Snow. A thousand white flecks fell from the heavens, and a thousand more followed. They piled upon his fur, sticking to his body like glue as they compacted together. Each one, a fragile existence. Combined, they covered nature and animal alike, smothering them both in white cold. Cold that seeped life from everything it could. He’d be next, if the icicles hanging from his fur meant anything.

Galal stomped up the snow-laden hill, each step sinking into the snow until his hooves were completely hidden. Frozen wind buffeted him, pushing him back, muscles freezing still as he fought against it. He stumbled forward, the snow piles on his shoulders breaking away only for them to be replaced by the onslaught of snowfall.

The top of the hill greeted him soon enough, revealing beyond it an empty white wasteland. At either side stood the shear cliffs of two mountains, together forming a pass between them wide enough to hold a city. Between them, so far off as to seem another life, a tower stood, a beam of green light emanating from it. The light rose further than he could make out, as if splitting the world in twain.

Black stone made up the walls of the tower. More a shell, in truth, a carapace for the light. Standing before the entrance he felt a chill grip him from the inside. Like fingers. It danced through him, wriggling from place to place, rising through him from his stomach. It stopped, curled around his heart for but a second, then continued its dance upward to his ear.

The horde.

Insignificant. That’s what he felt, staring at the tower’s top, at the light rising across the sky. For so long he had dwelt with humans and the Khor, small and brittle as they were. Only now did he feel small.

Lead.

War. Blood. Death. Battle. Survival. All experiences he had faced. Easy by comparison. Each bled into the others, joined together as if part of the same being. A conjoined monstrosity of conflict.

Lead your horde.

“I will.” It startled him, the sound of his voice. Hoarse, strained, the sound scratching at his ears. His appearance was worse.

The green beam of light changed, becoming a literal mirror to the world, reflecting his image within. His height had been unchanged, but it seemed the only thing. Skin clung to bone, the muscles atrophied so far he wondered how he was alive. If he was alive. His torso was filled with holes and tears, revealing shadowed patches within, the skin loosely hanging from visible ribs. His stomach, non-existent, only spine and torn flesh in its place.

Bring victory to the horde.

Brightness greeted him, white light filling his vision before receding, revealing a pillar of red at the tower’s center. He looked to the tower’s entranceway. It was coming. He could feel it. He could feel the horde. He could feel his horde. An ocean of them lying beyond the light. And they had begun to pass over. They had come.