With his hands on his knees, and his back bent from the exhaustion of running continuously, Shivam was panting for breath, his thoughts fogged by tiredness.

Josh was breathing heavily, too, as he sat with his forearms resting loosely on the knees of his folded legs.

Tiyasha wasn't tired from running, but still her heart raced. She looked at the exhausted face of the young man who had carried her in his arms all the way back to the forest.

He had surprised her by offering to do so, and of course she could have resisted, she SHOULD have resisted...she was a witch, after all, how could she let a strange young man take her in his arms? Where was her pride, her dignity, her rage?

'But he isn't just a strange young man. He has a name, and his name is Shivam. He stood up for you against the Infernos that night, and he helped you to escape from some Infernos today, again, and you can be sure if the need ever arises, he'll risk his life to save you again,' a voice in Tiyasha's mind said. She was familiar with this voice, it woke up whenever she thought about Shivam.

Tiyasha thought about the moments, which had seemed like eternities in slow-motion in the strong arms of Shivam. When he had swiped her up from the muddy street of the village, she had been afraid, sure he would drop her. But then she had coiled her own arms around his neck, and she had felt okay. She had felt safe.

"Call Took," Shivam said to Josh, and his voice brought Tiyasha back to the dangerous situation they surely were still in.

"Okay," Josh said in his wheezing voice, and then raised his roundish face to the sky and called: "Took? TOOK! COME RIGHT HERE! QUICKLY!"

"We have to keep running, don't we? I mean, Infernos are surely going to come hunting for us!" Tiyasha said to Shivam.

"Let's hope that the dragon will keep them occupied for some time. As soon as Took comes, we'll start moving," Shivam said.

"There's Took," Josh said, and pointed. Took descended from the branch of a very tall Banyan.

"I sensed a fire dragon! What happened in that village?" Took asked, landing on Josh's lap.

"Infernos came to arrest us all. A stupid old man called them somehow..." Josh said, scratching Took's head. Took wagged his tail and coughed up small smoke-balls.

"It had been a capture-painting. With my face on it. Blikrot has heard about us defeating his Infernos that night, and I guess he's not at all happy to have found out I turned one of his commanders into stone," Tiyasha said, her tone worried. "I am guessing that Blikrot has that capture-painting distributed everywhere. No place is safe for us now."

"Do you mind explaining what a capture-painting is? Are you talking about that wanted poster?" Shivam asked.

"A capture-painting bears the face of someone who has been declared as a criminal by Blikrot and..." Tiyasha began. "And, by shedding some of your own blood on it, you can alert Blikrot and his armies at the same time," Josh finished the sentence for her.

"Uh-oh," Shivam said. So now he was officially an accomplice of Blikrot's enemy. 'Wow. Good going, Shivam. Keep on moving and you'll be dead in no time,' his cynical voice was back in his mind. With some effort, he pushed it away. "So what do we do now?" He asked. He felt that what happened back in that village might have affected his bonding with Josh and Tiyasha in some manner.

"What else? We go to the Forest of Falling Leaves and find its dragon and ask it to kill Blikrot," Tiyasha said, impatiently.

"I'll ask the dragon to gift me the power of flying. I can't run anymore. Let alone run, I can't even walk!" Josh complained. In his lap Took giggled childishly.

"So...you guys are still with me?" Shivam said, emotions making his heart heavy.

Tiyasha and Josh looked at him silently for a moment. Then Josh said: "Obviously, big brother. Who else do I have? Where else shall I go? And I wouldn't leave you even if..."

"What do you mean by asking if we are still with you or not?" Tiyasha snapped, cutting Josh short.

"No, I mean, after all those Infernos..."

"The Infernos are looking after me, Shivam, ME! They wouldn't have even known you existed if it wasn't for me in the first place! So stop behaving like we are doing you a huge favour by accompanying you, okay? This is our battle, too!" Tiyasha said, anger evident in her manner.

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," Shivam said, and pretended to smile goofily.

But in his heart he felt being dragged into something that he didn't want anything to do with. Tiyasha said it was their battle too. But what battle? He didn't want to fight in a battle or anything! He was in this insane world to find his girlfriend, Aparajita! As soon as he found her, he intended to head back home! But instead he was being drawn into some kind of a rebellion against an evil emperor, helplessly, like a moth is drawn towards a candle's flame that would burn it alive.

"Some things are preordained," the Seamstress had said.

Shivam hoped, as cynically as ever, that his death was not a part of those "things".