Salas shrieked, kicking and thrashing in an attempt to forestall the inevitable end to everything. A single clawed jab from one of the monster’s massive hands and his screams, he knew, would end like they all had.

There were three beasts in the room, though it felt like there were more. The energy of their presence was so strong, it multiplied. Adding to the fact, they were large. They must have ducked under the beam of the doorway, for they were at least two heads taller than even the tallest Susconians Salas knew.

Though they walked on two feet, their animalistic features could not be denied. The dark fur, nearly black, covered them from head to toe. They were absent of apparel, their bodies perhaps too massive for clothing. Clawed hands and feet. Wolfish legs. Though the bones of their upper bodies were similar to those of human bones, their heads were nothing but lupine. They were complete with ferocious teeth set in mouths that did nothing to conceal their growls, and unforgiving red eyes that all focused directly on Salas.

The one that had dragged him from his confines had him in a bone-crushing grip by the arms to stop the brunt of his thrashing. The beast leveled him off the floor. Though Salas’ arms were immobile, he continued to kick and squirm, unable to accept his death was just seconds away.

The beast shook him easily, as though dusting out a sand-filled shoe, Salas’ head snapping back and forth with the momentum until the uncomfortable movement no longer allowed for screaming. His struggles calmed.

The beast then brought Salas close to his face, its eyes swiping up and down Salas’ form. This close, he could see his own terrified, pathetic self reflected back at him from the pair of bright eyes that assessed him. He let his own eyes fall shut, feeling as though he would faint at any moment. Unconsciousness would be a strange mercy.

He heard grunts as the beast sniffed him, though he couldn’t begin to guess why. Would they eat him? They hadn’t eaten the others. Salas whimpered.

When the beast shook him again with a low growl, Salas snapped his eyes open again in alarm. When the shaking immediately stopped, he knew that the beast wanted his attention.

In a rough, crackly voice, the monster spoke. “Bird?” It asked carefully, as though speech were a taxing accomplishment with its inhuman form.

Bird? It was asking if Salas was a Susconian palace bird. Salas mind reeled as he considered which answer he should give to the inquiry that could determine his future. Should he lie and say that he was not a bird? Would the beasts allow him to live, depending on his response? Which answer would lead to a favorable outcome?

The beast shook him once more. Stalling was not an option.

“Yes!” Salas gasped, “I am a palace bird. A...sla—” Even near death, Salas found that he could not say the word. “Please let me go!” he cried instead. Now that he was aware the beasts were intelligent beings, there might be a way to convince them to allow him his freedom.

 He felt hope swell in him when the beast holding him did not immediately kill him with his provided answer. Instead, it turned to its companions and a look was shared between them. Through nonverbal communication, a consensus was reached among them. After this decision had been reached, the beast holding Salas nodded, gripped him even firmer, and then threw him over its shoulder like a stableboy handling a hay bale.

The firm shoulder felt like stone as it dug into his stomach. He yelped in surprise at the pain, though he wisely chose not to put up a fuss. These beasts, for the moment, seemed to have decided not to kill him, and he saw no reason to sway them otherwise.

Salas attempted to adjust himself to ease the pain, but halted when his hands found clumped fur on the creature's backside. It was matted spottily, the clumps damp. When he assessed the sticky substance his fingers had gathered, he saw that it was blood. And the blood did not belong to the beast.

Salas couldn’t help it. He began to scream again.

This time, the beast did not react to Salas’ struggling display and instead ignored him completely. The three beasts left the room with Salas in their possession and began making their way through the maze of corridors. The pace was set at a walk, but even still, the speed was impressive. Yet the movement gave something away—it told Salas that the beasts were no longer in a hurry, as they might have been a while ago. 

Everything moves quickly on a battlefield, Eldron had once said, but the victors take their time with the cleanup. 

Questions spun through Salas, the first and foremost: how? How had this happened? Ten years ago, the North had been sullied with the darkest of curses. It should have taken their lives within a year. How were they alive and well? Then another thought came with sharp clarity. The Diagorian beasts had somehow made it past the Susconian border. It didn’t seem possible that they’d been able to kill every border patrolman, including border scouts that could ride to the palace to warn Eldron of the coming invasion. It was too unlikely that not a single rider had prevailed. Therefore, the northern beasts must have entered the kingdom by other means. Again, how? How?

He’d once again quieted and now blinked against the torchlight as he attempted to assess the state of the palace. 

