“Here she comes! Here she comes!”

  Sunica could hear the excited voices of the bullies up ahead. She didn’t care. Whatever they had in mind for her, she didn’t care. There was only one thing that mattered in the world. Musca. The dog was dependent on her. If those cruel bastards hurt her, Sunica was gonna–

  She broke into the clearing by the river, steam billowing up from the snow around her ankles. There was an audible gasp from the six kids present. One girl spoke up.

  “Scary! She’s like a monster!”

  Dorin stepped forward and pointed accusatorily at Sunica.

  “Not like a monster Juni. She is a monster.”

  Sunica had no time for this. She yelled back.

  “Where’s Musca!? Give me back my dog!”

  Dorin pointed over his shoulder. Musca was being held on a leash by one of the other kids. A younger girl. Sunica didn’t remember her name. Tel… something?

  “If you want her back so bad, you’re gonna have to go through me, monster.”

  “Why are you… Just give her back. I don’t want to fight.”

  “We’re protecting the poor dog from you. You don’t seem to get it. We’re the heroes who kill the monst–”

  Sunica’s fist smashed into the boy’s face, knocking him to the ground in an instant. Even she was surprised. Maybe she did want to fight. She felt like she was on fire.

  A kick to the gut sent the boy rolling.

  “I’m a monster!? After how all of you have–”

  Darkness overtook her for a moment. Pain split across her head. She blinked, and saw only white. It took her a moment to realize she was face down in the snow. She pushed herself up.

  Oh.

  Oh yeah. There were a bunch of kids here.

  Someone kicked her in the face, and she felt warm blood trickle from her nose as she rolled over. Just as she got a sense of where she was, another foot stomped her stomach, hard. She couldn’t breathe. A moment ter she was looking up at Dorin, grinning at her past a split lip as he straddled her chest. He started punching her in the face, again and again and again.

  Oh. She really was going to die here, wasn’t she? After everything, it was coming down to this. At least they probably wouldn’t hurt Musca. They just wanted her.

  She could hear Musca barking, and willed the dog to just be okay.

  They were going to kill her.

  Kill her and feel like heroes.

  The fire inside her was sputtering out.

  Maybe they were heroes..

  Maybe ridding Veni of her would make everyone happier.

  Maybe it would make her family happy to be rid of a burden.

  Only cinders were left.

  It would make everyone more comfortable if she wasn’t trying to live there and pretend to be one of them.

  It would make everyone happier.

  Except… Musca.

  She could hear the desperation in the dog’s cries.

  Musca would be sad without her. At least one thing in this world loved her.

  Sunica felt a spark.

  But what could she do? They were going to kill her. She could feel the blows still raining down on her from somepce far away.

  The fog she was falling into dissipated slightly. Something was happening. Dorin’s weight got knocked off of her. Had one of the adults come?

  “Get her! She’s killing Dorin!”

  Huh?

  “Kill the dog! Kill it!”

  No, wait! Sunica struggled to pull together. They wouldn’t! She wouldn’t let them hurt Musca!

  The fire inside her bzed. She was burning up. It was as if her anger had become fuel. Sunica ignited.

  Everything after that was a vignette.

  She could remember images, but nothing concrete.

  A cloud of steam erupted as the snow melted and evaporated in a wide area.

  Kids running.

  Musca, her muzzle coated in blood.

  Dorin’s neck, bleeding.

  The river, cracking and melting under her. Plunging her and Musca into the water.

  “NO!”

  Sunica stopped abruptly as Lily shouted at her.

  “Uh, no?”

  “You are NOT telling me a dead dog story right now, right? I- I can’t handle that!”

  Sunica bared her teeth in what was… almost a smile. She shook her head gently at Lily.

  “Don’t worry. Musca didn’t die. It was close, but she was okay.”

  Lily took a relieved breath. She’d been listening to Sunica’s story with rapt attention. Thinking back to Star. She missed Star so much…

  “She didn’t…? Then what happened?”

  “Dorin and his gang insisted that I had told Musca to attack them, and they defended themselves.”

  “What? But isn’t that like, obviously a lie? You were beaten half to death!”

  “Probably. I don’t know. But it was my word against theirs so…”

  “So what? What did they do about it?”

  Sunica hung her head. She looked like she was barely keeping a straight face, but Lily thought bringing attention to that would harm the girl more than just pretending not to notice. Besides, anger was fring up in her chest. She wasn’t used to feeling angry, but people mistreating Sunica really got under her skin.

  “They took her away.”

  “What? Why!? They can’t do that!”

  “Lily, it was like ten years ago.”

  “Yeah! But… But…”

  She was feeling ready to jump up and fight someone over this. But Sunica was right. There was nothing to be done now. So she just hugged Sunica, and let the silence sit for a minute.

  “They took her away, and insisted to my mother that I not live in Veni anymore. Because I’m a fire hazard, that was attacking their kids.”

  “That’s bullshit!”

  Sunica shook her head.

  “No. It wasn’t. They were right to take Musca. Even if it was for the wrong reasons.”

  Lily gave her a surprised look, then a confused one.

  “What? No. What?”

