I woke up from a sound sleep in Rulan’s arms and her staring at me intently, not really staring at me but more like through me. She looked like she had an in-depth discussion about the meaning of life. I hadn’t seen her like this before, and I wondered what she could be thinking. She thought so hard that she didn’t even notice me waking up.

“Where is your mind off to this morning?” I asked softly, and she snapped back to herself looking panicked and guilty.

“NOWHERE!” Rulan said too loudly, and too fast. I had my head close to hers where we were laying on the ground, so I flinched back from her loud yelling. “Sorry,” she said in a whisper now. “I wasn’t thinking about anything at all, stop looking at me like that,” she looked away from me after saying this. Why was she so defensive? I had just wondered what she had been thinking about, no need to get upset.

“Forget it. We should return to the tribe anyway. We have important information for the elders. Even if they don’t believe it,” I said and started to rise, but was pulled down again to lay beside Rulan.

“Can’t we stay here for a while, when I lie beside you I can almost forget,” Rulan started to say but cut herself off abruptly before continuing. She laid her head on my chest and sighed contentedly. “I’m thinking about keeping my braid this long, it certainly came in handy,” she said and looked up at me, wiggling her eyebrows up and down at her terrible joke. I almost laughed at that. It indeed had been useful during our lovemaking. Something was off about her, as I stroked her back her muscles tensed. I told myself to focus and managed to stay on course. It felt almost like she was trying to distract me from something. Usually, I would have been glad to go a few more rounds with her, but this new weapon of the goblins, whatever it was, needed to be taken seriously, the elders must know.

“Believe me when I say that I would love to fuck you some more,” I said, and she actually blushed at that. “But I have delayed long enough. We were originally supposed to be back by nightfall. Don’t you want to be a hunter?” I asked and forcibly rose from the ground. I took Rulan with me as she hugged me around my neck, hanging from it.

“Yes, of course, I do. But you can’t go back right now. You just can’t, alright,” Rulan said, still hanging from my neck, a desperate look in her eyes staring into mine.

“Why can’t we go back?”

“I can’t say, you are not supposed to be there yet. Oh by Ulissis, that was probably too much to say,” Rulan said before a red streak of light came rushing out of the forest, and entered Rulan’s body. She arched her back, her hands, free of my neck, and screamed an agonized scream into the air. She fell to the ground, her body writhing in pain as her tail tore up bushes and plants. She seemed to lose consciousness soon after, and I dove down to the ground to see if she was alright.

“RULAN! Rulan are you alright,” I shouted, but she didn’t respond. She seemed to be alive at least as her chest rose and fell rhythmically, and as I felt for her pulse, I found it strong if a bit fast but that was to be expected. I rose up quickly as a goblin stepped into view, I hadn’t noticed it earlier I must have been to busy with Rulan. But as my tongue flicked out of my mouth, I still couldn’t smell any goblins close by only rot trap, and lots of it. Rot trap was a carnivorous flower that used its foul smell to attract flys and insects, which it would then trap and digest. Had this goblin covered itself in rot trap to mask its scent? It looked like an ordinary goblin with a loincloth and evil smile, showing off jagged yellow teeth. Why would it be smiling like that, it has walked right into its own death. Then it held out its hand towards me, holding some sort of red crystal. It was fist-sized, for a goblin, and it pulsed with its red light faster and faster.

The light shot out of the crystal and into my body, incredible pain assaulted me, and I thought I heard someone scream in the distance. That voice was me I realized as the pain suddenly stopped, and I got back to my senses.

“What… what was that?” I panted, my voice raw from the screaming. I didn’t expect an answer, but I still got one.

Me has you now snake lady, just as lady friend on the ground there. The voice seemed to be speaking directly in my mind. It seemed to be the goblin speaking in my head. For at the same time, and with the same voice, the goblin jumped up and down in glee, speaking aloud in its goblin tongue. I looked down at Rulan laying on the ground beside me, her eyes closed, breathing softly. A shape had appeared on her forehead, as red as the gem in the goblins hand, made up of crisscrossed lines and circles. I knew very well that it hadn’t been there before, it must have something to do with the light that entered her, and had now entered me. What had Rulan said before collapsing? Something about me not being supposed to be there yet, did she mean the tribe? Had she kept me from going back there for some reason? It must be this little goblins doing, Rulan would never willingly betray her own people, no Naga would.

“What have you done to her, what have you done with Rulan!?” I asked, almost shouting.

