The Amalgam flew overhead, the sound of its passing nothing but distant rhythmic wingbeats. A horrifying writhing mass of excess limbs and ugly lumps of flesh. It looked like somebody poured a bucket of tar over some helpless creatures until only bits and pieces were still recognizable. For now, it was hundreds of feet in the air. The pair had seen it up close only once and the smell of rotting meat still permeated Tarvor's clothes. 

Shera had come up with the name, given the sickly way one could make out bits and pieces of things it had consumed. Mostly legs, but some arms and torsos as well, a few heads could be seen crying wordlessly, somehow stuck inside the black lumpy hide. More than a few of them were human. 

They'd been camped at the edge of the black glass field for more than a week. Tarvor had wanted to get closer, even suggesting they hide inside the cave the beast slept in, but Shera insisted they keep their distance. Its lair sat at the top of a spiked mound, a jagged pile of the same burned black ground they now stood on. It was nearly as large as a true mountain. The only time they'd managed to get a good look at the thing had been when they'd scaled its surface to peer into the cave directly. They had been looking for something, anything, that could give them a way to kill the beast. So far, they'd found nothing.

Shera continued to argue for patience as Tarvor grew ever more restless and irritable. When they arrived, they had discussed the best way to handle this. They disagreed, argued in hushed tones, but had calmly and rationally come up with the best plan, which was mostly just to wait and observe until a better plan could be made. Lately these little disagreements had become heated fights as the stresses of living under constant danger got to them. It was torture, curled up in an overhanging crag in the ground, afraid to leave except when absolutely necessary to observe the foe, or find food. 

However, it had become painfully clear that they would not be able to wait and plan forever. Whatever the Amalgam was, it grew at a fearsome rate. Even when seen from a great distance, it was obvious how much its hideous girth had expanded since they had first found it's lair. 

Shera was currently alone in their makeshift shelter, watching the black shape slowly circle above, wondering just what it was she was looking for. What could they even do against something like that? It seemed impossible to fight directly already, in a month it might topple entire armies with scarcely an effort. Still she stared unrelentingly at the Amalgam above, she could just make out a few of the vestigial limbs from this distance. Flimsy scraps of flesh that dangled uselessly and swayed with each chunky flap of its membranous wings. 

Her senses had sharpened recently and it unnerved her. At first, she thought it was only in her head but the more time passed the harder it was to deny. Her vision was tenfold clearer than it had been before she began the journey. If she tried, she could count the leaves on a bush that Tarvor would struggle to even see. Her other sense improved as well, and strange things seemed to be happening whenever she and Tarvor argued. The ground would shake or the wind would howl and blow as she tried to make her stubborn lover see reason. Something was coming to a head, she could feel it, like some alien force pressing slowly into her. If it could help fight the Amalgam she welcomed it, albeit uneasily. 

Tarvor denied it, of course he did the fool, but not as staunchly lately as he once had. From the way he avoided meeting her eyes when she brought it up she suspected he was noticing similar changes himself. If she pushed him on it he would still swear that nothing was happening at all, but he let her be their lookout and spy. He'd scoff at her when she claimed she could smell a rabbit half a mile away, but he'd go looking for it all the same. Now, she watched the skies, searching for any possible weakness, while he spent the entire day scouring the barren woods for scraps of food. They each had their jobs and focusing on the task at hand helped the time pass.

Early in the mornings, before the Amalgam stirred, he'd leave and sneak across the gap between their makeshift home and the edge of the forest. In the evening, he'd return with whatever he had scrounged up. Mostly squirrels, rarely anything as big as a rabbit, already cleaned and cooked when he got back. The fear that a fire, even a small one, in the empty glass expanse would bring down the Amalgam on them was enough that Shera hadn't eaten warm food since arriving. 

Each night he'd bring her the food he'd found and ask if her if she saw anything, and each time she would have to tell him no. How that irked her. He successfully, mostly, kept them fed despite personal danger, and she sat in a rotten hole, a painfully cramped crevice, and failed to see. Consistently denied any sort of useful information, anything that could make her feel valuable. She could catch squirrels too, it wasn't hard. Let him sit here all day and study chaos. She shuffled her paws uncomfortably and complained to herself.

