"B-but ... I'm supposed to be the only blonde in town!" mumbled Sarah.
One of the guards, always listening for any slur against the Life-Giver, had heard her. "Of course you are, you freak. You know the Life-Giver dwells in a castle just outside the edge of town."
"Why?" asked Sarah.
"Why are you asking such silly questions? Have you gone mad? The Life-Giver is not meant to live among us. We are merely her servants, destined for lifelong infertility, no thanks to the toxic waste that has contaminated our land. She must never set foot here, lest future generations never come to be."
Sarah thought she had heard the guard stifle a sniffle.
"And you," snarled the guard, "you're a living mockery of the Life-Giver with your royal wannabe hair. When her predecessor gave birth to you, you had red hair just like me. But after you left the palace to grow up here, your hair somehow lightened, as if you were the next Life-Giver. Obviously you're not, you Y-ner."
"What is this 'whining' stuff?"
"All that man-lust of yours has fried your brain. Shut up and follow me! There will be no men where you're going, pervert! And gimme that!"
"M-my rock ..."
The guard snatched it away and threw it in a wastebasket. "You won't need it there either."
"Where's there?" All Sarah wanted to do was to come back here so she could get the rock back. Until then ...
