Stephen was slowly getting dragged inside the mushy ground when suddenly, Athena who is behind immediately took the bag of dragonscale and lifted it up. "We would like to negotiate! I have the scale of Estienne!" She yelled and the witches that surrounds us starts to whisper and murmur. It's obvious they were intrigued.
The murmuring intensified, swirling like smoke around us. The ring of witches tightened towards us slightly, but their hostile focus had shifted from Athena to the shiny, iridescent dragonscale clutched in her hand. Stephen, struggling against the suffocating mud that had already reached his waist, managed to wrench one hand free to signal his gratitude to Athena.
