttered Blackthorne. If she was on the road there was no way for him to track her reliably. The chase was over.

Of course, there was a bigger concern as well. "And now my dumb ass is lost, too..."

Which direction did he take when heading back toward town? He looked around intently for a moment, but realized that he was too far out to see anything clearly except for grass.

"Could use that, maybe?" he asked no one in particular while looking at the only thing in the area taller than himself or the grass. It was a large rock on the side of the road.

Curious about the reason for its existence, but even more curious about his current location, he wandered over to see if he could stand on it to take a better look around.

His hopes rose higher when he discovered the rock to be steady and easily climbed. At the top he took in a breath of fresh air and looked around.

At first, he saw nothing but grass and more grass. However, after scanning the area for a brief time he did notice something off in the distance.

"A farm house?" he asked curiously. Uncertain due to the distance, he did not know if it was actually a farm house or if it was his eyes playing tricks on him. He could only see the hint of a roof, after all.

"Well, nowhere else to go. Maybe there will be someone there to give me directions," he said before hopping down. The moment he took his first step toward his destination a soft *Wha-Ping!* sound echoed through the air.

"Seriously? What's that noise about?" he asked himself. It happened randomly at times, but mostly when traveling.

The walk to the supposed farm house took quite a while. Blackthorne hummed to himself to pass the time, but it was difficult to stay motivated. After he'd walked for what felt like hours, he began to suspect that he'd passed the house by entirely.

His suspicions proved incorrect once he crested a small hill. The farm house that he'd suspected earlier turned out to be real. From his current location it was well off the road, and seemed a bit run down. In fact, he could see that it was falling down in places.

"Is there even anyone living there?" he asked curiously before setting off toward his goal.

Blackthorne walked quickly through the grass and soon arrived at the dilapidated building. From the fact that grass and vines had grown up all around the place, and the partially fallen roof, it was obvious that the place was abandoned.

*Wha-Ping!* The strange noise returned once more to remind him that it existed, though its true nature remained a mystery.

"Maybe there's something here that I can use at least?" he asked the empty house. The likelihood that the place held anything of interest was small due to how long it would have sat empty, but it was worth a try.

A single story building made of made, it had seen better days. The shutters on the nearby window hung loosely. One remained attached to the building by a single hinge. There was no glass in the window beyond, but someone in the past had opted to nail a board up from the inside to keep people from seeing the interior of the building.

The white paint on the walls flaked off as he knocked on the front door. It would impolite to enter without knocking. Sure, the place looked abandoned, but appearances could deceive.

When no one answered, he tried to door knob. It turned easily but to his surprise the door did not open. "Weird... Is it locked from the inside?"

Despite the noise he'd made, no one came to investigate the source so he assumed to building to be empty. "Guess I'll find another way inside."

Blackthorne scouted the exterior of the house and noticed that all of the doors and windows were either boarded up or locked tight. The roof was sunken in and falling down in one section, but otherwise the building was surprisingly sturdy.

"Maybe it's not abandoned, and the owner wants to repair it?" he asked thoughtfully. Either way, it was a bust for him. Unless he decided to break down a door or bust in a window there was no visible way inside. If the place were truly abandoned it would have been one thing, but breaking into a tightly locked house did not sit right with him.

As he turned to leave, however, something caught his eye. It was the grass, or rather the strange parting in the grass that signaled to his senses that something passed through recently.

"I haven't been over there..." he said slowly. The onions left trails but small ones, and they were hard to find once he looked away. This was a larger displacement of the grass, like something much larger than an onion had been dragged through the area.

Curiosity piqued, Blackthorne opted to follow the trail. He did not need to go far. The trail led to a dead-end in the grass. There was a slightly widened circular area at the end of the trail, but it did not progress further.

"Weird," he said. Whatever was dragged here seemed to disappear in this area.

He spent a moment looking around to see if he could find anything, but nearly missed a small piece of steel partially hidden in the grass. "What's this?"

The moment he noticed that piece of metal, what looked to be a dirt caked hinge, he began to notice other irregularities. The grass and dirt were slightly raised in a specific area.

Blackthorne felt around the oddly featured area and soon discovered a handle that was obscured by the dirt and grass. He pulled on it a little and caused a slight metallic clank to emanate upward.

