Black Halo

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 you were 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.

‘If Sheraptus has anything to tell us,’ Vashnear snarled, ‘then he can speak without the use of females. Until then, nothing is decided.’ He glanced fleetingly at Black-clad. ‘I still advocate overwhelming force. The males lead, use the nethra to burn the city to cinders without having to set foot in it and risk contamination.’

‘The cost would be enormous,’ Yldus protested.

‘You act as though we do not possess the stones.’ Vashnear tapped the red sphere dangling from his neck, smiled as it glowed brightly at his touch. ‘The cost is trivial.’

‘You aren’t considering the resources spent.’

‘Oh no,’ Vashnear moaned, rolling his white eyes. ‘More dead slaves? If only we had some inexhaustible source of working flesh and …’ He blinked suddenly, holding up a finger. ‘Oh wait.’ His thin hand made a dismissive gesture. ‘Ours is the right to take. We can always get more overscum.’

‘Really?’ Yldus strode to the edge of the ridge and stared down at the valley below. ‘We’ve already rounded up every green thing on the island and killed half of them already. Attempts to collect and subjugate the painted lizards have gone …’

Naxiaw peered through his bars, following the longface’s stare to the valley. Two females below dragged an unmoving compatriot by her ankles. Naxiaw’s eyes widened as he spied the female’s head, or the red pulp that used to be the head. He had but enough time to make out a miasma of colour, red-stained grey porridge rolling around in bits of exposed, glistening bone held together by a web of tattered purple flesh.

Then the two females tossed their fellow unceremoniously into the spike-lined pit. Shadowy figures moved beneath, stirred with sudden, violent movement. Naxiaw caught flashes of red and brown fur, bright teeth against black lips. An eerie cackle rose from the pit, to be drowned out by the sound of chewing and ripping.

‘Not as well as we had planned,’ Yldus finished.

‘If the worst that comes from our attempts is that the sikkhuns eat a little better and we lose a few females, so be it.’ Vashnear spoke with a very pleased smirk he was certain to swing toward Qaine. ‘Of course, we have an entire wealth of green-things that will not fight back readily, just waiting for-’

‘Not them.’

Black-clad’s voice lingered for just a moment this time, a spear instead of a cloak that he aimed directly at Vashnear. The red-robed longface nodded briefly, his smile disappearing.

‘Of course.’ He turned his stare back toward his fellow male. ‘But it is not as though there is a shortage of overscum in this world. We will use what we have to ruin their city and eliminate the need for this useless chatter or for useless females. The three of us. Burn them out. Burn them up. The problem is solved.’

Dech snorted. ‘What would be the point in just burning them, though?’

‘That’s what I was beginning to illuminate,’ Yldus replied. ‘The specifics simply have to be-’

‘Specifics?’ Dech frowned deeply. ‘You have a city full of pinkies. Stomp their faces in, cut their heads off, and if you want to get really specific, rip their arms out of their sockets and stab them in their throats with them.’

‘Stab them,’ Yldus repeated, ‘in the throat.’

‘With their arms, yeah.’

A silence settled over the assembly. Yldus stared at the Carnassial for a very long, unblinking moment before pursing his lips together and taking a deep breath through his nose.

‘At any rate,’ he continued, clearly biting back words far more suited to his mood, ‘burning will not work. The considerable resources that such a plan would utilise aside, our goal is not actually to burn as many overscum as possible, you will recall.’

‘Right,’ Qaine chuckled blackly. ‘Just a bonus.’

‘Rather,’ Yldus continued, shooting her a scowl, ‘I am hoping to minimise the amount of casualties needed, at least as far as our forces are concerned. Every female we lose in this battle will be a female we will not have for further conflicts. Hence, I will need more to attack the city.’

‘I don’t follow,’ Dech grunted.

‘Really.’ Yldus rolled his eyes. ‘The logic is simple. The overscum has a sizable presence. Not enough to hold my current force back, of course, but enough to take a toll that would make future conflicts with the underscum more of a difficulty than they need be.’

‘You have been given three venri to use,’ Xhai growled curtly. ‘More than enough for any true warrior.’

‘Females are warriors,’ Yldus countered. ‘I am not. And if we hope to have any warriors to fight the underscum with-’

‘The underscum are yet to be a problem.’

‘Really?’ Vashnear eyed her, noting the mass of thick purple tissue near her collarbone. ‘How did you get that mark again, unscarred? Or are we still able to call you that?’

‘This was given to me,’ she snarled, thumping the scar, ‘from no black-skinned, slime-spewing piece of krazhak.’

‘From the overscum you reported, then?’ Vashnear asked, smirking. ‘Perhaps you should have kept that to yourself, no?’

‘I have plans for that,’ she uttered, rubbing the scar with an intensity that went far beyond grudge-filled memory.

‘Could we perhaps get back to my plans?’ Yldus asked. ‘You know, the important