It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did. He remembered shrugging off blows like this before. Yet her first came down upon his neck and sent him buckling to his knees effortlessly. She made a clicking sound of disapproval, which he noticed less than the second strike she delivered. It was an intimate blow, all three metal-bound knuckles of her hand digging into his red flesh, finding a tender, affectionate spot between his shoulder blades.

Not possible. His thoughts ran wild, leaking out of his mouth as he hacked wildly, I don’t have tender spots.

His spine disagreed. His vertebrae rattled against each other, sinew bunched up painfully at the force that ran up his back and into his skull, sending brain slamming against bone and sending body crashing to the earth.

That’s never happened before …

That it hadhappened should have shocked him. It was difficult to feel shock, fear, pain, anything. Every scrap of consciousness was devoted to keeping his eyes open, to resist the urge to sleep into darkness, though he didn’t know why. At least if he fell now, he wouldn’t have to see the long, purple face leering down at him.

‘You’re doing it wrong.’ Her voice was clear and sharp as a knife.

Funny, but he hadn’t expected there to be a right way to die. The fact that he had been doing it wrong didexplain a lot. He might have mentioned this to her, had his throat not been swelling up.

‘It’s fine for us to do this, you know,’ she said. ‘But we’re netherlings. We come from nothing. We return to nothing. We live. We breed. We kill. We die. This is all there is in life.’ She reached down and tapped his red brow. ‘Note that third part, though, about the killing. That’s important.’

Her throat loomed over him. His hand would just about fit around it, he figured, but it trembled, refused to rise.

And why should it?he asked himself. Whatever your body knows, you didn’t. Now you’re both done. There’s nothing left.

‘But overscum are supposed to have bigger things on their minds, yeah? They talk to invisible people, spend their whole lives hoarding bits of metal instead of making them into weapons; they do stupid stuff like plant crops and store food and leave it all to wailing whelps who did nothing to deserve it. Point being … you’ve got reasons to scream, don’t you?’

His breath came in shrill whispers, leaking through a closing throat, just enough to breathe, just enough to think.

Kill her and then what? What’s left? Kill more, kill more, live in death. Die, live in nothingness … but with nothing to think about, to speak about, no one left to disappear.

‘But that’s what’s so fascinatingto us. To Carnassials, that is.’ She glanced over the cliff. ‘And some males. We’ve never seen this before, a breed that worries about so many stupid things and lives in complete fear of whatever invisible thing they talk to and is concerned with things other than breeding and killing. It’s like … watching ants. That’s the correct animal, right? Yeah … ants that run around and cling to every little piece of dirt like it’s the greatest piece they’ve ever seen, even as a thousand more lie around. Take that piece away, and what do they do? Some grab new ones, but most sit there … like you.’

And how much dirt have you been clinging to? Grahta, Grandfather, the humans … they’re all gone. How much more can you pick up?

‘You’re not going to get up, are you?’ She rose up, took her sword in both hands.

This won’t be so bad.

‘No more dirt, huh?’

No more hurting; no more being alone.

‘Too bad.’

She raised the weapon, angled the flat edge of it at his throat. It would be messy.

No more rivers; no more rocks.

‘Hey, maybe you’re right about the whole invisible thing, yeah? If so, I’m sure you’ll see your pink friends there with you by tonight.’

No more anything … It’ll be so great …

‘Anyway …’

‘ SHENKO-SA!’

He blinked. Those words weren’t said by the longface. That shrill, shrieking sound didn’t emanate from her, either.

The loud, angry roar as she staggered away, clutching at the arrow embedded in her side, however, certainly did.

Gariath was almost afraid to look across the river, afraid that he would see the pointy-eared one. If shehad placed the timely arrow and saved him, he resolved he would die right then and there, hopefully taking her with him. He was prepared for that possibility, prepared for the idea that it might have come from nowhere and given him an opportunity to take one last breath before lying down and dying.

What he saw, however, he was not prepared for.

Not Rhega, but definitely not human, the creature stood, tall and covered in green scales, at the other side of the river. His long, black bow was in a powerful, clawed hand. His body, ringed by black-and-red tattoos, was tensed and muscular. Behind his long, lashing tail, more like him — more reptilian creatures — stared at Gariath with broad, yellow eyes down long, green snouts.

The one in front raised his hand, regarded Gariath through his single yellow eye, and spoke.

‘ Inda-ah, Rhega.’

‘What?’ he breathed.

‘I knew it! I knew it!’ He looked to see the longface pulling the arrow free without wincing, as though she were simply scratching an itch with a jagged, biting head. ‘Xhai said you all got up when someone started mocking you! I didn’t believe her!’

He swept his stare across the river again. The creatures were gone; nothing but greenery remained where they had once stood. Perhaps he had imagined them; perhaps they hadn’t ever been there …

But that arrow on the sand, covered in blood, was impossible to imagine. And it lay there now. He looked from it to the longface staggering toward him, dragging her weapon.

Good enough.

‘I didn’t think it would work. I owe Xhai a-’

If she saw the fist coming, she didn’t move away.

A possibility, Gariath conceded, but one he was willing to accept as he and his arm rose as one, his knuckles connecting with her chin and sending her head snapping back. She was all skull — that much was apparent from his aching fist, if not her conversation.

She, too, was ready to accept. She accepted his punches as he followed with two more in rapid succession, feeling bones shake, but not break, under his fists. She accepted the ground lost as he drove her back. She accepted his horns again, accepted the broken nose as he drove his head against her face.

Only when he stepped back, waiting for her to fall that he might end it with a foot to her skull, did she refuse to accept. She pulled her face back up to stare at him, neck creaking as she did, teeth flashing in a grin that had only grown more wild as blood from her spattered visage dripped over her lips.

‘ Yeah …’

She came howling again, no concern for strategy, position or anything but the imminent and immediate desire to bring her blade swinging up to lop off his head. A moment of nostalgia swept over him at the sight of such recklessness, followed by a moment of swift panic as he saw the blade just as eager as her, sweeping up towards his head.

He caught it on his wrist, the metal gnawing at the metal bracers there. She drove the blade harder, straining to chew through and cleave his hand from his wrist, his head from his neck. He pushed back just as hard, reaching up to place his free hand on the edge. It was an effort tinged in blood as the weapon bit into his palm, making his grip slick as he shoved back, but an effort that sent the blade swinging wide and leaving her open.

He wasn’t sure if he was roaring or laughing, didn’t bother to think which it might have been, just as he didn’t wonder why his muscles suddenly felt so easy, so strong. There was blood on the ground, blood in his nostrils, anger in his veins and a purple neck beneath his claws.