At dusk the world changed. Pestilence reigned, and a low and utterly horrible whirring
and droning came from within the miasma, as if great clouds of insects flew within its grey
clouds. As the hour deepened, the surface of the earth itself developed great boils that eventually
burst to reveal writhing masses of grubs and worms.
When full night descended, terror replaced pestilence. Men swore they could hear teeth
gnashing in the darkness beyond the sheltered areas, or the whispers of nightmares too terrible to be contemplated. Terror writhed amid the untamed landscape of the night, and it waited—as had
pestilence and despair—for that single error that would let it feed.
Few managed any sleep, and the horses jostled nervously the entire time, forcing men to
their heads to try and keep them calm.
A league beyond the boundaries of the camp, coalesced a terror more terrible than any
could imagine.
For days the Hawkchilds that flew over the central plains had been driving
south-eastwards an army many thousands strong. It had been instructed by the Hawkchilds, and
given its purpose by them, but it was led by an immense brown and cream badger intent on its
own hunt after a lifetime of being hunted.
All that it saw in its mind and smelt with its nose was the heady brightness and aroma of
blood.
It wanted to feed.
As did every creature that lurched, scampered, hopped and flew behind it.
There were hundreds of once-white sheep, their wool now stained with madness and the
blood of those who had proved themselves a nuisance.
There were twice that number of dairy cows, their udders straining with accumulated
pestilence, their minds fixed on destroying those who had abused them in their former life. For
the past week they‘d been sharpening their horns on every stone they came across.
There was a mass of pigs, thousands of them, grown strange tusks in hairy snouts, their
eyes almost enclosed by thickened, puffy eyelids, grunting with every step they took. They too
wanted revenge against those who‘d bred them exclusively for the table.
Among the sheep and cattle and pigs scuttled sundry dogs and cats, many of them far
longer-limbed than they‘d been several weeks previously, their sides gaunt-ribbed, their mouths
open in permanent snarls, rabid saliva flickering from their jaws to dot the paths they took. There
were rats and hamsters, mules and oxen, and a thousand maddened chicken, geese and turkeys.
And among all these beasts who had formerly been enslaved, ran those creatures who had
once commanded them. Naked, febrile men, women and children, sometimes running upright,
sometimes scuttling on all fours, snapping at any creature that came within reach.
All lost to the Demons.
All wanting blood, and revenge for whatever slight their madness had magnified in their
mind.
They adored this wasteland, and they would do anything— anything—to protect it.
They attacked at dawn when hunger ruled the land.
Zared and his army had no knowledge of their approach. The air was dark about them,
and they were muddle-witted from an almost sleepless night. They were still broken up into their
seventy-five squares, a formation hardly conducive to effective defence.
The donkeys gave the first warning. They had been curled up beside Zared and Leagh‘s
sleeping roll when they jerked awake, their eyes wide, and scrambled to their feet.
If that alone was not enough to startle those about them into wide-eyed apprehension, it
was the low, rumbling growl that issued forth from one of the donkeys‘ throats.
Zared followed the donkeys‘ stare into the lightening gloom, and then drew his sword
with a sharp rattle.
―Ware!‖ he shouted, and the shout was taken up a hundred times until it echoed about the
camp.
Ware! Ware! Ware!
Then the maddened army was upon them.
That those they wished to kill currently rested under shade did not worry them in the
slightest. Shade or sun, they could still attack, and attack they did against an army that had never,
never, trained for defence against scuttling cats, or vicious-eyed hamsters, or sharp-toothed
sheep, or the sheer weight of a charging cow or ox. Or the sight of a scrawny, naked woman who
had twisted her hands into claws and who threw herself into the fray with no thought for the
swords that were pointed at her belly.
Horses—and men—panicked.
Zared found himself, and those who sheltered with him, almost overwhelmed by the first
wave of attack. A pig knocked him to his knees, and he only just managed to run his sword
through its left eye and into its brain before its teeth would have sliced into his throat.
