The Howling had heard him.

The Howling had found him.

Had he the consciousness to feel his heart stop, he still would not have been afraid of it. The Howling had long ago ceased to be something strange and mystical, long ago ceased to even be the instinctual knowledge that all shicts shared. He had spent many years within it, listening to it, learning it. It was a part of him, as it was a part of all shicts. As he was one with the Howling, so too was he one with all shicts.

And they would hear him as they heard their own thoughts.

Emptiness passed in an instant; then his head filled. Images of sand and blood consumed him, swirled together with sea and ships, purple faces, clenching teeth, red iron, bleeding bodies, fallen trees. War, disease, mutation, danger, anger, hatred. Through these things, coursing as blood through his thoughts, his intent boiled over.

Find.

Rescue.

Kill.

Harvest.

The intent flowed across the emptiness, dew across the petals of the flower. It would reach his people, he knew: a whisper in their ears, a sudden chill down their spines as they knew what he knew in an instant. They would hear him, they would feel him, and they would come with their blood and Spokesmen and hatred and-

Wait.

His ears went taut of their own volition, sensing something he had not the consciousness to. A sound without meaning? No, he realised, a sound craving meaning. It ranged wildly, whimpering quietly one moment, snarling angrily the next, then letting out a terrified howl and searching for an answer beyond its own echo.

Impossible to listen to. Too loud, too painful.

Impossible to ignore. Too close, too familiar.

His people? No.

No s’na shict s’ha. Then … what?

‘Oh! Look, look, look! He’s doing it again!’

Another voice. Distant, meaningless.

‘What is it that he’s doing, then?’

Words for those without minds, terrified of emptiness.

‘No idea. He always does this, though. Never says a word, just … sits.’

Words for those without thought, terrified of silence.

‘Well, it’s boring. Wake him up.’

An explosion of sound.

His eyes snapped open as the flower of emptiness wilted in his mind; he turned to see the iron blade rattled against the bars of his cage. Behind it, white hair, white eyes and jagged teeth set in a long, purple face. He recognised this one, gathered her name long ago, associated it with her ever-present, ever-unpleasant grin.

Qaine.

The longfaces behind her, the male with the wispy patch of hair beneath his lower lip, the male with the long nose and red robe, the female with the long, spiky bristles of white serving as hair, he recognised too.

Yldus, Vashnear, Dech.

Behind them, standing with arms crossed over her chest, taller and more powerful than any male or female assembled, face drawn so tight it appeared as though it would split apart and bare glistening muscle underneath at any moment … This one, he knew only by the venom with which the others spewed her name.

Xhai. Carnassial.

He repeated their names to himself whenever he felt his anger towards them slipping. He collected their names like flowers and wore them about his neck in something fragile that he would pluck, petal by bloody petal and crush under his six toes. Names for now, targets for later. Just as soon as his people heard, just as soon as they knew …

‘Must you really do that?’ the one called Yldus asked, making a look of disapproval that seemed perpetual.

‘It’s not fair,’ Qaine replied, peering into the cage. ‘I caught him, I should get to kill him.’

‘ Ifroze him, thank you. I suppose the irony is lost on you that we are gathered here to discuss the ways in which you can kill more than just one overscum and you’re barely paying attention for want of killing this one?’

‘He killed twofemales! I didn’t even get a chance to fight him!’

‘Two?’ Dech asked, raising an eyebrow. ‘I didn’t think they were that hard.’

‘Did you not also say he bled all over them?’ The one called Vashnear, long of nose, red of robe, twisted his upper lip in disgust. ‘Filthy creature. Keep it in its cage.’

‘It’s obvious by now that the overscum won’t infect you with anything,’ Yldus replied, rolling his eyes.

‘You cannot know that,’ Vashnear snapped back.

‘Just a moment out of the cage,’ Qaine whispered. Her hands drifted, one toward the lock on his cage, the other toward the blade on her belt. ‘It’ll be quick. Those others were weaklings. He can’t be thatstrong.’

Naxiaw held his belt, already calculating how he would kill her, then leap to the spike-headed one and rip her throat out, seize her sword and move to the males. They were small, delicate — one stroke would finish them both. The big one with the taut face … he would have to flee and come back for her later. Just as well, though; shicts didn’t fight fair.

His breath came slow and steady as her fingers drifted closer to the lock. He was prepared for this. He was ready to spill their blood. He was s’na shict s’ha. He would kill them all as soon as she just drew a little closer and-

‘No.’

There wasn’t even enough air left to gasp with after the voice spoke. There was no threat in it, Naxiaw discerned; threats implied uncertainty, conditions that must be met. The voice spoke with nothing of the sort. It was a word full of certainty, a sound full of meaning.

This one sat so still at the edge of the ruined terrace, demurely seated upon a hewn brick, idly drumming his long fingertips on a crumbling trellis, staring down at the valley with what Naxiaw was sure was extreme boredom, even if he couldn’t see the male’s long face.

This one had no name as far as Naxiaw knew. His was whispered so softly, with such quiet reverence, that it escaped even the long reach of his ears. It seemed, rather, that the other longfaces took great care not to mention his name within earshot of the shict. They turned their eyes away from him, and even Naxiaw felt the urge to look away, to avoid the sight of his void-black robes and long and stiff white hair.

But he forced himself to look, to give this one a name, one more flower to the necklace. This one would bleed. This one would die. This one, Black-clad, would suffer most of all.

After a moment, the sound of fingers drumming resumed. Air returned to their lungs, meaninglessness to their voices.

‘As I was saying,’ Yldus continued, ‘the subject of the invasion is of some concern to me.’

‘As to us all,’ Vashnear replied with a sneer. ‘The fact that youwere chosen to lead it is a decision of unending concern.’

‘I suppose you have a better idea?’ Qaine replied, stepping in front of Yldus, returning his sneer.

This, Naxiaw gathered, was their function — to be hounds to the males. To bare their teeth and snarl at those who looked at them without their express approval. These tall, white-haired ones, the Carnassials, were the fiercest and most protective of their charges. And Naxiaw waited with morbid anticipation for the spike-headed Dech to return Qaine’s aggression with the grim hope that one of them would die shortly after.

‘Granted, given the company,’ Yldus said before Dech could make a move, ‘I know that to request an end to your female posturing and snarling is to ask the impossible, but I was hoping we could get at least a little business done before you start tearing each other apart.’

‘The Master’s decision,’ Xhai uttered, ‘was made.’

A long silence trailed her words, suggesting that any event of tearing apart, as far as she was concerned, would end with her in possession of all her limbs and possibly one or two extra. The remaining females met her gaze briefly before snorting derisively and stepping back to their respective males.