It was deep beneath the earth.

The world was dark and closed off on all sides, a vault of stone, a waiting grave. This was where a thousand stories told her goblins died. Where the weak and sick were pushed forward in the dark, because there was no saving everyone. No outwitting the hungry things that lived here. There was only offering up your least fit, and praying they weren’t still hungry when the last bone was picked clean.

The spear trembled in her hand. The violet-white light radiating from the point barely pushed back the gloom, glistening on the snail’s greasy flesh as it surged towards her.

They hunted by sheer inevitability. By following for hours until you couldn’t run any further and they washed over you like a tide of slime.

The beast’s yawning mouth reached for her.

The wind filled her hair. The moment of fear passed into cold anger, and her hand tightened on the spear-haft. Her back foot planted itself, and her whole body turned into the blow as the spear whipped into a crescent cut of violet-white fire. The hanging trail of light crossed up through the snail's barbed tongue and over one eyestalk, cleaving them away in a spray of yellow blood.

Hearing the snotty growl of pain felt good. Like wounding a god.

Then she turned, and ran.

The rest were ahead of her, vaulting over rock formations, splashing through pools. The jungle of stone pillars and luminous mosses was a strange, vast place. Things moved in the dark, their silhouettes passing in front of the light and vanishing down in shadow. Behind, the lurching, slurping sound of the snails followed them.

She had the wind, and the earth blurred underfoot as she ran. Ahead she could see the stoneskin, hear their armor clank, their torches wavering in the dark.

Tusk-Mouth had fallen behind, limping, and she saw his silhouette fall against the ground. As she rushed forward she could feel his heartbeat. The drums of the goblin warsong echoed in his head.

Shiny heard them too.

The wardrums were echoing in the dark, the song of her ancestors filling her with strength, but something was wrong. Something new had joined them. Beneath the heavy thud and pound of the drums, there was the melancholic little hum of a subtle lyre.

It wove into the melody she’d known her entire life, and warped it from within. A worm in the fruit.

Her hand was outstretched to help the fallen chie up when the realization hit, when she saw the gleam of the knife folded into his hand. Tusk-Fang drew back his lips and snarled as he lunged, slashing for her leg, missing by fractional inches as she slid back, letting the wind carry her.

“You betrayed us.” He snarled. “Gave us away to that damn spirit.”

“Y’know. I really don’t need to talk to kill you.” No. She’d been ready to kill him since the day he came to the oasis. Her spear jabbed forward, but he flung himself back into a roll, coming up braced for the second volley. Shiny obliged with a sweep that smashed against his knife and sent sputtering threads of lightning through his arm.

The knife dropped as his fingers fell numb. Tusk-Mouth was tough, and he was fast, but he wasn’t even close to his depth. She stabbed into his hip, feeling bone shatter under the blade as she sent him to the ground, howling, his body kicking with electric jolts.

Shiny paused for a moment Ahead she could barely see the retreating stoneskins. Behind, she could hear the snails grinding over the stone like avalanches of slithering fat.

But somewhere, in all this, she could still hear the lyre.

Something was wrong.

On the ground, Tusk-Mouth whimpered. He could hear the predators coming. She kicked his knife away, but she didn’t leave him to die. Not yet. There was something wrong, something there in the dark-

“What did you do? Why are the drums wrong, you-” She kicked him, slamming the heel of her foot against his wound till he howled. “You idiot.”

A greedy, stubborn idiot. She’d already killed him, reduced him to thing on the ground, in pain, in fear.

She couldn’t even feel pity. At least Wild-Eye had protected the tribe. At the very least, the old bastard had done that much, and he would never have turned his back on the ancestors. Never let the warsong be corrupted - eaten from within by the invading lyre.

“I-” For a moment his faith was shaken, maybe. Then his voice hardened. “I heard the gods call. Not like you. You whore, you and your false spirit would’ve turned us into slaves.”

He looked so proud as he lay there, broken, a traitor.

What could she even say? Nothing. She left him in the dark to die, and ran as fast as she could. He wouldn’t be the only one. If the song was changing, the ones above would hear it too. They'd be infected with the same anger.

The stoneskin were walking into an ambush.

---

Bug-Eater watched in horror as the warriors rolled stones towards the cavern’s mouth, pushing them along on striped-smooth logs that served as wheels beneath each boulder. The ground had been carved into a slant years ago, shaped to be a killing field if any beasts tried to surface. The stones would crash down as soon as the foreigners showed themselves. Already, two guards stood over the dark entrance, poised to throw their spears and retreat.

The spirit had rescued him. Shine-Catch had saved his life.

And they were going to walk into a massacre.

Something was wrong. He felt the distant sound of the drums, felt the ancestor-mind call to him. The world was swimming with the sound of the war-song and the urge to kill but…

It was all wrong. He should’ve felt hot with glory, filled with confidence; Bug-Eater had never felt more alive than when the war-song called to him and he ran with his brothers. Every hurt, every bad memory, drowned in the raw sensation of the hunt and the joy of his own strength.

He felt a sick hunger instead. A fury that turned inwards and made him hate.

He hated himself for needing to be saved. He hated Shine-Catch for running away when he thought maybe she could be his and they could be happy. Hated and hated and hated, hated everyone stronger than him for the abuse they put on his back, hated everyone weaker for not giving him the respect he deserved.

So he sat with his head in his hands as the warriors prepared to kill their allies. Unable to bring himself to stand up, to do the thing he knew was right.

A hand settled on his back. Terribly aged, the skin like soft thin leather around bony fingers. Well-Finder, shaman of the tribe, leaned low. Her breathe stunk like bitter herbs and wine. “You need to stand up.”

He looked at her blankly. She sighed out a terrible breath, and slapped him. The pain helped. As he nursed his stinging cheek, things slid into focus.

“Right.” He jolted up to his feet, grabbing his spear.

He took three steps before the shaman grabbed his braid and yanked him back.

“Oh? Are you going to fight them all? Yourself?” She chided. “Lean down.”

He did and she slapped him again. Leading him by the chin, the shaman made him turn.

Behind the warriors, among the ashes of their homes, were the rest of them. The skinny, cast-off members of the tribe, sled-pushers and mushroom-gatherers, too weak to hold their own in the days-long hunt. But there were so many of them, and the corrupted war-song didn’t sing them with the same strength. They still had their wits; they watched in horror as the warriors betrayed the spirit that had brought them food and water, rescue in their time of need.

They knew it was wrong; they still had their own minds. They just needed someone to lead them.

“Right. Right.” As Bug-Catcher nodded to himself and walked towards the tribe, the shaman just shook her head. If that boy was ever going to be a leader, he was going to need to borrow someone’s brain.