He looked up. ―Leagh!‖
She had shrunk back among the horses—now rearing and plunging. A howling, naked
boy of about ten was darting under the plunging hooves, trying to reach her. He held a great rock
in one hand.
―Leagh!‖
Zared tried to rise and go to her aid, but a cat sprang and wrapped its legs and claws
about his head. Blinded, Zared jabbed the hilt of his sword into the cat‘s body, over and over,
until he felt its grip loosening.
Something massive and foul-breathed loomed to one side, and Zared ducked, flinging the
body of the cat as far away as he could.
He tried to turn to meet the new threat, but something bit into the calf of a leg, and he
grunted in pain, momentarily distracted.
The huge creature—an ox!—lunged, its forelegs stiff and murderous, but in the instant
before it crushed Zared, something white flashed in from the side, and suddenly the ox had no
head, and half its left side was gone as well.
It toppled to the ground.
Zared blinked, clearing his own blood from his eyes, then blinked again.
What? He had the hazy impression of something white, more massive even than the ox,
moving swiftly through the mayhem.
There was an inhuman shriek, and he vaguely saw the boy who was attacking Leagh fall
under the onslaught of the white beast. And there was another white creature, leaping the
distance between his shelter and the one adjoining.
Was it a Demonic beast as well, that it could run between shelters?
One…roared? Zared blinked again. There. Yes! It roared, and swiped with a huge paw,
and suddenly animals were scattering everywhere, fleeing back into the wilderness from whence
they had come.
Zared concentrated, but he could not clearly see what it was that had come to their aid.
The two white forms—they were so immense!—were leaping from shelter to shelter, and setting
to flight any crazed animal that fell within their field of vision.
―Leagh?‖ Zared scrambled to his feet. ―Leagh?‖
―Here. Safe.‖ She emerged from behind one of the horses, now strangely calm, and
looked at Zared.
―What was that?‖
He shook his head. ―I don‘t know.‖ He made sure that Leagh was, indeed, unharmed,
then moved among his men within the shelter. Some carried deep wounds, several were dead, but
most had survived the encounter relatively physically intact. Their frightened eyes, however,
made Zared wonder how well their souls had survived.
―Gustus?‖ Zared called to the next shelter and, gradually, as men shouted between
shelters, he managed to get an idea of how badly his force had been hit.
High overhead, a swarm of Hawkchilds hissed and whispered in frustration. What had
gone wrong? There had been an enchantment worked below—but what kind? How? They were
far from any forest. Was not the Star Dance dead? Was it the stray magician or two that had
aided the army below? They screamed, then veered north to commune with the Demons.
Also to the north, the brown and cream badger snapped and snarled his own force back
into some form of order. They‘d had their chance, and wasted it. But the badger had learned.
He‘d wait, and grow, and next time…next time…
Zared let the surgeon suture the wounds on his forehead—that cat had truly been
murderous—and talked to Herme, Theod and Leagh through the man‘s twisting fingers.
―What happened?‖ he asked.
Theod and Herme looked at each other.
―We were attacked—‖ Herme began.
―By what?‖ Zared snapped.
Leagh looked at Theod and Herme, and placed her hands on her husband‘s shoulders,
smiling her thanks to the surgeon as he packed his bag and left.
―They know no more than we do,‖ she said gently. ―We were attacked by crazed
animals.‖
―They moved as one force,‖ Zared said. ―Under direction.‖
―Yes,‖ Herme said. ―We knew that numbers of demented creatures wandered the plains,
but we did not know of this organised force.‖
―And the people among them,‖ Leagh shuddered. ―I swear that I recognised one or two of
those faces.‖
―They were more animal than the creatures they ran with,‖ Theod said softly. ―Is this
what awaits all of us?‖
―Unless Drago finds this Sanctuary,‖ Zared said, and stood up. He gazed slowly about,
and eventually looked back at his wife and two closest friends.