She sat and fumed, while far to the east she could feel Tarvor slowly moving through the forest. She didn't bother to hide her feelings, didn't bother to hold her discontent inside and not let it run across their shared bond, he'd come back snarling himself anyway. He blamed her for wasting time. He said he didn't, and he hid his feelings through the bond well, but Shera knew he did. How could he not? She surely blamed herself, and he must arrive at the same conclusion. They were only in this hell because of her. They should have stayed on the mountain, they were happy then. What could they do against this black THING anyway? She watched the skies and saw nothing, nothing but a terrifying black blob on the horizon that grew by the minute.

***

Tarvor could feel the anger leaking through the bond. Burning raw emotion that could only be one thing. Anger, disappointment, at him for bringing her nothing but cold squirrel meat every night, or worse nothing at all. He tried his hardest, this forest was just deserted. All life had been drained from it, and the place was eerily quiet. Even his footsteps felt deadened, as if sound itself had fled this place in fear. So yes, he brought her squirrels, and yes they were cold because they couldn't afford to make a fire at night in the open, and yes he knew she wanted better. Yet what could he do? He tried his hardest. He braided himself on her behalf.

It had been getting easier however. The first night was the only one he had to return to her empty handed. It wasn't that there was more game now, the place became steadily more lifeless as he walked through the forest, he just seemed to have better luck at finding it. Trivial things like broken twigs seemed to unravel a mystery before him. He'd never been a bad tracker, but lately he felt a god among men. Every twitching blade of grass meant something, each one told a story and at the end of the story was dinner. It was uncanny. Perhaps the desperation of the situation had led him to become better by necessity.

Shera claimed she could tell the sex of a hawk that flew overhead now, which was complete nonsense. She'd gone stir crazy, being cooped up in that crevasse all hours of the day. It was understandable, but she was so insistent. Constantly calling him stubborn and mule-headed just because he refused to believe in her fairy tales. Here he was stretching his abilities to heights he didn't know he had just to keep them alive, and she sat and daydreamed about superpowers of all things. The absurdity of it put him further on edge every time he thought about it.

He looked around, night was falling. About the only useful thing they'd learned about the Amalgam, what a stupid name, he could have thought of a better one, was that it kept a tight schedule. By evening it had entered its cave, and it wouldn't return until dawn had fully broken. Predators that kept that schedule had poor night vision generally, bears and big cats among others. A week, nearly two, spent wasting time and that was the only thing useful they'd learned. Oh, and it was growing, but that was more terrifying than useful. Tarvor sighed.

Tarvor looked at his catch for the day, three thin squirrels. They tasted like gamey boots. He would wait until it got a little darker before cooking them, using the foliage to hide the light and smoke of a greasy campfire. The forest was lifeless but the wood was still mostly green and wet, it threw up too much smoke and made the meat taste awful.He'd give two of the three to the cat, she was bigger than him. He paused. Then again, he was the one who did all the real work. He'd eat one now and tell her he only caught two.

He had the decency to redden with shame immediately. He frowned down at the pitiful meal and scowled. He hated himself for even thinking such a vile thought. It only made sense for Shera to get the bigger portion, she needed more food to keep going than he did. A stout heavily muscled predator needed to eat better than a gangly idiot who lived on a mountainside. He'd give her two, if she argued about getting the larger portion he'd claim he caught four and had eaten one before he came back. He was trying to take care of her. He was trying so hard. She didn't have to be so rude about it though. He could feel her in his mind, rough and raw anger bleeding through, disappointment in him, matching his own feelings for himself.

***

The sun was down and Shera could feel Tarvor returning. She'd stopped her watchful vigil almost an hour ago. She could see just as well in the dark as she could in the day, lately, but there was no point watching an empty sky. The Amalgam had long since gone to ground. She should feel happy just to see Tarvor again, but mostly she just felt hungry, and a little apprehensive. She hated admitting failure to him each day. He never came out and blamed her for it, but still. He did his job and she couldn't do hers and that gnawed at her. He was all she had in this world and to fail him so was unbearably painful.

On some level, she knew it was just the stress of the situation getting to her, but that did little to help her temper. The pair fed on each other, their own emotions slipping through the bond and amplifying in the other's mind. Each one becoming increasingly angry at the other, as their own frustration leaked across the bond, intensified, and fed back into themselves. The same thing that caused their love making to be so passionately blissful caused their sense of frustration and hopelessness to become all-consuming at times. They both saw it for what it was, and were partially complicit in it. The strongest hate a person can feel is for themselves, and it is hard to back down from a fight when you feel that sense of failure amplified in the connection to your partner.