His head tilted sideways, he began to brush away the grass around the area near the handle, and discovered a well-hidden sliding lock. He unlocked it and pulled the handle upward.

Immediately, he was assaulted by the stench of urine and shit. Sounds that he could not hear before began making their presence known. Someone was crying.

"P-please goddess..." pleaded a soft feminine, but childish, voice. The sound of crying echoed through the air once more.

Eyes narrowed, suspicions flaring, Blackthorne slipped down into the room below by way of a set of simple wooden stairs. The sound from before returned again. *Wha-Ping!*

He ignored the weird sound and continued forward. The room under the ground looked to be some sort of root cellar if the broken and discarded bits of roots and jars were to be believed.

The rattling and clank of chains reached his ears not long after. Someone was moving down in the dark. Light from the opened cellar door provided the only light in the room, albeit not much.

"P-please, goddess of night, send me an angel... t-take me from my plight..." whimpered the voice once more.

Blackthorne rounded a corner and saw the vague shape of something that set his teeth on edge. There was a little girl lying on a pile of grass. Even in the darkness he could see that she was chained to the wall by several chains.

He glared hotly at the scene. It was everything he'd never wished to see in this life. His chest rose and fell rapidly as he began to hyperventilate. His fingers curled into fists so tight that the knuckles went completely white. His entire body began to shake and shudder.

Images from the past rose up unbidden within his mind. The sight of his little sister's body, and the blood...

The body of the tiny girl on the grass pile bucked softly and she whispered out another prayer to her dark goddess. Blackthorne, having seen more than enough, forced the images inside his head to go away for the moment.

Almost gently, he called out, "Hello?"

The girl bolted upright and turned her whole body to look at him. Her eyes shined brightly in the dark.

For a moment they stared at each other, both surprised at what they were seeing. Blackthorne saw a little girl with glowing red eyes. The girl saw a human whom she'd not met.

Blackthorne moved closer to her, his eyes going wide briefly before they narrowed angrily. She scooted back a little in alarm. The sight of him was quite terrifying, even if she held out the tiniest bit of hope now.

"Damn, can barely see..." he said after a moment. The rage on his face dissipated into a dull omni-present anger just before he remembered that he had something for the occasion. He took out a torch stone and activated it.

The little girl hissed a little and closed her eyes. Unused to the light at this point it was visibly painful to her.

Blackthorne hesitated briefly when he got a good look at her. Ears that were long and tapered to a point, dusky brown skin, and eyes slightly too big for her head, she bore all the ear marks of an elf.

"W-what are you doing?" she asked him timidly, before curling up into a fetal ball against the back wall. It was as far away from him as she could get.

Whispers in the back of his mind began to play havoc with his senses. The sight of a frightened little girl huddling in the corner awoke something within him once more.

"Let's get those chains off," seething anger in his voice, and a tight mask of rage on his face growing tighter by the moment. At this point it was all he could do to keep any semblance of control.

"Really... You, really?" she asked, her voice rising up.

He glared at her briefly, not meaning to do so. She shrunk back into the corner even further, now uncertain that he meant to help her at all.

With a shuddering breath, Blackthorne closed his eyes and fought back against the rage. He did not know the details, but it was obvious what was happening here. He could not help his sister. She was gone. He could help this little girl, but only if he could keep his shit together long enough to do something other than terrify her.

"Yes," he said simply after reigning in his anger a little.

Timidly, she tried to smile at him. Brusquely, he nodded to her then began to do what needed to be done. As much as he wanted to console her at the moment, there was no time to waste. Who knew when the people who'd done this would return? Also, he was not exactly someone prepared to give comfort and ease to anyone at the moment, even someone who needed it desperately.

He looked to where the chains where attached and realized that they were a series of loops that all connected at a single point. The bolt that held them fast was exceptionally thick and strong, but after checking the connections out, he realized the he did not need to break the bolt. If he could break the part that the bolt was attached to, it would be all the same.

Blackthorne looked to her then said, "Look, I'm going to try to break this chain. Try to remain calm, and we'll get out of here."

She nodded rapidly at him then hugged herself tightly. The moment he struck out at her bonds with his blade, she closed her eyes and buried her face in her knees. Tears fell freely from her eyes, even as her girlish cries acted in counter-point with his sword strokes. Was this really happening? Was it a dream? Was she actually going to be set free?