Stop that snapping and snarling me no understand, only annoy. The voice said in my head, and my mouth snapped shut by itself. No matter how hard I tried my mouth stayed closed, I could not disobey this little goblin even if the order was inadvertent. You become slave, lucky, least not die like rest. Die like rest? Was that why I wasn’t supposed to go to the village? Had the goblins planned an attack and used Rulan to keep me away.

I lunged at the goblin, still unable to open my mouth but I still had my tail. Before I could wrap it around the little creature, the voice in my head shouted STOP, and I did. My body became frozen around the goblin, in the beginning, fazes of wrapping it up in my coils. So close if I could just get a bit closer, but I could not move a single muscle, what would happen to us now, and what had happened back at the village? Could the goblins have attacked, it was an alien and strange thought. I mean they were only goblins, but I could see no other reason for them to want to keep me away. I wasn’t just the best hunter, but a good fighter as well. The elders were unaware of their ice and couldn’t prepare the warriors. The goblins would almost certainly be underestimated.

The little goblin was dancing and cackling in the circle of my tail, why in the name of everything did I need to listen to this foolish creature, a moment ago it had been full of terror but was now dancing joyfully as if it didn’t have a care in the world. It had only told me to stop talking not to keep my mouth shut so tightly that it hurt. I could suddenly feel my jaw loosening, and I grabbed at the opportunity, thinking about what the goblin had actually said. I could not eat or hunt effectively, and surely the goblin did not want that from a slave. I regained control of my mouth. The goblin hadn’t noticed anything, to busy reveling in its own glee.

My head was above it, and I opened, letting my fangs elongate. I pushed some venom out of them, droplets formed and fell to the ground and onto the goblin. It stopped dancing and looked up in confusion, so I pushed more venom out the droplets being absorbed by the goblin's skin. It shrieked as its legs gave out and it fell to the ground, losing its grip on the pulsing crystal, it rolled away from me toward where Rulan was lying and stopped halfway between us. The goblin was lying still on the ground, fully paralyzed now, but its voice still sounded in my head.

Dumb snake, both stuck now, nothing can do, was that true, would we be stuck here now forever? Couldn’t the goblin command me anymore? It wasn’t doing that at the moment at least. Maybe it needed to hold the gem for that to work. We would at least be stuck until my venom wore off and the goblin retrieved the crystal, or it died. My venom was only a paralytic, but weak creatures sometimes found it hard to breathe under its effects and would die from lack of air. Would the command be undone if it did? Or would I be stuck here with no one to undo my frozen state? No, the crystal was necessary, without it the goblin was just a regular goblin. I thought about how I had regained control of my mouth. I was still mute I noticed, the goblin had only told me to stop, that didn’t mean my whole body would freeze. I slowly regained control of my body, but I was still stuck in the same position. I could flex and move a little bit but nothing more. I looked at the crystal and focused intently on it if I could just get to it. This little monster would have no power over me, probably.

I was so focused on the gem that at first I didn’t notice the rock that smashed down on it, splintering it in a thousand little shard. I was brought back to myself by the impact, and I fell to the ground, my body completely mine again. The hand holding the rock belonged to Rulan, she let out a fierce cry after destroying the gem, it was not a cry of agony this time but one of release it seemed to me. When she was done the tears came, and she broke down crying on the ground.

“What have I done, I deserve the worst fate imaginable,” Rulan said through her sobs. I had risen myself during this time and was moving towards her. I lifted her from the ground and hugged her in a firm embrace. She cried even harder, returning my embrace. After some time she calmed herself, extracting her face from my bosom. The red symbol on her forehead was completely gone, I noticed. I touched her forehead finding only soft and smooth skin. She felt the spot herself, smiling in relief.

“Oh, thank the ancestors I’m finally free of their filth,” she said, her body relaxing as if a great weight had been lifted.

“How long?” she frowned at the question, the familiar crease appearing between her eyebrows.

“About five days, but we don’t have time to stand and talk. We need to get back, or we risk losing everyone,” I nodded gravely at this, having wanted to return some time ago. We donned our leather armor again, Rulan’s thoroughly dry now. I strapped on my shield even though there was a hole in it, figuring that it could be useful in a fight. I would have to stop by the armory for a weapon or make a crude one on the way. Rulan still had her bow and arrow, which she strung in preparation.

“What do you want to do with the goblin?” I asked pointing to it still lying paralyzed on the ground.

“Leave it to me,” she said and approached the creature. I felt little remorse for it since I was almost enslaved by it, Rulan even less so. But it was still a gruesome sight watching her remove the head from the body. You usually needed some type of sharp object, but Rulan made it look easy using only her tail.