A full stomach was an excellent cure for all ails, however. Though in this case neither one of them was truly sated. Shera did object to being given the larger portion after all, and she could feel the falsehood of Tarvor's prepared lie as he said it. A small part of her remembered how caring he was before they had been pushed to the brink, a larger part of her was spitefully mad at the lie anyway. 

The argument started small, most did. She wasn't truly angry about the lie, of course she wasn't. Yet, logic has always taken a supporting role to emotion when feelings were running as hot as these two had been. So it was, that she objected to him denying himself food for her sake, and he falsely claimed that he wasn't hungry anyway. She reminded him he couldn't lie to her when she could feel his mind and he shut himself off, reminding her that he deserved his privacy.

It rose and escalated like a real living thing. A tiny meaningless spark fueled by stress and thoughts of inadequacy. Even wonderful selfless care for each other turned this tinder box into an inferno until roaring and shouting filled the night. Tarvor found himself growling like a wild animal when his tongue failed him and he could only shove raw emotion through the bond. Shera responded, 'I just wish we could go home' and they both quieted in pensive silence, shamed.

If this were an inn, or a quiet meadow, in more peaceful times that would have been the end of it. One admission of innocence in a long procession of hurtful accusations and it would be over. Tarvor would have said something like 'That's all I ever wanted in the first place'. He would have reached up gently to the lioness' face, gazing tenderly into her eyes as they both remembered what they meant to each other. As they both forgot all the weight they had carried for far too long. One of them would have leaned in first, it doesn't matter who, and they would have felt love and commitment rekindled. They would have joined in a warm embrace and let time wash over their naked bodies as they reswore the unspoken vows of deep lovers.

But this was not an inn or a quiet meadow.

Unfortunately for the pair this was an empty barren hellscape. Devoid of life, devoid of anything. Unfortunately for them the night was unnaturally silent, and a loud lover's spat carries across a blackened glass field. Words that could have been said quietly, in thought alone, but were shouted and roared out despite common sense. Up to a darkened cave at the top of a hideous mockery of a mountain.

A roar split the night. A hateful alien sound. Something that should not be, but was. Evil wings lifted a bulbous hideous body into the air. 

Tarvor swore hotly under his breath, though he learned his lesson about yelling and sent only his thoughts to Shera. "I thought you said it never went out at night." He hurried to gather up what he could. Spear and bow first, before all else he needed to be ready for an impending fight.

Shera's hazel eyes searched the darkness near the peak. A shape, somehow blacker than night itself, appeared and drew closer. They had time but precious little of it, soon it would be nearly on top of them. "It doesn't! Or didn't... We need to run, its coming for us. I can see it."

"You can't see shit. It's your imagination. It's never flown at night before, we probably just woke it up. It will roll over and go back to sleep."

"Why do you keep refusing to believe me when I tell you that something is happening to me. Do you think I can't see the same thoughts in your wool-headed brain?" He didn't have an answer for that. "Why are you so god damn stubborn all the time."

"I live on a fucking mountain, what about that made you think I was easy to get along with. Look, this isn't the time. You say its flying, I believe you. But, maybe it can't see, maybe it's just following the sound. If we sneak out quietly or just hunker down it might not find us."

"And then if it can see it finds a free meal."

"You said it doesn't go out at night, it's obviously a predator. Predators that don't go out at night can't see in the dark!"

"It DIDN'T go out before, it's sure out now though." She looked out again, it was still distant but moving ever closer, at speed. "We don't have much time, we have to decide. Hide, run, or fight? How sure are you about its eyesight?"

"You're asking me about the habits of large predatory animals?" He sounded sarcastic. 

Shera growled loudly. "I'm asking the man I love about his opinion on how we stay alive. Stop arguing with me." 

Tarvor flushed with embarrassment. She was right, even if this was a conversation that needed to happen, and it wasn't, it certainly didn't need to happen now. He looked to his love there in the dim moonlight and witnessed the abject fear in her eyes. It was his call, she would always look to him for guidance when it really came down to it. He needed to decide for both of them, it could be their lives either way. 

