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  Were it not for the cold wind, Bee-bee felt that she would have long ago perished under the burning sun.

  She hugged the monstrous firefly that she straddled with her legs. Earth was far below. She felt as if she’d seen all of it during the weeks in which the firefly flew nonstop. It had beelined over vale, over lake, over dark green forest, over soft-green forest, over rocky hill, over creek and stream and river. The land was endless. The horizon was ever there, and everyday she lost hope that the firefly would come down.

  All she had wanted to do was to join the fray. Her goblin king had finally pitched them into battle, and she had so badly wanted a piece of the pie. When the great battle of Double Mutiny had erupted, she had done something incredibly stupid. She had climbed upon one of the thousands of giant fireflies which had filled the sky. How stupid!

  She missed out on the fight, she was no longer near the sea, she was stuck high up, and she missed her only chance at becoming a goblin freebooter captain. She had been so mad! Stupid firefly!

  But her emotions had run their course over the days stuck in flight. They firefly had droned on, seemingly uncaring for her beating fists. She pinched and pulled, but the firefly never responded. How could something as large as a horse feel the vicious panic of a little goblin like her? She turned to petting the firefly, but that had been of no use. And now, under another dusk, with her cheek on the bare thorax of the firefly, she watched from a state of deep boredom as the earth began to rise closer to her.

  Bee-bee pushed herself up. The soft beating wings of the firefly flickered her nose. Through their busy blur, Bee-bee saw a human city. They were flying right over the edge, and descending.

  “Yes!” said Bee-bee. “Down! Safely! No crashing!”

  They sloped without changing speed, and Bee-bee hugged the monstrous firefly with her legs and her arms. She clenched her teeth and crushed her eyes. Trees whooshed by. They bumped into something large and hard, and they flipped and whirled. Bee-bee screamed as they careened.

  After a moment of silence, they crashed into a bushy bush. Bee-bee cried out. The firefly scrambled above her, for they had landed upside down. Its thorax blinked green, and she could see the light through her eyelids. Its legs stabbed her as it scurried off and clambered out of the bush.

  Bee-bee groaned, and she cried. She hurt everywhere. But she was alive! But she couldn’t move. But she was finally out of the sky! But she had no idea where she was. Oh, Peg-tooth!

  Bushes began crashing. Leaves rustled. Twigs snapped. Voices rose in what sounded like alarm and worry. They were human voices.

  “What ever could that have been!” said a woman.

  Bee-bee gritted her teeth against the pain. Branches were poking every inch of her skin, and she suffered the tickling of a leaf in her ear. With her other ear, she could tell that the human was an old woman.

  “A star,” said an old man.

  “I don’t think stars go around flashing like the lightning flies.”

  “It was huge.”

  “Through there!” said the old woman.

  Two humans, much older than Bee-bee had thought they would be, ambled through the cluster of underbrush. They explored the site of the crash, and Bee-bee hoped they couldn’t see her. The last thing she needed was to deal with humans. She needed to go back to sea before she got in trouble. She did not want to be strung up as a figurehead! No, no no! Anything but that!

  “My goodness!” said the old woman.

  “A goblin?” said the old man.

  “Are you all right, dear?”

  Bee-bee did her best to give them a big ‘ol thumbs up. She couldn’t even lift her nose. She cried out in pain instead.

  “Arthie,” said the old woman. “Get her out of there! Poor thing.”

  Bee-bee felt the bush beneath her tremble as the old man leaned in and worked his hands beneath her. He lifted her from the bush, and she felt a small relief as the branches no longer poked her everywhere all at once. Her limbs flopped beside her, and she felt pain, sharp as knife stabs, in her bones. She screamed.

  “Careful, Arthie! Careful, you brute!”

  “I’m being careful, but I had to fetch her. It’s not so easy to be perfect, you know!”

  Bee-bee felt like she was floating. The pain was tremendous, and her thoughts were beginning to turn feverish. She found it tough to keep track of what they were saying, where they were going, and what they planned. She felt herself losing focus.