  “Musca almost drowned. And she was taken in the first pce. I wasn’t strong enough to protect her. She ended up protecting me, and getting hurt for it.”

  “From EVIL people! It wasn’t your fault!”

  “It was, though. If I had been stronger, I could have protected her. If I had been more in control of my fire, I wouldn’t have burned down that part of the forest, and we wouldn’t have fallen in the river. If I had been smarter, I would have involved some adults before the situation got that bad. Or even Avea.”

  Lily stared at Sunica for a minute, speechless. And then had a realization.

  “Wait, wait wait wait. Is this coming up because I’m Musca in this scenario?”

  Sunica coloured a little.

  “Uh… No? I mean. I didn’t really think about it like that.”

  “That’s totally what this is!”

  The baur girl raised her hands.

  “It’s not– Okay. Maybe a little. But, it just feels… simir. What I’m trying to say is–”

  “Is what, huh? You gotta solve every problem, or anything that goes wrong is automatically your fault? ‘Cause I am totally capable of fucking everything up without your input at all!”

  “I mean, not exactly that…”

  Lily was a little miffed. Sunica shouldn’t bme herself for anything and everything that happened between them. Not that Lily was really one to talk. But still! On principle! If one of them was going to be a sad sack, that was firmly Lily’s territory!

  “Well, what then?”

  Sunica thought for a moment. The sun was coming in the windows fully now, gleaming off her bright red scales. While Lily waited for an answer, she just stared at the sun shining on the scales on Sunica’s hands and how reflective they were.

  She was still staring at Sunica’s hands when she saw them tense up. A noise broke their dialogue and Sunica was instantly on edge. Lily looked over. The goblin had rolled over. That was probably a good sign. But Sunica’s reaction was still troubling. She’d expected this story to be about Musca getting killed by goblins or something. But, she supposed she was just shaken about Lily being in danger?

  “I guess I just… I want to be stronger. To protect you. And when we were fighting the goblins that all came back to me. If you got hurt, I don’t know if I could forgive myself. I was too weak to protect Musca. I don’t want to be powerless in a situation like that ever again. And I don’t want anyone to take you away from me. So, I’ve made up my mind. I think you’re crazy for this goblin stuff. But, I’m going to support your choices no matter what. And if someone tries to hurt you for it, no matter who or what they are, I’m gonna be here to put them in the ground.”

  Lily didn’t know what to say to that. The idea that someone would want to defend her of all people was crazy on the face of it. Her mind went bnk.

  Sunica was… kinda cool sometimes.

  She coughed.

  “I don’t know what to say. Thank you? I think?”

  The girl with the scarlet scales just closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She rolled her shoulders a little and tilted her head up. It looked like a bit of weight had come off her shoulders.

  Lily tried to change the subject. Being the center of any sort of positive attention was making her pretty uncomfortable. She cast her mind around for anything to talk about instead.

  “I uh, leveled up st night. Actually, my [Student] css became the [Lady] css.”

  Sunica choked.

  “What!? Why didn’t you say something earlier?”

  “We were talking about more important stuff!”

  Sunica rolled her eyes and huffed.

  “This is huge news though! Did you get any skills?”

  Lily nodded and put on her best smug expression.

  “Mhmm. I don’t know how it works, but I got the skill [Official Seal]. Honestly, I haven’t even figured out how [Mental Notes] works yet. But, that’s two I can py with.”

  “I guess you really are a [Lady] though. Maybe you have some kind of royalty like, far back in your family history?”

  Lily ughed. Oh yeah, totally. She actually had a secret bloodline her whole life and no one told her. Just like every generic fantasy protagonist. No, she was quite sure she was just a girl.

  “Not a chance. If I was queen of anything it was rotting in my bed. No… I was just a failure in my old world. I was completely pathetic, and 100% normal.”

  “That’s weird. Then, how’d you get the css…?”

  Lily shrugged. She honestly had no idea. But right now, she wasn’t all that concerned about it. Really, the idea of csses and levels had never felt less important to her.

  “Dunno. Don’t really care. Okay, I care a lot. But for now if it’ll help me do the things I want to do, I’m happy to have it. I have too much on my mind right now to worry about it, really.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like getting Adelina to forgive me. Like keeping this goblin safe. Like learning how to be good or even normal at social stuff. Like how to handle the Avezare situation. The whole cloning business.”

  Sunica yawned.

  “How about we start with breakfast? I’m hungry.”

  Lily smiled. Sunica had a habit of bringing her down from being stuck in her head.

  “Yeah, that sounds great. Staying up half the night has me exhausted and famished too.”

  So, they had a nice quiet breakfast together. It was exactly what they both needed, after a night of difficult emotions.

  Author's Note:

  It's a day te! I hope you all enjoy it anyway.

  I fell a little behind. We got a puppy! Her name is Lulu. Our adult dog is Ruth, and the two have been getting along well.

  But getting along well also means turning my house into a permanent tornado of piss and violence. Which as it happens, makes it pretty hard to get work done.

  I'm tired ya'll. But she will grow up to be a very well behaved and lovely dog. So, until then, I'm just gonna have to write around the disaster!