He only had seconds to consider. He chose. They would run. "We go for the treeline. If it can't see at night it probably can't follow us from sound alone, not easily anyway. We can't fight it, or at least we have no reason to think we can. It's the safest option."  Quick and simple, a good plan. 

Feline claws and soft leather soled boots scrambled up the steep side of their makeshift home. Tarvor couldn't see anything very well, he hadn't been graced by Shera's night vision, certainly no Amalgam in the sky, hardly even a treeline in the distance. If Shera claimed she could see clearly in the waning light of this slim crescent moon he was more likely to rely on her than argue at this point. 

She ran ahead of him, picking a path that he could follow that wouldn't end with him stepping in a deep crack and breaking his ankle. She sent him a rough picture of what things looked like, it came through as a crude pile of grey dots but it was enough to scramble along in near darkness. His eyes could make out vague shapes and close details on his own, Shera's mental maps was enough to make it work. The cat was full of surprises. It disturbed him deeply, but he had no time to dwell on it as another roar shook the night. 

They scrambled over a jagged line of glass that Tarvor remembered as being near the tree line. This fissure ran wide and he had to cross it twice a day. Barely distinguishable shadows loomed up ahead, making a jagged line against the sky. They were losing ground to the Amalgam based on the sound of its roars alone, but they were close enough to cover that it might not matter. 

Leonine claws skittered for purchase on the hard ground, an uncomfortable scraping sound, as Shera fought for more speed. The quiet thumps of Tarvor's soft-soled boots were the only other noise in the night. Echoes of the last roar died quickly and only the sounds of their own flight rang in her ears. Heavy breathing, frantic pace, and palpable fear. Then, quietly at first, the sound of meaty dark wings. 

Shera looked behind her and saw the beast, no more than a few hundred yards away. Its eyes glowed a malignant red, a deep amber hue that seemed to carry its own light, and they were focused on them. There was no doubt anymore, it saw. Night was haven no longer. Foliage quickly blocked the Amalgam from view as they reached the edge of the forest, and its relative safety. "I saw its eyes and they stared straight into me, it can see in the dark now for sure, assuming it couldn't before. Is it growing as well as gaining new abilities?"

"That is a problem for tomorrow, should we live to see it." Tarvor sent, there was no spare breath for words. His chest already heaved from exertion, his bow rattled in its case with each step. "It shouldn't matter though, with the canopy overhead it won't be able to see us easily, and I doubt our footsteps will be loud enough to follow alone."  Tarvor grinned wryly, they could lose this thing, shake it off their trail and find somewhere to hide.

The feet of a trained hunter were louder than those of a born predator, though not by much. Swift silence and good cover would be their safety tonight. They could run until the point of exhaustion and if that wasn't enough? Better not to dwell on it.

Shera's voice was full of remorse. "I'm sorry Tarvor. I didn't mean to cause this, I didn't mean anything I said." 

"You didn't cause anything. I know you didn't mean it, I am sorry as well. Just run, my love." Tarvor yearned to reach out a hand to her. Touch amplified their mental bond and had always been a reliable source of comfort to them both. The mountain lion was pulling ahead of him though, he was not yet flagging in his stride but on his best day he could not hope to match Shera in pure speed.  He would hold her later, should there be a later, he would not let go. His knuckles were white as he gripped his spear in one hand and hurdled a fallen log. Now that they were off that hideous broken glass terrain he felt at one with nature, like he could see every tree around him, even as his eyes were still blind.

Shera could feel the wingbeats getting closer, even Tarvor was starting to make them out, but they were off course. The beast had started to lose them, it had drifted south and was no longer following true. Shera elated, for a moment. 

There are two dragons left in the world. Tarvor knew the name of one, Tr'axis, but not the other. Legends say many things of dragons, that they roamed the world as great sources of wisdom, that they were greedy and hoarded gold and power above all else. Scholarly debate rages on about which of the tales can be believed and which were simply exaggeration told across the ages. There is one thing upon which all of them can agree. Dragons breath fire. Hot, burning, fire. Terrible enough to incinerate a man to ash, bones and all, on a whim. What the Amalgam breathed was not fire, were that it was.