  She opened her eyes, and found herself floating toward a building with candles in the windows. She opened her eyes and found herself staring up at wooden beams across a ceiling. A blanket covered her. She felt like she had only blinked, but now a new human was there beside the worried old couple. It was a woman, and she was leaning over and frowning. Bee-bee felt her hand in the woman’s hands.

  “Hello there,” said the woman. “I’m Ulle. I’m a healer. Can you hear me?” Bee-bee nodded. “That’s a good sign,” said the woman to the old couple standing beside her. “But she’s broken quite a few bones.”

  “Oh, dear!” said the old woman.

  “The bad news is that she’s in a lot of pain. The good news is that I have the magic to numb the pain for her. She’s lucky she’s a goblin. Goblins heal bones faster than any creature in the world. It’ll take a week for her to recover. Are you willing to look after her?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said the old man.

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  The old woman backhanded the old man’s shoulder. “Of course we are! Poor thing!”

  The healer placed her fingers softly to Bee-bee’s temple. Her face reflected a fuzzy green light. The ceiling reflected a fuzzy green light. Fuzzy green light covered the faces of the old couple, and Bee-bee noticed that the old woman had tears running down her cheeks. She held a crumpled kerchief to her lips.

  Bee-bee shifted her line of sight to the healer’s concentrating face. The woman’s tresses slipped from her shoulders and fell around Bee-bee. A tingly warmth rushed from her head down her spine. Bee-bee felt her body relax. She felt able to draw in a deep breath, and she closed her eyes.

  When she opened her eyes, shafts of sunlight were frozen in the hovering dust of a window. Bee-bee could have sworn it was night only a moment ago. Now it was day? How?

  “Olive,” said the old man. “Our little goblin is awake.”

  Fabric shuffled across the floor. Bee-bee sat up and groaned as the old woman appeared at her bedside. And what a bed it was! Twenty goblins could fit on it! Whoa-wow!

  Olive shoved a number of pillows behind Bee-bee’s back. Arthie offered Bee-bee a metal mug full of water. Bee-bee snatched the mug, and she eyed the old couple over the rim as she guzzled water. When she removed the mug from her face, she discovered that Arthie was offering her a bowl of steaming colors. Steam was rising from thick orange, oily yellows, and black specks.

  Bee-bee frowned.

  “Carrot soup,” said Arthie. “It’s a good recipe.”

  Bee-bee carefully handled the wooden bowl. She was offered a spoon, but she saw no sense in it. She sipped from the lip of the bowl instead. She wasn’t surprised to find that humans made the most disgusting food in the world. Not that she’d had experience trying foods from other races. Still, humans were bad at making food. Where was the meat? What was food without meat? No, no, no. Not good.

  “How are you feeling, dear?” said Olive. She sat one butt cheek on the bed like she wanted to keep distance.

  Bee-bee cleared her throat after she couldn’t manage to say something on her first try. “Sore.”

  Olive and Arthie smiled at each other rather warmly. They seemed quite happy, like things were going their way in life. Bee-bee found that sort of expression quite new. At least her goblin crewmates never had expressions like that before.

  “We’ve been worried sick,” said Olive.

  “Oh, so sick,” said Arthie. “We’re so happy you’re doing better.”

  Bee-bee was shocked and confused. That’s why they were happy? Because she was doing better? What did humans care? No, they were lying.

  “Are you comfortable?” said Olive. “Would you like more carrot soup?”

  Bee-bee screwed her face into half of a snarl at the mention of more carrot soup. She regarded the humans from under her brows. Another round of carrot soup did not appeal to her at all, despite the protesting growl of her stomach. Shh!

  Arthie chuckled. “Goblins have particular taste, I bet. Is there something you’d like? We don’t have much, but we’d be happy to feed you until you recover.”

  Bee-bee’s eyes went wide. Her gaze darted from human to human. Did she hear correctly? They would feed her?

  “Well,” said Olive. “We have a lot of flour and a lot of cheese and a ton of tomatoes. Arthie and I have planned to bake tom pies. Would you like one?”

  Bee-bee frowned. She considered deeply what it would mean to put a tom in a pie. Her frown shifted through several shapes before she decided she was quite all right with eating a tom in a pie, unless…

  “Tom’s not a goblin?” she said.

