"How is it even possible?" I muttered to myself, staring down at the thick iron chains.
The idea that a young girl could have literally chewed her way through heavy metal links was mind-boggling.
I turned around to look at the elf girl. "When did you find out?"
"Since yesterday," Eli replied softly, keeping her eyes cast downward.
She knew? A sudden prickle of irritation flared up in my chest. She knew since yesterday, and she didn't tell me? What else has she been hi—wait. I caught myself, forcing my breath to slow. Why am I getting so upset? Why am I angry?
I looked up and caught the expressions of the group standing before me. Both of the kids were shrinking back with wide, frightened eyes, and Eli looked completely wracked with guilt, deliberately avoiding eye contact with me.
I took a deep breath, consciously smoothing out my features. So what if she ran away? Honestly, maybe it's for the better. I can't realistically take care of an entire army of people out here. Maybe I'm just upset because I felt like she didn't trust me after everything I did. But looking at it another way, if she's wary of people, she'll be less likely to trust any other humans she runs into, which means a lower chance of getting caught again.
My anger drained away, replaced by standard pragmatism.
"No worries," I said aloud.
The sudden shift in my voice caused all three of them to snap their heads up to look at me.
"You... you aren't angry?" Kyo asked, her voice small and tentative.
"I wasn't angry, just a bit upset," I said.
I dropped down onto my knees so I was at her eye level, offering her a reassuring smile as I gently patted her head.
"Though, honestly, maybe it really is for the better. I can't exactly take care of a whole army of kids out here."
Hearing those words, Kyo and Nyoko traded a wide-eyed, bewildered glance before turning back to me.
"You... you are going to take care of us?" Kyo asked, her voice trembling slightly.
Nyoko stepped forward, coming to stand right beside his sister. "Are you sure? You don't even know us."
"First of all, I do know you," I countered playfully, pointing a finger at each of them in turn.
"You are Kyo, and you are Nyoko. Second of all... obviously I'm taking care of you. I thought that was pretty much implied from the first day we met. Well, at least until we can find your family—or unless you guys just don't want me around."
Before the last sentence could even fully leave my mouth, both kids launched themselves at me, wrapping their arms around my neck in a fierce, desperate group hug.
I stumbled slightly under the sudden weight, catching them as Kyo buried her face into my shoulder, starting to tear up.
"Wha... what happened?" I stammered, looking up over their heads at Eli, completely bewildered by the sheer intensity of their reaction.
"Why are they doing this?"
"Well... they honestly thought you were going to leave them behind," Eli explained, her voice carrying a heavy tinge of sadness. "It is incredibly uncommon for a human to willingly help beastfolk."
"Why, though?" I asked, slowly and gently easing the two crying kids off my chest so I could breathe.
"Is it because of some past war? Like the ones between elves and humans?"
"No..." Kyo interrupted, wiping her eyes. "It's because of your god."
"Your god doesn't like any non-human beings," Nyoko added grimly.
I blinked, momentarily thrown off by the revelation.
"Well, I don't have a god. Especially not a god that is a racist."
Eli's eyes narrowed slightly in curiosity. "Is it because you don't remember anything?"
"I don't think so," I answered smoothly.
But internally, a cold sweat broke out. Crap. I spoke too much without thinking. Now I have to add yet another layer to this memory-loss lie just to keep things consistent.
Seeing that Eli was opening her mouth to press further—"The—"—I loudly cut her off to forcefully derail the conversation.
"Look, since the blue girl ran away, why don't we all just pray to whoever or whatever we believe in that she stays safe out there?" I suggested, clapping my hands together to pivot the subject.
"That's a good idea," Kyo agreed instantly.
She closed her eyes, clasped her small hands together, and began muttering a quiet, earnest prayer. Her brother Nyoko hesitated for a second before following her lead, closing his eyes to join her.
Seizing the opportunity while the kids were distracted, I stood up, stepped close to Eli, and leaned in to whisper directly into her ear.
"You're telling me everything about that later."