Great gouts of pure death washed over the forest, spewed from unholy lungs. Thick black fog rolled, dark enough to cloak the world, and everything it touched died. Trees did not burn, they did not crack and fall, they simply ceased. They dissolved into their base parts, crumbling as if suddenly composed of fine dust. Grass, logs, hapless squirrels, nothing was spared. Where the fog rolled the world itself died, and sickening black glass was all that remained. 

Pure fear and panic stabbed through the bond into Tarvor's mind, sharp enough to sting. Shera had seen. She had stared into the void and felt it call down to her. This thing should not be. Tarvor was more blind than ever, what scant traces of light were given by the moon were subdued by the thick canopy of leaves. He ran on his own recognizance, relying on senses other than mere sight, and she was glad he could not see as she did.

The wing beats stopped suddenly, eerie dreadful silence, and the Amalgam plummeted. It hurdled down through the air and crashed into the field of glass left behind by its horrific smog. Where its feet landed the ground broke, and ugly shards of black spiked outward like a row of uneven teeth. Its misshapen head swung away from them looking through the trees, scanning for the prey it knew existed. Slowly, inevitably, the head turned back the other way. Shera watched over her shoulder as the creature slowly focused on them. Two shapes darted between trees, glowing red eyes saw, and the chase continued.

The amalgam ran with an awkward lumbering gait, it's ungainly, lumpy legs flailing at uneven intervals, launching its girth forward in uncomfortable fits and starts. Despite its apparent difficulties, however, it covered ground with alarming speed, and crashed directly through any trees that got in its way. They shattered like twigs, larger trees breaking off and leaving jagged stumps behind while smaller ones were torn from the ground roots and all. That dreadful black mist poured from the corners of its mouth with each drawn breath, like death itself solidifying in the cool air.

Shera swore. Tarvor couldn't see what she did, he was intently focused on running, needing every ounce of awareness to avoid breaking a leg in the black soupy night. He was blissfully ignorant of how terrifyingly fast the Amalgam was, how quickly they were losing ground to it. Only the constant sound of cracking lumber, growing ever nearer, let him know how close the end lay. They could not outrun this thing. Not at the speed Tarvor was going anyway. 

He was an excellent hunter and no stranger to athletic endurance, but ultimately, he was still just a man. Shera could outpace him easily, but that would mean leaving him behind to fend off the evil creature alone. He wouldn't stand a chance, the best he would hope for is delaying it long enough that Shera could escape, but a life without Tarvor? She'd rather die. 

"We have to fight. It's gaining on us. If we keep running we're just going to have to fight it later when we're even more exhausted." She said. They could not win, Shera had no doubt of that, though she tried to prevent Tarvor from feeling the uncomfortable certainty in her. But she would not leave Tarvor behind, and she would not be dragged to the dirt as she ran. She would not die like prey. She and Tarvor would stand and fight and die on their feet. A coldness settled over her.

"We can't fight it!" Tarvor cried mentally "I can hardly see a foot ahead of me, it's miracle enough I haven't broken a leg running like this in the black of night." He was breathing heavily, great heavy lungfuls of air to keep his aching legs moving. He ducked his head to avoid the low branches of an ancient elm. 

"Trust me, my love, it will catch us. Sooner rather than later I fear. How much longer can we delay? Stand and fight with me."

She fought to conceal it but Tarvor could hear the grim finality in her voice. It seemed to echo like thunder in his head, that weighty tone. Even so, how could he fight a monster he couldn't see. He ran on pure instinct, he could sense Shera to his right through their bond but nothing else. Only the odd feeling that he could sense the trees and roots that blocked his path. He felt like he could point to each odd bit of landscape around him but he had no idea why. He ran on hope and blind faith. 

Tarvor knew, however, that Shera was right. If things kept on as they were they would be run down, slaughtered. A storm was rolling in, what little moonlight that filtered through the trees was stripped away and electric rumbling filled the air. Something had to be done. 

Tarvor stopped short, Shera's claws clattered in the twigs and dirt as she came to a halt slightly past her mate. In a practiced motion, the mountain man unslung his bow and nocked an arrow in a single sweep of his arm. He had no target, only barren blackness lay before him, but he drew back fully and loosed blind as he was. Shera watched the arrow fly off course and clatter uselessly off an oak, leaving an ugly scratch where it grazed the bark.

"Right" she said, in a hushed whisper.

