"Dorothea, no. Listen to me," Sam said as she shook her head. She was trying to put on a brave face but she could hear her voice cracking. "I can't run through these woods all night, and even if I could...I won't know where I'm going. I don't know anything about this world. I'd just get lost and they'd catch us anyway. Don't get caught because of me." She could hear them now, the men with the clinking armor. The sounds were growing closer each second and Sam glanced over her shoulder quickly as she tried to calm her racing heart. She looked back up at Dorothea as the cat girl declared that Sam was her responsibility. It unexpectedly touched her heart and Sam felt herself smile a bit. "I can take care of myself," she said softly. Sam had felt this way for so long, even as a kid. But when she had said it just now it had felt a bit like a lie on her tongue.

The princess began to leap onto branches higher in the tree and Sam heard the disturbing of the leaves and twigs on the forest floor. She closed her eyes briefly before slowly turning to see the Marshal and his two guardsmen approaching. She felt her heart hammer in her chest as the two thugs advanced towards her and she stumbled away from them until her back was pressed against the tree. They had cornered her and had their swords drawn and held up near her throat. Sam eyed the blades, her face pale, before looking into their faces. The one with blood dripping from his nose had a particularly pleased expression on his face and he looked like he couldn't wait to run her through. He spoke to his leader, basically asking for permission to kill her on the spot.

It was at this moment as she stared Death in the face that Sam realized if she died here in this world then no one back in her own would ever know what had happened to her. To her family and friends she would have simply just vanished off the face of the earth. She couldn't let that happen. She had to live, had to get home. Sam refused to die in a world that wasn't her own. She looked at the Marshal to see him considering her and she found her voice. "What kind of man are you? First you kidnap me and trap me in this place, for no reason by the way. I swear I didn't know anything. And now that we're on the other side you're just going to kill me? Why didn't you just do it before, why bring me here at all?" Sam could hear her voice shaking as she begged for her life. But it was not just due to fear. She was also angry. "You made me a liability when you had these two drag me through that mirror! And look at me, how much of a threat could I possibly be to you? Look. At. Me. Please." She swallowed as she gazed at the man. "Only a monster would murder a scared, lost girl in the woods. Is that the kind of man you are? A monster?"