I had no choice but to run, as futile as it was. I cradled the empty, enchanted pot in my arms as I fled deeper into the woods. I kept my head down as the branches scraped across my porcelain skin and tore ruffles and ribbons from my doll's outfit as trophies of their cruelty.
As I ran I swore I could see a pair of yellow eyes trailing me from the boughs above. I refocused on the path I was blazing just in time to trip over a log. I heard something crack as I landed in the pile of leaves.
As I struggled to my feet, a pair of long bony tendrils wrapped around me and lifted me several feet off the ground. My once-human Father glared up at me with reptilian eyes and the inhuman mockery of a smile while the beast that controlled him balanced itself on his right shoulder, already firmly anchored inside the host's rib cage. I looked at the skeletal wings that it used as claws, and then at my own pinned appendages.
My right hand had snapped off in the fall, leaving a jagged hollow tube of ceramic for a forearm. I had to assume the teapot was lost with it.
"Thank you so much for the tea," he hissed, "but my new friend here says it's time for supper!'
"But I'm not flesh!", I stammered. "I'm porcelain!"
"Oh, but your Spheres are pure magic, Sweet Qli," he growled. "The Creator giveth, and the Creator taketh away."
I shut my glass eyes whimpering as the serpent reared over my Creator's body, jaws extended to strike..
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