Each moment brought the hulking Amalgam a stride closer, another second drained away into nothingness. Bright light crackled briefly as thunder echoed through the forest, the dull splintering of tree trunks now close enough to be heard when the echoes of the lightning died. Tarvor let his breath out slowly and aimed at the afterimage in his mind. For a moment, he had seen with enough clarity to aim, he loosed another shaft.

Shera watched it as it whistled away from them making a low, shallow, arc beneath the canopy. It passed branch after branch, shooting through narrow gaps between trees. It streaked away, fifty yards, a hundred, borne on uncomfortably still air despite the storm gathering in the skies above. By divine luck it found its mark and sunk deeply into the face of the great beast, just below one bulging eye. 

The Amalgam hardly reacted at all, no diseased cry or roar of pain, it hardly even stopped running. Instead Shera watched in disgust as one of the sickly vestigial arms that hung at odd angles from the writhing flesh lurched awkwardly. This definitively human arm now moving with intent toward the arrow lodged in the beast's cheek. Black twisted fingers wrapped around the shaft, joints bending in ways never intended by any gods, and in one swift motion yanking the arrow free. 

A gout of flame surged up from the open wound, the creature's thick black blood bursting into flame as soon as it touched the open air. A sizable burst of fire blossomed out, causing a nearby tree to begin to smolder as the beast continued to crash forward. In a moment the fire went out, the creatures volatile blood erupting into flame and then cauterizing its own wound, minimizing the amount of blood lost. The fire that had caught the trees continued to burn, shedding dancing light out into the night.

Tarvor swore through clenched teeth, and sent arrow after arrow sailing toward the beast, as fast as he could loose. The creature stumbled, but kept its feet underneath it and never slowed its dogged pursuit. Pillars of flame shot from the creature's body as arrows were pried from its skin by hideous limbs, trees burned in full blaze behind it as it ran, turning night into day. Thunder rolled overhead but not a single drop of rain fell on the burning forest. 

Unhindered, undeterred the Amalgam crashed into Tarvor as he went to nock another arrow, and Shera screamed.

The hunter rolled with the blow, tumbling backwards through the forest, crashing with sickening sounds over root and stone. At the end of his slide he got his feet back under him, and brought up his long spear as his heels still slid in the dirt, bloodied but not yet out of the fight. Firelight danced around him making the bulbous body of the Amalgam loom oddly in the shifting light. Tarvor opened his mouth and let loose a guttural yell sounding as near a lion's roar as a human could. Lightning cracked overhead.

It started then, a hideous reimagining of the fight Shera had seen months before, but it was no simple bear this time. The Amalgam was bigger, faster, than the bear had ever been and while Tarvor managed to score hit after hit in the things bloated hide they simply flared into life, blowing fire into the night air, and burning down to a closed scab as fast as Tarvor could make them. And yet, all the Amalgam needed to do was land a single solid blow from any one of its unpredictable thrashing limbs. 

The hunter darted left and struck forth with his thin leaf-bladed spear. It scored a long scratch along the Amalgam's dark shoulder. The smell of burning fat, tangy and acrid, filled the air. The beast would not even acknowledge the small blows with the smallest growl, ignoring them as paltry gnat bites as it repeatedly beat at the ground. It threw its limbs in great arcs, beating down furiously with no thought to strategy or tactics, it tore earth with raw power as it fought to end Tarvor's life.

Shera cried and roared in frustration, unable to help the man she loved as he fought for them both. She dared not even try to bite and claw the beast in desperation, as the resulting fire would surely hurt her more than any damage she could deal to it. She watched, utterly helpless, as Tarvor slowly lost ground, driven ever back as the ground beneath his feet became torn and uneven. The forest around them burned on, heat and light effusing the intense battlefield.

As an experienced hunter, Tarvor knew that battles with large beasts like this were often fights of endurance. Without a weapon that could fell a creature this large in a single terrifying blow, it was a matter of slowly wounding it, until the loss of blood weakened it. An apex predator that was slow from blood loss was something a man could reasonably kill, he just had to dance around its attacks until it reached that point. That tactic was pitifully unsuccessful here, and Tarvor did not have a back-up plan. Wounds sealed up as soon as he made them, worse, the flames that so benefited the Amalgam licked at Tarvor with each strike, until small burns pocked his arms and his tight leather clothes smoldered.

