Kalmia had to think of a way to get out of this situation. If she didn’t escape now, she’d probably never get to enjoy her freedom ever again. She couldn’t really move anything but her head and maybe squirm a bit around. A tear was rolling down her cheek due to her panicking and slowly loosing her hope.

  The two men that kidnapped her, had already left for a while now and it was completely dark inside the room, however Kalmia could somehow still see all of her surroundings. She had to think on how to get out of this situation.The tension was evident from her face. She was so stressed that she wasn’t able to think straight so she went through all the details once again to sort her thoughts and think of a solution. She was tied to a metal pole, her legs were bound together at her feet, her arms were tied together at the wrists and close to the elbows, her neck was tied to the pole and her mouth was stuffed with some piece of cloth from what she could tell so she couldn’t even let out a noise.

  An idea came to her mind. She tried to get her legs up to her mouth to try to saw through them with the teeth that would as far as she could guess poke out underneath. However after a few minutes of trying she gave up on that idea. She just couldn’t get her mouth and the ropes close enough to each other to even properly try that. In return Kalmia tried to calm down and think a bit more. Did they overlook something, that Kalmia could use to free herself… maybe… just maybe…

  Kalmia moved her left arm up and her right arm down as much as she could. Then she did the opposite. She continued this for hours before finally *SNAP* the rope was sawed through by the scales on her arms and wrists. They may be smooth usually but Kalmia found out not too long ago that, when she was stressed, they would become rougher, a bit like sandpaper.

  Now, Kalmia had to find out how to unknot these knots while not even being able to see them. First she took that cloth out her mouth and then tried to loosen the knot that bound her neck to the pole so she could look around a bit better. First of all though, she had to find the knot. It was not right at her neck. After a bit of feeling around she found it right on the other side of the pole. She tried pulling on random parts of the knots first and managed to loosen something. She must have done something wrong though as now it was a very compressed knot. Kalmia now had to somehow find a spot in that knot that she could pull to get it loosened up. It took a while but finally she found it.

  Outside, the sun seemed to slowly rise again. Kalmia was still sitting there loosening the knots. After freeing her arms and neck she went on and managed to loosen one knot after the other. The problem was the knot binding her body and tail to the pole. She couldn’t reach that knot with her arm so she had to think of something. She looked around a bit and saw the bag with sweets she had bought earlier lying right next to her. Suddenly she got an idea and grabbed the bag and took one of those seemingly hard things out and put it into her mouth.

  It was a very sweet taste, sweeter than even the cake. She wanted to enjoy it more but she didn’t have the time to do that now. She bit on that candy and it broke off. She did it a few times more until she had a sharp plate in her mouth. With that she went on to cut loose the last rope that bond her to the pole. And not one second too early. She heard the goons entering the building again talking about their plans so she hid behind some boxes.

  “No touching the merchandise!”

  “But how are we going to train her without teaching her those basics?”

  “Once she is broken, she won’t have to be taught any more.”

  Kalmia's heart felt weird and she got very tense not just that but she also hard to suppress her hunger and hope that her stomach wouldn’t grumble.

  The goons went over to the pole where Kalmia was bound to and found it empty.

  “WHERE IS SHE?!?”

  “QUICK, SEARCH EVERYTHING! IF SHE GOT OUT WE ARE DOOMED!”

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  Kalmia knew her hideout wasn’t that great and it was only a matter of time before she was found. She tried to sneak into the direction of the door to finally get out.

  Behind her she heard them pushing over boxes, opening closets and generally searching.

  She was right in front of the door when

  *grab*

  “GOT YOU BITCH!”

  One of the goons grabbed Kalmia by her horns and she panicked.

  “Good job, Max!”

  Kalmia turned around and in all her panic just bit down on his arm. It was not the first time she did that in such a situation but this time she didn’t hold back at all. After just a moment there, where previously his arm was now there was starting the elbow only a stump left, which blood flowed out to no end.

  The goon fell to the ground and writhed in pain. Merkatur hurried over but when he almost reached his friend and Kalmia, Kalmia just jumped on him maniacally and bit into his neck until there was a big chunk of the neck missing.

  Kalmia's clothes and hair were both soaked in blood and she felt, what the inner Egas in her would say, not humane. She didn’t feel anything but ease when killing them.

  She made her way outside and found herself at a storage room right next to the harbour. When walking past the people on the dock, they looked at her intensely. They all could guess that what coloured her red was blood, however all of them wouldn’t dare to confront someone that has so much blood on them.

  Not minding all those stares she walked the path that she did remember until – finally – she reached the inn again. When entering the bar everything inside became silent.

  A happy voice was yelling aloud.

  “GIRL! THERE YOU ARE! Dedrik has been so worried about you!”

  It was the woman working behind the counter that was overjoyed. When she got closer though her tone changed and she became more serious.

  “What happened? Where have you been? Who did this to you? Ah wait. First of all take a seat. I’ll bring you something to eat and then you go and clean yourself.”

  Kalmia had a lot of hunger but didn’t really feel like eating. Nonetheless once the food was put in front of her she couldn’t stop eating. She ate even more than when they arrived in the city.

  After that meal she went up into the bathroom of her room and washed herself. In that time not for a single second she thought about where Dedrik would be. First she rinsed off the blood from her body and then out of her hair. It wasn’t too easy to get it out of the hair but after a while her hair shone in the perfect silver-white colour it has had before. She was also quite happy that she brought a few replacement dresses with her in the case something would happen and whether they’d get dirty.

  She pulled the dress over her head and hid her tail inside of it again. Then she went out into the dining area of the inn again.

  “Dedrik will be here shortly, girl. Just wait a bit.”

  “… okay.”

  “But tell me… what happened?”

  Kalmia didn’t really wanna talk about it much however after a bit of persuasion she faltered and told her everything, leaving out some key details that would give hints to her being a dragon.

  “You shouldn’t have gone outside all alone, girl. The city is dangerous!”

  “…yes…”

  “Did you at least enjoy the day during the time before?”

  “…yes.”

  “That’s good to hear. Now come here i am sure you want to eat more now that you hopefully feel a bit better!”

  And truly Kalmia was able to eat a few plates more.

  Before eating the last plate though, Dedrik came into the inn, his face completely pale. When he saw Kalmia there eating, colour came back to his face.

  He seemed like he was almost falling over when hurrying to Kalmia.

  Kalmia didn’t even see him entering the inn or walking towards her and suddenly two hands grabbed her from behind. It was a hug. Kalmia's face lightened up a bit that after that torturous night, she could see Dedrik again. At the start of the night, she thought that she could never see him again. The man that saved her when she was in her – previous – hardest moment of her life.

  “I’m happy you are fine”

  “…”

  Kalmia turned around and hugged him back.

  Both of them could not have been happier in this moment.

  The woman from behind the counter also came to the table again.

  “Don’t worry. The meal this time is my treat.”

  “Thank you, Julia.”

  So Julia was her name all this time.

  After that they both went up into Kalmia's room where she explained everything that happened.

  **CHAPTER 8: END**