Jack waited until the village was out of sight to speak.

“Where exactly are you planning on going?” Ai had to say that it was a lot easier to concentrate on what he was saying now he had actual clothes on. The top and bottoms were both a little too short though, exposing his ankles and a slither of his midriff.

“I was going to follow the road. If we go into the forest then we’ll get lost for sure.”

Jacks expression tightened at this. “The people at either end of that road will enslave people like us. And kill your little goblin pet.”

“Well, where do you want to go?” Ai challenged.

Silence.

A small voice pipped up from behind them.

“There’s the Free City. I’ve heard humans talking about it.” The goblin had finally spoken, breaking its long silence.

No longer feeling overwhelmed with guilt?

“Where’s that?”

“It’s, uh, down the road. You pass by it on the way to one of the…” The goblin glanced at Jack. “Less accepting cities.”

“What did he say?” Jack asked Ai, not having understood a word of the Spirit People language.

“There’s a city we can go to without getting enslaved.”

“They don’t have slaves there?” Jack asked Ai.

The goblin shook its head, large pointed ears flapping slightly.

Jacks silted pupils got slimmer, if that was possible, expanding the areas of toxic green. “It can understand we’re saying and it’s still speaking in the language of the village people.”

The goblin pulled back its top lip, revealing a row of pointed teeth.

“I’m smart. I know lots of languages.” Ai had never heard a more snooty tone come out of the goblins mouth.

Ai could practically feel conflict brewing between Jack and the goblin.

“The language we speak, do all people speak it? Humans?” If they did, her ‘find people who speak the same language’ plan wasn’t going to work.

“Yes. It’s the most common language.” Damn.

“Well, speak common human from now on then. It’s rude not to.”

The goblins eyebrows crawled almost imperceptibly up its face. She was giving it orders?

“You don’t get to tell me what to do. We’re in a partnership. Remember?”

Ai didn’t have the time or patience to deal with his ‘I’m not subservient to you’ attitude.

“Do what you want, just don’t blame me when it comes back around to bite you in the ass.”

At her words the goblins prickly demeanour stayed exactly the same.

“The goblin is being difficult.” Ai told Jack as if said goblin weren’t listening to every word. “We’ll go to the road and to this ‘Free city’ from there. Once we’re there, we’ll sort things out.”

“Ok.” Jack sighed, shifting the heavy bag on his back.

He was carrying the most stuff of the three of them by far. Ai felt a little bad.

The goblin didn’t look like it gave a shit.

They began walking towards the road. In silence.

If Ai thought that it was hard going to walk through the forest before, it was nothing compared to now. Her bag seemed like it weighted a ton more with every step. She was thirsty and sweaty and the contrast between her heat the cold misty air was giving her a biting headache.

She would be in shape in no time doing this. She wished that she had a horse. Maybe two. And a cart.

Soon after that she stopped thinking and just concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. In retrospect, she probably shouldn’t have helped herself to quite so many of Tals clothes. None of them were suitable for the rainy season anyway.

The clothes she was wearing now were too revealing for her liking; a tight crop top and very tight leather leggings. By the time they set up a temporary camp, Ai was pretty sure she was going to have to peel the leggings off of herself. Ai cursed Tals fashion sense.

When they finished the three hour walk to the road, Ai found an unexpected sight waiting for her.

A very familiar very wrinkled body. A younger girl with long braided blonde hair and brown eyes. Brown eyes that were looking expectantly at their mad grandmother, who was in turn looking straight at Ai.

At least, Ai thought that she was looking at her. It was hard to tell with Celina, given the fact her eyelids sagged so much they covered her eyeballs. It’s not natural to be that old. Ai shuddered lightly.

“Tick-tock tick-tock. You’re late!” Celina tapped her unadorned wrist in a motion familiar to Ai on some basic level.

Striding closer, Ai instinctively reached for her daggers. She found the handle of a single knife instead.

“We’re leaving. We don’t have time to stay and talk.” Ai told the mad woman not entirely certain that she even understood her.

When the old woman tutted and shook her head Ai shot a pleading look at her granddaughter.

Listen the young girl mouthed at Ai.

“No no no, naughty.” Celina slapped Ais hand off the knife hilt. “I told you. So many times. You never hear. Never listen. Now, the. Boy. Is. Dead.” Each word was accentuated with a poke in Ais chest.

Ai rubbed the sore spot as Jack pulled her back and away from the mad woman. Protectively, she realised, when he inserted himself between them.

Celina threw her hands in the air, exasperated.

“The assassin thinks that she needs protecting! A fool through and through!”

“What do you want?” Ai snapped from her position beside, but slightly behind Jack.

“What I always want! The beast dead! I already told you but you never listen. Nobody ever listens.” She shook her head, crooning and tugging on her wispy gray hair. Suddenly, her head snapped up again. “Kill it today. Kill it today or we’ll all perish.”

“We?”

“I want cheese. Cheese and bread. Did you bring the cheese and bread?” Celina turned on her granddaughter, Dill, who was quite clearly empty handed.

Either way, Celina waited for a response.

“I must’ve forgotten gran.” The girl said, clearly never having been asked to bring cheese and bread in the first place.

“Always forgetting! You’re lucky I cover for you!” Celina cried, pulling bread and cheese from nowhere.

Ai just blinked. Jack appeared to be in some state of shock too. Ai wondered what he would say if he knew this was the most understandable Ai had ever seen her.

Either way, Ai remembered vaguely what Celina had told her in the alleyway. But that was impossible, she couldn’t have known about the Queen Bean all the way back then, could she?

“Here.” Celina pushed the bread and cheese towards Ai.

Somewhat uncertainly, Ai took it.

“You need your strength. Take it. Keep it. Eat it. Kill the beast, or Dill will die. Kele will die. Tal will die. Brandi will die…” And so she continued to list names Ai had never heard before, others she had heard mentioned in conversation.

Ai noticed that she didn’t list her own name.

Dill looked like she had just seen a ghost. She turned her small vulnerable frame and big, liquid brown eyes on Ai and Ai knew she couldn’t say no.

Maybe this wasn’t a mad quest. Maybe Celina really had fought the beast, all that time ago. It felt like a lifetime. She had bought it up long before anybody else had ever found any corpses. And the corpses had looked old too.

Maybe, just maybe, Celina wasn’t mad. Maybe Dill was right, and she should listen.

But she wasn’t on her own anymore, and while she was glad for it, it also meant she couldn’t make a decision and run off.

She didn’t know what Jack would say, but she highly doubted that the goblin would be in favour.

“Yes, yes now you listen. Dill, we need to go back. You shouldn’t leave the village. It isn’t safe, there’s monsters about.” Celina grabbed her granddaughter’s hand.

A few moments later, they were lost between the trees.

Jack turned to her, eyes full of questions.