The forest roared and crackled in the dry air, flames catching from tree to tree until the heat began to blister Tarvor's face and arms and drain the strength from his tired muscles. Thunder rolled ahead, punctuating every dancing fluid strike of Tarvor's spear. The heaving blows of the Amalgam did not need the aid of nature to echo in the night air.

The Amalgam was fleet of foot when it had been chasing them, but it fought with a wild savagery, and no finesse. It swung its lumpen appendages in great smashing arcs, often landing nowhere near Tarvor, relying on sheer brute strength alone. Deadly smoke trailed out the corners of its mouth, turning the detritus of the forest floor to twisted black glass wherever they happened to fall. Red eyes glowed with unnerving fury.

Thunder crackled heavily overhead, a continuous growling rumble. No longer singular peals of light and sound but a constant epileptic flashing and rolling bass roar. Fire encircled the combatants entirely, a frightened mountain lion dashed from one side of the arena to the other in frenetic aimless panic. The amalgam's chest swelled and it planted its legs in the dirt, drawing its head back. Shera cried out for she knew what would happen.

Tarvor snapped forward before it could release the caustic gas, diving his spear into the pulsing black hide in desperation, burying the entire head of the leaf blade a foot deep in its chest. The weapon stuck fast, and the creature never stumbled. A leg, hanging akimbo, of some unknown creature, previously fallen prey to the monstrosity, kicked hard at the spear buried in its chest and shattered the haft effortlessly. Tarvor had only the time to widen his eyes in shock. A burst of flame taller than a man shot out from the gaping wound, catching Tarvor across his arms, the cloth of his shirt turned black and peeled away. His flesh bubbled. 

While the huntsman reeled, badly burned by the gout of fire, the Amalgam's head lurched forward, finishing the motion it had started, and its jaws opened wide. The deadly gas bellowed forth in a billowing cloud, turning burning trees to dust and then nothing with careless ease.  It would have consumed Tarvor as well, had the Amalgam not stumbled ever so slightly. That first flicker of mortality, of vital weakness, of infinitesimally small hope, is what saved Tarvor's life in that moment. Instead of his life it, only cost him an arm as it slid slightly off its mark.

There was no pain, surprisingly. People talk of grievous injury in lofty poetic terms, how they burned like ice or felt like thousands of needles piercing the skin. Tarvor would have described his burnt hand like that, bits of melted flesh stretched and tore when he dropped the broken spear haft in a silent scream, flecks of himself pulling away, staying behind where they had fused with a weapon he considered as much a part of him as the arm that heft it. The pain in his hand had descriptors, intensifiers, raw and rippling feelings that tore at his brain. His arm, however, was nothing and felt nothing. Dust drifted away and settled on black glass ground.

From shoulder down Tarvor's arm was gone. A thin line of the familiar dark crystal, solidified nothingness, marked the boundary where hale and healthy flesh simply stopped. With no weapon, body wracked with exhaustion and the pain of seared flesh, Tarvor fell to the forest floor. He had one arm to slow his fall, and it badly burned, and so landed roughly in the last season's leaves. The soft detritus of the forest floor welcoming him into deep unconsciousness.  

Shera lost herself. 

Months ago, she had gained an unwanted knowledge of the world that had irreparably changed her into something distinctly other. A creature alone in the world, a unique singular being separated from everything, and guided by vague purpose. She had followed her instincts to a man who would come to replace everything she had lost. Where she had felt alone and abandoned, he had been an island in a surging storm. She latched on and had found her savior. He had given her more meaning than she had ever thought to have, replaced every bit of her that regretted what she lost. He had become, in no uncertain terms, everything to her, and now he lay beaten and broken at the horrible feet of her dread purpose. She had been awakened to find and destroy this creature, only to find herself hopelessly worthless in the fight itself. She had helplessly watched as her world had been taken from her, she had endlessly cried as her entire self was stripped away.

Gone, with everything else, was her reason to avoid fighting. The storm clouds opened and poured their sadness onto the world beneath. Driving rains came and the mountain lion fought. Her fur stood on end with the static charge of the lightning storm that raged overhead. Teeth bared, claws out, nothing to lose.

