My execution falters.
Not out of fear of the beast. But because in that single, fragmented second, my mind superimposes the image of those jaws closing aroundher.
It is a fraction of a second. A sliver of hesitation.
The shadowmaw’s claws slip past my guard. They rake across my left shoulder, tearing through the thick hide and scoring deep into the muscle beneath.
The sharp sting of pain instantly shatters the panic.
I snarl, a low, guttural sound of pure rage. My right hand shoots out with terrifying speed, closing around theshadowmaw’s throat. I lift it off the ground with one arm, my claws digging deep under its scales, and hurl it backward to crush the advancing rival warrior beneath its weight.
In the mindspace, a sharp spike of urgency hits my consciousness.
“We cannot hold all the passages,” Rok projects, his mental voice tight with strain as he holds the left flank ten feet away. “The beasts are too fast.”
“HOLD THE UNEVEN GROUND,” I roar back, throwing another shadowmaw back into the fray. “PROTECT THE TUNNEL DESCENT.”
I turn back to the fray, unleashing a wave of violence that clears a ten-foot radius around my position. My claws are fully extended, my teeth bared. The starfield burns blindingly bright.
And then, the chaotic current of the battle shifts.
A towering rival warrior called Ryden breaks through the secondary line. He slips along the far edge, diving into the deep shadows near the offshoot to the bathing chambers.
My eyes track his movement, but I am pinned down by three more attackers. I cannot reach him.
In the shadows, a shape moves and time stills.
A female.
Eh-ree-kah?
No. Tre-sha.
What is she doing here? She is smaller, lighter, unsuited for the reality of the front lines.
To Ryden, moving fast and blinded by the erratic strobe of my glow, the shape in the darkness is a threat. A smaller male attempting to flank him.
He does not know that these arefemales. He does not know he is in the presence of a Daughter.
He sets his stance and he charges.
Tre-sha realizes he is coming. She does not try to fight. She does not cower.
Instead, she lets out a loud, high-pitched scream.
It is piercing. In the cavern, the pitch of it hits our hyper-sensitive ears, enough that it affects even my warriors who have been conditioned to listen to the female’s various sounds for so many cycles.
Ryden flinches. He breaks stride, his head snapping back as he recoils from the sharp burst of pain.
It is just enough.
Tre-sha turns and sprints for the deepest shadows. The sleeping area. I want to roar at her to run the other way, but maybe I have forgotten who these females are. Who they come from. The Daughters were the makers of the Drakav. They were not fools.
I see where she is heading a moment before she scrambles into the dense bone cage I constructed over Eh-ree-kah’s sleeping furs. The bones catch her thin skin, drawing lifeblood, but she doesn’t stop the mad scatter until she is inside.
She pulls her legs in just as Ryden recovers.
He attacks through the thick bone bars, his arm reaching into the cage. His claws find purchase.