Eli shivered slightly as my breath brushed her ear. A small, amused smirk tugged at the corner of her lips as she leaned back just enough to look up at me through her eyelashes.
"Anything you say..." she whispered back, her tone dropping into a soft, playful drawl that felt entirely too flirty for the situation.
I blinked, a sudden heat climbing up my neck, but before I could process it, the kids finished their prayers and opened their eyes.
"Now what? Can we go play?" Kyo asked...
"Oh, sur—" Eli started to answer, but I cut her off again.
"Now, we start packing," I commanded, my tone dead serious. "We will be leaving this campsite as soon as humanly possible."
Eli blinked in surprise. "Why do we need to leave?"
"Yeah, this place is basically perfect," Nyoko protested, gesturing around the clearing.
"There's a clean river right nearby, fruit trees, berry patches, wild mushrooms, and plenty of small game to hunt."
"Well, this place is also the exact coordinates for a slave trader meetup," I stated bluntly.
That shut them up instantly.
"Don't you remember?" I continued, laying out the stark reality. "The buyers who were supposed to purchase you guys were scheduled to arrive here. From what I managed to gather before, the caravan was supposed to leave this camp on the tenth day. That means the buyers will either show up on the tenth day itself, or the day before to finalize the deal. Which means..."
I froze, a sudden wave of panic hitting me as I tried to calculate the timeline. Wait. What day is it today? Is it my eighth day in this world? Or my ninth?
I shook my head to clear the thoughts. "Well, the exact day doesn't matter. What matters is that we need to be gone before they get here."
"I... I didn't even think about that," Eli admitted, her face paling as the realization set in. "They could be close by right now. He's entirely right—we have to leave."
The kids looked between the two of us and nodded in unison, their playful moods completely vanishing. "What should we do first then?" they asked together.
All three pairs of eyes locked onto me, waiting for orders.
"Well, first thing's first," I said, stepping into the role of coordinator. "We have to figure out where the hell we actually are. And after that, we need to choose a city to travel toward that can actually provide safety for all four of us."
"Let's go to the main tent, then," Eli suggested, snapping her fingers. "I saw some maps stored in there yesterday."
Without waiting, she turned on her heel and hurried toward the large canvas structure.
The three of us followed closely behind her. Once nearby, the kids and I sat down on the trunk near the cold fireplace while Eli rummaged through the crates, waiting for her to unearth the maps. After a few tense minutes, she emerged holding two rolled-up pieces of parchment—one massive, and one medium-sized.
She handed the medium map over to me and immediately began rolling the larger one back up. Seeing our focused, questioning stares, she explained, "We don't need this large one right now. It's a map of the entire continent."
"Which one is this, then?" I asked, carefully unrolling the parchment she had handed me. It looked like a detailed map of a specific country.
"That's a map of the Xinyth Kingdom," Eli said, sitting down cross-legged right beside me. "We have to be somewhere within the human kingdom's borders, since this was the only regional map the slavers carried."
I spread the map flat on the ground. Various locations were heavily marked with ink, featuring handwritten labels scrawled across the terrain. My eyes swept over the elegant cursive letters, and a sudden, sinking feeling hit my stomach.
I can't read a single word of this.
I flattened the map against the dirt and looked up at Eli. "Can you read this?"
"I can," she nodded. Shifting closer until her shoulder brushed mine, she reached out and pointed a slender finger toward the extreme edge of the kingdom's border. "This spot right here is Solvesetso. It's the village I'm from. So, logically, we have to be somewhere near this general region."
"We must be right here, then," I said, pointing randomly at a heavily inked, prominent mark on the parchment.
"I don't think so," Eli corrected gently, tilting her head. "When the slave caravan was moving us, we traveled to the west, not the east. Look here—I think this campsite right here is the one we're currently occupying." She traced a thin line on the parchment. "It lines up perfectly with the path of the river."
Following her finger, Kyo leaned over the map and chimed in excitedly, "In that case, we should travel to Myzan!"