Motivated by their escape, Liza and company marched into the night without rest. However, there’s only so much that motivation can do for you. After hours walking, their eyelids grew heavy and their muscles screamed from pain. Eliot and Boro were the only ones with energy to spare – as was usually the case.

“Guys… guys, I can’t… I can’t keep going anymore,” said Ben.

His legs shaking, Ben fell to his knees and lay down on the ground. Grunting, he tried to stretch his legs to alleviate the pain, but even that felt like a monumental task. He just lay there, breathing roughly.

“I’m spent too, though I wish we could keep going for a bit longer. Well, whatever, let’s sleep here for the rest of the night. We’ll move again at first light,” said Liza, shaking her head.

Liza plopped to the ground and began rummaging through her linen sack, searching it by touch till she found a group of small leather packages. Picking six of them up, she threw one to Ben and two to Eliot and Boro each, keeping one for herself.

“That’s the food. Eat up.”

The meal was a combination of stale bread, dried-up fruits and jerky. Their appearance was terrible, their consistence was disgusting, and their taste was non-existent (saved the salted jerky). They ate in silence. Ben felt this was quite possibly the worst meal he ever had, even Popis’ paltry offerings that night were much better than what he was currently chewing on.

[This is travel food, huh. Oh boy, this will be a torture to get used to.]

At some point, Eliot and Boro walked away into the night.

“Hey, where are you guys going?” asked Ben.

“Leave them be, they’ll be back eventually.”

“Really? But why are they leaving?”

“You know how much they eat, they would never be happy with only two portions of rations.”

“Oh.”

After he was done eating, Ben gave a long sigh and looked up at the starry sky. There were no constellations he was familiar with amongst all the shining dots that littered the firmament.

[I’ve never understood how constellations got their names. No matter how you link the stars, they never quite make a drawing of what they’re supposedly called. It’s beyond me how Ptolemy thought that Taurus looked like a bull. Only a few of them are somewhat understandable, like Gemini and Libra…]

Lost in the fog of his own mind, Ben soon fell into slumber. Although Liza was tired too, she fought the urge to close her eyes and sleep. She scanned the darkness around them, waiting for something. Only when Eliot and Boro returned – their mouths smeared in blood – did she finally feel relieved and managed to shut her eyes.

A few hours later, they all woke up with the stinging rays of sunlight clashing against their closed eyelids. While Liza stretched and helped Eliot with his gear, Ben started to roll around in the grass, crying silently.

[Why is this happening? Why am I here? How could all of this be real?! I can’t take it! I wasn’t made for this! And what about my parents? They must be crying to sleep every night, worried about their only son that disappeared from the face of the Earth!]

Liza watched the little show with interest. Done venting his feelings, Ben ignored her questioning glance, sniffled and prepared his stuff to departure. Another day of endless marching had begun. In this fashion they walked tirelessly, stopping only for brief periods of rest and to eat meals. At dusk Ben collapsed again, signalling the end of another day of travel.

“I can’t believe how tired I was yesterday, I don’t even remember when I fell asleep,” said Ben, taking a bite of his salted jerky.

“That’s normal, you were a spoiled noble from where you came from, right?”

“What, me? No way! I’m just a regular guy.”

“Really? I was sure you had blue blood, given your weird clothes, the weird stuff you say – well, the weird stuff that thing speaks for you – and your overall… cleanliness,” said Liza, rather begrudgingly.

“Ah, I can see why you would think so. Where I come from this is normal though, most people are like me.”

“Must be nice, but I have to say…” said Liza with a smile, “you do look good with mud smeared on your face, hahahaha. Now you’re just like us, lowly peasants.”

Ben shook his head, smiling wryly. It seemed like Liza still thought of him like a sheltered noble of some kind. After dinner, Liza checked and redressed all their wounds, nodding approvingly about their recovery.

“Hey, yesterday I just blacked out, but shouldn’t we take turns to stand guard?”

“No can do, imagine explaining that to Eliot. Besides, I used to travel alone before, so I’m used to sleeping light and staying alert.”

“That must be lonely… and dangerous.”

“Yeah, it was. You don’t have to worry though, if something managed to sneak upon Eliot, it wouldn’t matter if we were awake or not, we would be dead.”

[That’s not exactly comforting…] thought Ben.

Liza tousled Eliot’s hair in a lovingly manner. It had been almost a month now since she began traveling with him and she couldn’t help but have tender feelings for the young man. Not mentioning the fact he’d saved her life, she couldn’t help but see herself in his childish, mismatching behaviour. It was endearing, but also worried her about the troubles he could get into.

Early in the next morning they departed again. It was a repetition of the two previous days – walking along the plains, climbing small hills and resting here and there. Ben was sorely disappointed. He thought a fantasy world would be fascinating in all its aspects, but he soon found out that traveling like this wasn’t much different than walking around in the remote countryside.

In the afternoon they came across a small brook where they took the opportunity to rest and refill their canteens. Ben was massaging his sore legs and taking in the view when he noticed a small head that seemed to have popped up from the tall grass. He was perplexed, but before he could say anything another six heads popped up.

