Chap lunged into the old one's mind, waiting for whatever might come.

Sounds and images rose, led by the face of a tall elf with wide cheekbones. Chap let go of all else, even anger, and sank into Most Aged Father's rising memories.

Sorhkafare stood amid the night-wrapped trees surrounding Aonnis Lhoin'n, First Glade.

It had been the longest run of his life to reach his people's land and what now seemed the only sanctuary in a blighted world. He led his dwindling group to this place hoping to find other survivors, hoping to find help. But he could still hear the grunts and weeping and madness of the night horde ranging beyond the forest's edge.

All through his flight home, every town and village, and even every keep and stronghold, was littered with bodies torn as if fed upon by animals. The few living they encountered joined them in flight from the pale predators with crystalline eyes, always in their wake.

The numbers of their pursuers grew with each fall of the sun.

Fewer than half of those who fled Sorhkafare's encampment with him reached the forests of his people. Not one of the dwarves made it on their stout legs carrying thick heavy bodies. Thalhomerk had been the last of their people to succumb, along with his son and daughter.

In a dead run through the dark, Sorhkafare had heard the dwarven lord's vicious curses. He looked back as Thalhomerk submerged under a wave of pale bodies. He shuddered at the sound of bones cracking under the dwarf's massive fists and mace. And still the horde flowed toward Sorhkafare and over Thalhomerk's son and daughter. He could not tell which one had screamed out, as Hoil'lhan's voice smothered it with a visceral shout. She whirled to turn back.

Her hair whipped about her long face as she swung the butt of her thick metal spear shaft. It cracked through a pale face. Splattering black fluids blotted out the creature's glittering eyes and maw of sharp teeth.

Sorhkafare did not understand Hoil'lhan's preference for dwarven and human company, nor her restless and savage nature. Perhaps she had been killing for too long.

Hoil'lhan spun her spear without pause as three more pale figures closed on her. The spear's wide and long head split through the first's collarbone, grinding into its chest. She jerked her weapon out as the other two hesitated, and she screeched at them madly, ready to charge.

Sorhkafare grabbed her, pulling her around as more of the horde rushed at them through the dark.

"Run," he ordered.

Even in renewed flight Hoil'lhan tried to turn on him with her metal spear. Snahacroe snatched her other arm, and they dragged her onward.

"You cannot save Thalhomerk," Snahacroe said in a hollow voice.

The endless running took its toll. Two more of Sorhkafare's soldiers dropped in their tracks before any saw the forest's edge. All he could do was hope they died of exhaustion before…

In the clearing of First Glade, humans and elves now huddled in fear. Sorhkafare could no longer look at their gaunt faces.

So few… and in the distance, beyond the forest's limits, carried the shouts and cries of dark figures with crystalline eyes. A part of him found that easier to face than to count the small number who still lived.

A small pack of the silver-gray wolves came out of the trees. They moved with eerie conscious intent. At first their presence had frightened all, but they never attempted any harm; quite the opposite. They wove among the people, sniffing about. One stopped to lick and nuzzle a small elven girl holding a human infant.

These wolves had eyes like crystals tinted with sky blue, and neither he nor his troops had ever seen such before. But during his campaigns against the enemy, Sorhkafare had heard reports and rumors of strange wolves, deer, and other animals joining allied forces in battles in other lands.Which made these wolves a welcome sight.

The survivors in First Glade ate little and slept less. If sleep did come, they cried out in their dreams. Every night, Sorhkafare waited for the pale horde to surge in upon them.

But they never came.

On the sixth night, he could stand it no more and walked out into the forest. Leshiara tried to stop him.

Youngest of their council of elders, she stood in his way, soft lines of coming age on a face urgent and firm beneath her long graying hair. She pulled her maroon robe tight about herself against the night's chill.

"You cannot leave!" she whispered sharply. "These people need to see every warrior we have left ready to stand for them. You will make them think you abandon them."

"Stand against what?" he snarled at her, not caring who heard. "You do not know what is out there any more than I. And if they could come for us, why have they not done so? Leave me be!"

He stepped around her, heading into the trees, but not before he caught Snahacroe watching him with sad disappointment. In days past, his kinsman's silent reproach would have cut him, but now he felt nothing.

Sorhkafare followed the sounds of beasts on two legs out beyond the forest, wondering why they had not come for the pitiful count of refugees.These things on two legs… things that would not die… blood-hungry with familiar faces as pale as corpses'. He heard them more clearly as the trees thinned around him, and he stopped in the night to listen.

The noise they made had changed. Screams of pain were strangled short beneath wet tearing sounds.

Sorhkafare stumbled forward, sickened by his own curiosity.

Through a stand of border aspens before the open plain, he saw three silhouettes with sparking eyes. They rushed, one after another, upon a fourth fleeing before them.

Still, he kept on, slipping in behind one aspen.

In days past, Sorhkafare would have leaped to defend any poor victim.But not now. It did not matter if anyone out there on the plain still lived. He peered around the aspen's trunk.

The three hunkered upon the ground with lowered heads, tearing back and forth. Beneath them, the fourth struggled wildly, its pain-pitched voice ringing in Sorhkafare's ears.

The sound of such terrified suffering ate at him.

He lunged around the tree, running for the victim's outstretched hand. Halfway there, the figure thrashed free and scrambled across the matted grass with wide, panicked eyes…

Glittering, crystalline eyes.

Sorhkafare's feet slid upon autumn leaves as he halted.

Out on the plain, dark silhouettes chased and hunted each other with cries of fear and hunger. The moon and stars dimly lit shapes tearing into each other with fingers and teeth. With nothing else to feed upon, the pale creatures turned upon each other.

These things… so hungry for warm life.

One of the three lifted its head.

Sorhkafare made out a pale face, its mouth smeared with wet black. Its eyes sparked as if gathering the waninglight, and it saw him. It rose, turning toward him as the other pair chased the fourth through the grass.

Sorhkafare heard his own breath. He retreated a few paces, just inside the forest's tree line.

This pale thing he saw… a man… was human.

His quivering lips and teeth were darkened, as if he had been drinking black ink. He sniffed the air wildly and a ravenous twist distorted his features. He began running toward Sorhkafare.

This one smelled him, sensed his life.

Sorhkafare jerked out his long war knife and braced himself.

The human came straight at him, its feral features pained with starvation. Perhaps it gained no sustenance in feeding on its own. But he no longer cared for anything beyond seeing these horrors gone from his world.

It ran straight at him like an animal without reason.

When it stepped between the first trees of the forest, it stopped short, hissing and gurgling in desperation. Sorhkafare saw the man clearly now.