Fiona paced back and forth in their cell. At the occasional spot, she would stop and examine the stones before pacing again.

  “Can someone stop her?” the grumpy Hobusian of the treasure hunters, Collin as he had introduced himself, shouted. “She’s getting on my nerves!”

  The Bentulousian, Daisy, spoke up, “Stop complaining about every little thing!”

  “I have a right to complain! A foreign nation treating us with this sort of ill will is liable to cause a war! Isn’t that blue bimbo supposed to be some sort of royalty!”

  “Does he ever shut up?” Haliegh asked. She rubbed her temples.

  Daisy sighed, “Only when he is smoking his sticks, and he gets grumpy when he can’t any for a while.”

  “That’s another thing! Taking away a man’s smoke is heinous. Heinous I tell you.”

  If the treasure hunters had any reservations getting to know Fiona and Haliegh, they were quickly dispelled when they realized the situation the group was in. However, recognizing a solution for the situation was a very different skill sets. Daisy mostly kept her thoughts to herself, but Collin was playing into the blowhard Hobusian stereotype. Given how her father did his best to have good relationships with them, and keep his kids from engaging in such stereotypes, it felt a little weird to her to have it confirmed in some small way.

  She decided it was best to focus on something else and pressed a blue hand against the stony wall. It was sturdy enough, even a Bentulousian like Daisy would probably have trouble knocking it down—maybe Rheba could do it, but not some random treasure hunter. She sighed. There was still a trump card with Sun letting her teleport everyone away, but she wasn’t sure which way was out or if she might overexert before escaping.

  Their best bet was still for Goldie to help out until Gwyn and the elf without tact could come and help them. Given how long he was taking, she figured he must have gone back to get more help. It certainly wasn’t because he perished, not at all. She wasn’t going to let those thought creep into her mind.

  The blue princess shook her head and sat next to Hal’s sister. Her red eyes turned to the princess and said more than words ever could, they might be in trouble if Goldie didn’t return soon with good news.

  Fiona sighed. She should at least rebond with her Needaimus. In an effort to show goodwill, she left Sun in the crate in case Goldie returned sooner versus later, but it was beginning to be clear the fishgirl was taking her time.

  In a cosmic sort of way, the princess wondered if she should have tried to do so sooner, since as soon as she stood up and took several steps toward the Needaimus, a sploosh from the water caught everyone’s attention. Two brutes with spears were the first to pop out of the water, followed by the golden girl. Fiona told herself it was an odd coincidence and gave a friendly smile to Goldie.

  “Hey friend! I hope everything went well!”

  The face of the fish girl told Fiona everything had, in fact, not gone well.

  “Our Godking summon you.”

  Before Fiona could ask what that all entailed, the two brutes slid giant body bags over Daisy and Colllin. The duo struggled, but the bags soon inflated, and hardened, until they became the same pods that had brought in the two treasure hunters in the first place. Haliegh jumped up and managed to get a few steps back before one of the men bagged her as well.

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  Fiona flashed Goldie a sad look. The scaly girl reflected the expression back to her, and that was the last thing the princess saw before a bag was pulled over her head.

  She didn’t bother struggling, the others had shown that was a fruitless effort. In time, the fabric seemed to expand away, then stiffened. The bottom knitted itself shut, shoving her first foot up and twisting her ankle painfully. She pulled her second up willingly to avoid the pain. As far as she could tell, there was no way for air to get in, which meant the trip would have to be short or she might suffocate.

  A sudden jerk came with what must have been one of the brutes hoisting her pod over his shoulder. She slammed into the wall of the pod then heard the sound of water. Time seemed to collapse in on itself as they moved underwater. Was it five minutes, thirty minutes, an hour? She wasn’t sure. It at least was enough time for her mind to flash to all sorts of things.

  They might truly perish here, under the ocean by the hand of fish people. She wondered if anyone would miss her. Donn would cry, but he was a softy. Hermina was much the same. But what about her mother, the woman was always a bit cold, even to Fiona’s late father, would she even shed a tear for the troublemaker daughter. And what about Gwyn?

  Fiona shook her head, it was too much to ponder, too depressing to ponder. She ought to be thinking about what to do to escape. Perhaps the leader could be reasoned with. Perhaps she could snatch Sun and get a better line of sight for escape. She had a team that seemed pretty decent for fighting, and Haliegh, there could be a chance they battle their way out.

  Her optimism was short lived as they emerged from the water and Fiona felt her pod fall on the ground. It opened and the brute who greeted her quickly bound her hands in ropes. The others soon followed suit, and their bindings were linked with another rope so that they were in a chain.

  Collin tried to struggle the most with one of the brutes, which earned him a slap to the face, and a broken arm. He screamed and fell down as the guards finished tying his rope to the end of the chain. Goldie emerged last, with Sun cradled in her arms. The Needaimus seemed calm for the moment, possibly trying to indicate to Fiona that she should do the same. She didn’t like it, but without a better plan, she went along with it.

  The rope linked to Fiona was jerked and they were lead in a train into a city. It was something to behold. Half of the town was inside a cavern, of which the prison was located on the far wall, and it fed into a large metallic space of the old ruins. In size, it wasn’t all that large. Fiona could see to the other end, where the metal ruins had stairs going to balconies, but where they lacked in space they made up in height.

  It may have been the case that the town was not built in a cavern, but rather the cavern itself was carved around the town. There were multiple pillars that seemed to function for both housing and load support, and around the main pillars were small networks of buildings and tight streets. Where stone was removed from the cavern, it seemed in turn to have been built inside the ruins, but Fiona quickly lost sight of the metal space as they moved into the closely carved stone buildings.

  It was almost claustrophobic, with barely enough space for two of the fish people to pass by shoulder to shoulder. The carved buildings were high enough to cut off any sense of direction in the cavern, it was only after a short while of moving through the dense pathways that Fiona noticed there was always a pillar in sight, and each was painted with a different color at the top. A way of navigating the same-same pathways, she guessed.

  From the houses and buildings, curious eyes watched them pass by, but none dared to try and get a closer look. Fiona imagined that this was just as much as all of them seeing other races of Resh as it was for her seeing them. She was filled with questions, and perhaps would have tried to probe, but the narrowness of the streets and the energy of the town brought with it a choking feeling.

  Soon a new building came into view, it was tall like the pillars, but not like the structural support. It was sectioned into increasingly smaller cubes as it ascended, a pyramid of sorts. They climbed a staircase at its base to the top where a stone fence encased the top.

  Goldie looked concerned as she walked in front of them to the gate.

  “Now, you meet Godking.”