They were ugly, gnarled heads of a greenish hue with distorted facial features and pointy, flappy ears. Goblins. The word raced through his mind at lightning speed and he was part delighted, part scared, and part disgusted. The goblins ran at them while shouting and waving their weapons – sticks and makeshift spears.

“Guys, goblins! Real goblins! Ugly as hell goblins!”

Ignoring Ben’s excitement, Liza let loose an arrow, hitting a charging goblin in the leg. Eliot got up and walked towards the goblins slowly, seemingly uninterested, while Boro flew in for the kill. In the span of a few moments all the goblins besides the one Liza shot in the leg were dead. Ben gasped at the carnage and the ease which the enemies were dispatched.

“Are goblins this weak?”

“It depends. If they don’t have sharp tools they are annoying more than anything. The problem is they never attack unless they have the advantage in numbers. A regular person will have trouble dealing with two or three goblins alone, whether they’ve sharp tools or not.”

“I see. Do they usually pop up from the ground like that?”

“They don’t pop up from the ground, that’s only what it looked like. They probably made their burrows near this brook where they can get water easily.”

“Hum… What the heck! Cannibal!”

Ben fell to the ground on his ass, his hand trembling and pointing at Eliot who was nibbling on a goblin’s heart. The only surviving goblin was terrified and began crawling away slowly in a futile attempt to escape.

“He’s eating their heart, he’s a mon…”

“He’s what?! Huh, say it!” asked Liza, fuming with anger.

The interruption and harsh tone helped Ben to calm down a little. He assessed Liza’s mood and dangerous glare and shut his mouth. He thought for a spell and decided to measure his response.

“He’s brave for eating raw meat?” said Ben in an unconvincing manner.

Feeling she had overreacted, Liza let out a long sigh.

“Look, Eliot’s circumstances are complicated. He was living inside a dangerous forest when I met him. From what I’ve gathered, he lived there alone for years, probably since he was a kid. How he survived is beyond me. Just be careful how you treat or speak about him, all right? And don’t worry, I’d never let him eat the remains of someone from the common races. If you can’t accept it no matter what, feel free to leave.”

Ben gulped and nodded. Leaving was not an option he was going to consider, there was no way he could make it alone. He couldn’t help but look back at the scene with morbid fascination. A young man and his dragon feasting on flesh and blood. Although it still disgusted him somewhat, there was now a trace of pity and wonder in his gaze.

[I thought he wasn’t quite right in the head at first, but it turns out he’s a real-life Tarzan! Who would have thought? That explains a lot of things.]

“Not leaving? Good! Now come with me, it’s time you started learning how to deal with things here in Flanac.”

Liza’s words brought Ben back from his reverie. He followed her till they were in front of the last surviving goblin who was crawling on the floor, trying to get away. Ben felt tremendous amount of pity for the creature that was doing its utmost to live on. Liza drew one of her long knives and put it on Ben’s hands.

“Kill it.”

“What? No way!”

Ben staggered back and dropped the knife. Liza shook her head, picked the knife back up from the ground and put it on his palm again. This time she clasped her hand firmly on his, not letting him drop the weapon. She forced his hand towards the goblin. Terrified, Ben struggled against her, but he wasn’t nearly strong enough. Slowly but surely, the knife dug into the creature’s neck, making blood gush on their hands and arms.

Through the knife, Ben felt clearly the resistance of the creature’s skin and how the blade scrapped against its small throat. It gave him goose bumps and made him shiver. With the deed done, Liza finally let off her grasp on him and cleaned the blood from her own hand. Completely shaken, Ben fell to his knees and stared emptily at the dead goblin, then at his bloody hand. Feeling sick, he doubled to the side and threw up.

“Take your time. We’ll move again when you’re ready.”

Liza left Ben alone and went to search the goblins for any valuables. Finding nothing of worth, she cleaved their ears, cleaned them on the brook and stored them in a jar. They could serve as proof of extermination and were something she could exchange for some coin at the guild.

Ben remained in a daze for a long time. It was Liza that forced his hand, but that did nothing to ease the turmoil of emotions he was going through. After much though he decided the least he could do was bury the goblin he’d killed, that would appease his heart somewhat.

It didn’t take long for him to realize that would be impossible. Without the proper tools it would take ages for him to dig a shallow grave for the creature, something he couldn’t do when they were on the run. Next, he thought about cremating it, but he lacked the right materials for that too. Finally, he decided that the only thing he could do was cover the goblin with something.

He took his own blanket from the bag and draped it over the small monster, saying a little prayer afterwards. Liza watched everything silently and though she thought that was a waste of a perfectly fine blanket, she didn’t say a thing. She knew this was important for Ben to move on.

[What have I got myself into… Eliot and Boro have no restraint, they kill without batting an eye. Ben on the other hand is a sissy that can’t harm a fly. I can see more stressful days on the horizon.]

The rest of the journey was a blur to Ben, his mind always wandering back to that moment when the knife cut into the goblin’s throat. He was so out of it that he didn’t even feel the fatigue and pain that ailed him the last couple days. He only snapped out of it when he heard Liza speaking with joy.

“Kelna village! We made it! We can lay low here till things calm down.”