"Acer, wake up for the sake of the deities, Wake up!" Sarphi screamed at me in a panicked voice, interrupting my very pleasant dreamless sleep which I had fallen into after nearly collapsing from exhaustion on the side of the road.

I jolted awake, making incomprehensible noises and glancing around groggily. "What...what is it?" I asked, rubbing my head.

My hand was pulled away from my head and I was brought to my feet. "We have to go." Sarphi threw my bags in my arms whilst Senka climbed up my trouser leg and hid herself in my bag. "Can't you hear them?"

I hadn't really been awake enough to pay attention to my surroundings, but as she mentioned it, I began to hear the pounding of feet and loud voices.

"Patrollers," I identified with a groan. I shouldered my bag and began trying to catch up with Aknon, who was already a fair bit down the road. "What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing," he snapped. I then noticed that his fists were clenched, and his tail was wrapped around him. I thought that meant that quite the opposite was the case, there was definitely something wrong.

But I elected to ignore it as I turned to Sarphi, making sure that she had her bag with everything inside of it before we got too far from where we slept. "I didn't think we'd sleep that long." I sighed and looked up at the sky, where the sun had risen quite a bit.

"Me too, now shut up." Sarphi put her hand on my shoulder and began walking me forward even quicker. We were walking in a single-file line along the road, so we would convince most who saw us from behind that we were only a single person. Aknon moved to walk behind us, hiding Sarphi easily.

The three of us kept walking in silence, my hand on Sarphi's so that we could move more fluidly. We used to use our tails for this, but they were rather sensitive and pulling on them unexpectedly caused more shouts and got us caught far more often than it helped us.

We tried to walk quicker than the patrol, but for some reason this particular group was almost charging along the road. We began moving off the path, following a thin road through the field. It was difficult keeping ourselves disguised as one. I even heard Aknon muttering some prayers or enchantments under his breath.

I'd thought that we'd finally lost them when I heard a "halt!" from behind me. I glanced back at Aknon, who just shook his head before turning around on the spot to look at the patrollers. Sarphi and I moved to stand by his side, if not a little behind him.

"Can we help you?" Aknon asked in a rather professional tone, which didn't show just how much he was panicking inside.

"Yes, what is your business here?" the patroller in front asked us, pointing their sword in our direction. Their voice was echoey due to the helmet they wore, in addition to their really heavy-looking armour, which I would struggle to move in if I was ever tasked with wearing it. They all looked the same; intimidating and lethal.

"We are travelling," Aknon replied. "My siblings and I are travelling to find help for my sister's condition." This was the excuse we always used, since it wasn't very uncommon to see people travelling for cures.

The patroller seemed to laugh, the noise sounding horrible and metallic. "And what condition would that be?" I knew what they were indicating, and I wasn't impressed, but I kept my mouth shut.

"She's weak and gets ill easily." Aknon gestured to her. "She has been ever since she was a child, and we've been searching for a cure for this illness."

"I think you're all ill," the patroller to the main one's right commented, apparently rather amused by Aknon's words.

"We get that a lot," I replied, my eyes narrowed. The patrollers demanded respect, but that doesn't mean that they were getting it from me. "Do you have any recommendations of healers we could visit? We're running out of ideas."

"Dwi," the second patroller remarked, causing an uproar of laughter front he patrollers.

I sighed and rolled my eyes. He had just named the deity of curses, and it was another typical answer for us to receive. "Thank you for your service."

"Hold," the first patroller commanded. "You're not allowed to continue." He gestured to the other patrollers who came over and surrounded us. "We're taking you to the nearest city."

"Which is?" I asked in a very annoyed tone. "We don't quite have any kind of map."

Sarphi clutched my hand tighter in warning, glaring at me. She knew me well enough to know that I wouldn't stop, but she showed her irritation either way. Aknon was probably staring straight at the first patroller, pretending as though I wasn't speaking.

"A good surprise for you," the second patroller remarked. "Don't you know where you're going? What kind of travellers don't have a map?"

"Us," I replied snarkily. "I just told you that we didn't have a map."

The first patroller sighed and marched around us. "Follow us or get run through with a sword."

"And I would adore doing that." the other patroller glared at me, moving forward as well, his blade getting uncomfortably close.

"Nice going," Sarphi said quietly as we were forced to remain inside the circle of patrollers. "Now who knows where we're going?"

"They do," I said in the same volume of voice that I'd been using before and nodded to the two main patrollers. "It's a little surprise."

"I hate you," Aknon seethed. "So much." That was obviously directed at me. I couldn't' blame him too much when I had a sword at my back.

"We're being escorted," I said quietly to them both. "Trust me."

I could've sworn I heard Senka gasp, I figured she understood what I was trying to do and didn't seem to be totally against it. I had to put my hand over that part of my bag, patting it and telling her to be quiet.

"Do you have any weapons in there?" a patroller from behind me asked, causing me to turn my head with a flirtatious smile. If I acted any other way from my normal self, they would probably see right through me.

"Not at all, I was just checking to see if our supper was in there still. You know how wiggly rats are." I found utter delight in their reaction. Which was a very startled intake of breath. If they were going to joke about us being cursed or creatures of darkness, I was going to lean right into their expectations.

"Silence," the first patroller commanded at the front. "Or you'll be going straight to the stocks, or stables, depending on which one's dirtier."

I gave a wicked grin, but I kept quiet, I didn't like either of those punishments.

It was pretty late by the time we got to the city, which they still didn't tell us the name of. I didn't recognise it by looking around, which is a little concerning after so much time travelling. I thought that maybe we had gone in a completely different direction, taking a longer way but in the same direction as Daefocer, maybe we were closer to our goal than what we would've been if we went straight there.

But our late arrival meant that we had to be taken to the city jail, which was absolutely rotten and rather empty. There were two guards patrolling the hallway, whilst we were put into one rather small cell.

"I'm surprised we weren't separated," Aknon mumbled as he crouched down, back pressed against the cold wall. The wall looked disgusting; I didn't even want to put my coat against it.

"A mistake on their part, but one we shouldn't point out," Sarphi replied before moving to the door of the cell and putting her arms through the bars casually, leaning against it. She was subtly checking to see where the lock was on the cell door, just in case we had a chance to actually escape.

"Who do you think we're seeing tomorrow?" I asked, resting my foot on the wall and standing straight with my arms crossed. "If it's royalty, I called dibs." I let a smirk rest on my face.

"Not everyone wants you to call dibs on them," Aknon retorted. "But it probably will be the ruler of the city, maybe even a council."

"More hearts to win over with my music and good looks."

I glanced to my right and saw two button eyes peeking out of my bag. I gave Senka a small wave and a nod, to tell her I'd seen her and that everything was okay. I wasn't sure why I cared about the emotional welfare of a sentient stuffed doll, but I didn't want her to be too worried.

"Let's just rest as well as we can for the night," Aknon advised, closing his eyes. "I know I'm exhausted after being with you three all day. And now we've got an interrogation to deal with."