She snarled mindlessly and threw herself at her prey. She moved on pure predatory instinct, dodging powerful but clumsy attacks, scratching and biting at anything she could reach. Defensive flames burst from the countless small scratches, but each was unimportant, only enough to burn fur, lightly touching at the tender flesh beneath, and the rains came down. The small fires got weaker and weaker until they did not come at all and the creature bled freely from a thousand cuts, the water pouring across it dousing fires before they could start.

The Amalgam howled in frustration, the first noise it had made since the chase began, the feline harried its flanks and forced its attention away from the downed human. It sought to crush the smaller predator, but its ungainly blows were too slow to connect. Where the hunter had been a swift flowing stream the mountain lion was wind itself. Though each terrible swing of the Amalgam's forelegs made the ground tremble and roots crack, none could touch the ferocious cat. Bitter pelting rain drenched its hide and ran off it in thick rivulets, tainted a dark red with its near black blood.

A thick bulbous limb crashed heavily into a nearby tree, sending it careening toward Shera. Her claws bit deep into the leaf covered floor of the forest as she leapt to avoid it. Water was running into her eyes and making it hard to see, it was frustrating but she felt that, against all odds, she had the upper hand, and she was unafraid. She hardly dared to think the treacherous thought, as if even entertaining the idea would be to throw hubris straight into the face of the uncaring gods, but she could win. She felt it.

The Amalgam slowed its advance, as if it had come to much the same conclusion. It turned, ignoring the lion who could still do little more than scratch its leathery hide, and walked slowly back toward Tarvor. 

Shera did not wait to consider her options. She tore at the ground beneath her, her chest heaving as she pushed against the dirt with force, and bounded back toward her world. She outpaced the wounded and slowing monster, reaching the hunter first and stood defensively over him, baring her teeth. A long low growl rumbled from deep in her chest, her fur stood on end despite the drizzling damp that fought to  mat it. 

The black beast paused, but only long enough to raise a meaty fore leg high into the air like a demonic club. The wicked overhand ready to come down to earth in a slow powerful arc. It moved ponderously with a weight and unshakable inevitability to it, Shera could avoid it easily, it would ever come close. The man she stood over, however, could not. The growl turned into a roar and she stood her ground and something in her grew.

She felt it in her mind first, or maybe her soul, a blinding illumination of light. It pushed all of herself away, like the one time when Tarvor had come forcefully into her mind, or the initial awakening months ago. It pushed at her until there was no room left for her at all, and she felt herself shattering inside her own body. Somebody else, somebody foreign, reached inside her and seized her lungs. Somebody forced her legs to steady and tighten, forced her to brace against the ground, then somebody squeezed.

The presence in her that pushed her so suddenly receded, like a bubble of soap popping innocently in the warm summer air, but the motions set in action came on unheeded. Shera had growled before, she had roared, she had never done this. To say she roared loudly would be like saying a mountain was a tall hill. A sound thumped out of her, ripping her jaws open and visibly shaking the very air. A wave seemed to pass in front of the sound, rippling the leaves of the few trees not already turned to cinder, then the sound itself came and ripped the leaves, the branches, and the trees themselves out of the ground. Even the Amalgam could not stand before this hero lion's roar, the meaty arm that was raised so threateningly tumbled along bonelessly with the rest of the misshapen form. 

It landed in a crumpled heap, ten, twenty feet from where it had previously stood, but still it stirred. It awkwardly tried to stand, one limb dangling uselessly and the other three barely able to stay upright between them, and then took to the air. Shera watched it go, her legs still locked, the force of her roar had pushed herself back a distance, leaving deep furrows in the ground. She watched it until it disappeared behind the canopy and then listened to its hideous flapping until even her sensitive ears could no longer pick it up. 

Shera finally allowed herself to relax and slumped onto the ground near Tarvor. She didn't have the strength to lift herself a moment longer, let alone drag Tarvor to safety. She closed her eyes and started to drift off into much needed sleep when a voice, wholly not her own and made of summer breezes, shattered through her brain with all the subtlety of broken glass.

I AM HERE.

Shera couldn't rouse herself from the gentle lulling rhythm of deep slumber, she was too far gone, too spent. The last thing she noticed before passing out, was a third mind in her head. Her own, Tarvor's steady but weak pulse, and a third opalescent shimmering. She slept.

Tomorrow brought unasked for change. 