  “A goblin?” said Olive, and she guffawed. “Tom is short for tomato. It’s a tomato pie. We brew tomato sauce until it's nice and thick, then we spread on a round of dough, then we bake it in the old rathskeller, and then we sprinkle grated cheese on top.”

  Cheese. Bee-bee was shocked that they had cheese. So the humans did know what good food was. They were just keeping it from her! Well, she’d have to take them up on their offer. Especially since she was still hungry—starving! She hadn’t eaten in too many days.

  “You relax and recover,” said Arthie. He refilled her mug of water from a glass pitcher, and he set the mug on a nightstand beside the bed.

  “We’ll bring some tom pie up in about an hour,” said Olive. “Keep comfy.”

  “Get some rest,” said Arthie.

  They left, and Bee-bee wrestled with her bedding until she was buried beneath them. A hollow tunnel let in fresh air and let out goblin breath. In the dark, in the warmth, while she frowned in concentration against the pain in her body, Bee-bee went a whole hour without being yelled at by a senior goblin. Never had she spent an hour in such silence and peace.

  Her eyelids slipped shut, and a door creaked open and its doorknob tapped the wall. Bee-bee groaned, and wrestled herself up through the tunnel of her wrangled bedding.

  Her nose came out first, and she caught a whiff of hot meaty tomatoes. The smell came with browned bread crust and the vapors of a melted milky cheese.

  “How are you feeling?” said Arthie.

  “Oh, look at her, honey!” said Olive.

  So Bee-bee looked at herself. Her head, chest, and arms were out of the twisted tunnel of bedding around her. The twist of bedding spiraled from her like a long flowing dress.

  The humans came right up to the bed, and Olive sat one buttcheek on the bed once more. Arthie placed a huge round dish upon her lap.

  Heat waves shifted reality above the pie—what Bee-bee assumed was a tom pie. Her nostrils flared, and she found her mouth watering. They were going to share that with her? Then she realized that Arthie had a whole second dish with him! Two tom pies? One had to be all for her, right? Please?

  Olive attacked the tom pie with a knife. She sliced it from every side until her cuts gridded the pie. She nabbed a square slice of tom pie, and offered the piece to Bee-bee in a bowl.

  “You must be feeling better already!” said Arthie. “You’re up on your feet.”

  “Oh, I’m so glad you’re doing well. I didn’t know goblins healed that quickly! I mean—Ulle had said you would, but it’s hard to believe things until you see them for yourselves sometimes!”

  Bee-bee bit into her slice of tom pie. Her next bite was the rest of the entire slice at once. She couldn’t believe tom pie tasted so good. It was so meaty! And just by the smell it made her mouth water. How did humans discover such a gift? No, only goblin gods could have ever created such a divine thing. The humans must have intercepted the recipe. That’s what happened.

  Arthie placed another square into Bee-bee’s bowl. Bee-bee, bewildered, looked at him. He was giving her more? Olive placed another piece into her bowl. Bee-bee was so glad then that she had two hands. This was what two hands were meant for: to manage two slices of tom pie at once. Oh, the bread was so soft! Such crunchy crust! Delicious!

  “Oh, Arthie,” said Olive. “She loves it!”

  “I love it!” said Bee-bee.

  “Like I said, a few friends gifted us an impossible amount of ingredients. When you’re feeling better, would you like us to teach you how to make tom pie?”

  Bee-bee gawked, and once again she looked from one human to the other. She suspected that she might be caught in an elaborate ruse designed to take advantage of a goblin, but so far the humans had been kind and very giving. She balked at the idea that they wanted to make even more tom pie with her! Didn’t they want to keep their stolen recipe a secret? She could not say no to such an opportunity.

  “I’m feeling much better already,” said Bee-bee. She stretched to prove that fact through her limberness. She could manage her pain. It was fading, and it would be gone in no time. Just like every other time she’d been hurt.

  Olive and Arthie considered each other with raised brows. They laughed, and they once again shared more slices with Bee-bee. More slices! Oh, Bee-bee could not believe her luck! And it was all because of the monster firefly. What amazing creatures fire-flies were! Majestic things!