It felt like days instead of just over an hour since Salas had been in the hall. This feeling was emphasized with the lack of likeness to the assembly room it had been before. Chairs and tables were overturned. Streamers lay in torn heaps among litters of food. There were more beasts in the hall, though Salas’ focus was not directed to them immediately; not when his eyes found the bodies on the floor, bloodied and broken.

Salas tried not to look at the unmoving figures, afraid that he would spot someone he recognized and once again lose control.

Strangely, there were men in the hall, too, walking around idly. The men wore colors of green and yellow and adorned in all the metal fit for armsmen. But these were not Susconian soldiers, no. That much was obvious. They walked about apprehensively, though seemingly none-too concerned with the beasts in attendance. Though the unknown soldiers did not approach the beasts, they roamed about alongside them, working towards a similar goal. Whoever the men were, they were colluding with the North.

The shape of an elk centered the placard of their breast plates. The sigil, along with green and yellow coloring, drew a slow understanding from Salas. He had seen the elk before, worn on a pin by the same man who had told Salas to hide before the beasts had invaded. It was clear that that man had known Suscon was to fall. 

Jovack. The men were Malthenians. The country of Malthens had planned a raid alongside Diagor, and had successfully betrayed Suscon. Jovack was a traitor, Salas realized. How long had he been deceiving everyone?

Before Salas could reach more conclusions, something else within the Great Hall drew his attention. Birds.

The birds were alive! They had not been killed in the raid. About twenty of them sat, in their silken festival outfits, alongside a wall. They were guarded by yet another beast, shaking and crying in their spots. Most looked up in apprehension when Salas’ party approached, but their eyes grew wide with relief and hope once they spotted him. The reaction stirred something strange in him that, of course, he couldn’t name.

He was deposited alongside the other birds on the floor, made to wait.

The beasts and Malthenians moved with purpose, claiming complete dominion over the grounds swiftly. Any Susconian soldier who’d managed to arm themselves were brought down without hesitation. It was not long before the cries of victory erupted through the palace with the Malthenians shouting and the Diagorians howling. The Susconian flags一featuring a teal sea serpent一were ripped from the walls and burnt in scattered bonfires in the courtyard just beyond the hall. The colors of the North一green and black一raised in their places.

The Great Hall fell silent, however, when two tall women stepped into the room. They were thin and absurdly tall, just a hand shorter than the beasts, perhaps, and carried with them an ethereal authority as they tread in on their spidery legs. They had magic, Salas could sense immediately. It energized the air around them and caressed a sixth sense that was only noticeable when something or someone enchanted was near.

The women were not fae, he dared to guess. At least, they did not appear to be. He knew the fae of the Faeland Forest, the forest that separated the Northern and Southern Kingdoms, were filled with creatures carrying features that went beyond belief. Other than being tall, these women appeared human. They were witches.

The two contrasted in their coloring. A blond with fair skin and brunette with a deeper complexion. The brunette stepped forward, layered in what must have been modern attire in the North but only served to suffocate in the South, and her eyes found the beast guard that stood over Salas and the other birds.

She spoke in Diagorian, but Salas knew only bits and pieces of the language he’d learned through song. She spoke about ‘leaving,’ though he couldn’t place the subject. She paused once, frowning as her eyes skimmed the birds.

After, the guard responded with a respectful nod and came closer to the birds, perhaps obeying an order he’d received. Several beasts moved upon the birds as well and soon, the prisoners were bound at the wrists behind their backs with itchy, splintering rope. Their feet were left alone, so they must have needed the continued mobility of their legs to walk.

The dark-haired witch faced away and began murmuring into the air, casting a spell and waving her hands as she gathered energy. She gasped in response to the sensation, and then the scene of the Great Hall parted, as though cut cleanly with a crisp knife. Color and light rippled around the cut, creating a portal that emitted dark, milky clouds.

The sight was more than an uncomfortable illusion. The witch had created some type of time or space portal, Salas realized. It was most likely one that created a space fissure, as it would explain how the Diagorians and Malthenians had breached the kingdom with such ease. They’d entered through these portals.

The guard minding the prisoners barked an order to Salas and his fellow birds. When the order was only met with confusion, the beast roughly grabbed a bird and pushed them through the portal, where they vanished.

Apprehension built in Salas as the prisoners were made to line up and then, one by one, were shoved through. When it was Salas’ turn, he took a breath he wasn’t sure he could release. Obediently, he took a step. He didn’t know until much later, but that moment might have been the last time he ever saw the Susconian palace. Had he known, he would have looked back. Alas, the moment became one of many regrets.