The Final Push

Chapter Six: Rush Work

~Breccan~

The next three days of my life were awful. I was forced to sit in the back of that cart and do nothing. Sheera never wanted to stop and only did when I threatened to pee all over her scrap generator. Doran's humming got annoying too. It was loud and always the same song. I now knew why she didn't want him to sing out loud. So when we finally started to see The Speed clan's camp on the fourth morning, I was ready to cry in relief. The Speed, from what I could see, weren't on the move, but it didn't look like they were settling here forever. That's when it hit me. They were probably here for the annual Wing party. That must've been it. Although it was strange that they would bring their whole clan. Maybe they were going to try and get some food from the Wings, but that would be a waste of time. Everyone knew that The Wings were low on food. They barely had enough to feed their own.

All of these thoughts were chasing each other around in my head as we came to the edge of camp and a Speed guardian stopped us.

"Who are you?" the guard asked.

"You know it's us Justun," Sheera rolled her eyes.

Justun nodded, "Yes, but I still have to ask."

"It's Sheera, Doran, and a captured Panther," Sheera said. The guard looked in the back at me.

"He's fully tied down?" he asked.

"Yes," Sheera nodded.

"Alright go on ahead," Justun motioned us in. Sheera flicked the reins and we entered the camp. The camp reminded me a bit of The Panthers. It was organized and uniform but there wasn't the luxury that was associated with The Panthers. They were rather brute, unlike the gracefulness of my old clan. However, this was the next best thing to being in The Panthers.

Sheera steered the cart to a little group of tents and then stopped. She and Doran then hopped out and walked around to the back of the cart to where I was. Doran quickly untied the bonds at my ankles but left the ones on my wrists. He then picked me up and out of the cart, setting me on the ground outside.

Doran saw the blood on my hands and feet, "Are you okay?"

I was about to answer when Sheera cut me off, "It doesn't matter if he is okay, he will be sacrificed before too long." She shoved me forward, "Let's just go offer him to the master." Doran nodded and we started walking.

"Um... you know you really don't have to offer me as a sacrifice," I pleaded with them.

"Don't talk," Sheera hissed at me.

"But I don't want to be a sacrifice," I mumbled.

She turned to me and glared, "I told you to stop talking and you are going to or I'll gag you."

"You know listening to people has never been my strong suit," I smirked. Her face grew bright red and she ripped a cloth out of her back pocket and stuffed it into my mouth.

"Mnph!" I protested through the nasty tasting cloth. She ignored my groans and shoved me forward into a tent. I stumbled in through the flap and fell onto my face. A big hand came up behind me and lifted me up.

"Careful little buddy," Doran said. He set me down gently and brushed some of the dirt off my filthy clothes.

"Don't bother, he's already disgusting," Sheera spat at me.

"Aw... but I just don't think we should be so mean to him," he looked at me sadly.

"Mwaar!" I yelled through the gag.

"Shut up!" Sheera yelled at me.

A clear voice cut through our jabber, "Sheera, Doran, what is the meaning of this?" I glanced up and saw an older woman standing in front of us. She probably used to have brown hair but now it was just gray. Her face was skinny and cut tightly, with cruel lines.