“Our rations are running thin,” said Tuketu. His eyes glinted in the waning light. “We may have restocked on resources, but we’ve only two weeks of meat supplies. Nothing debilitating, mind you—but the Tribe tries to stay at least a month ahead.”

He cleared his throat. “Your first assignment: to hunt down and bring back a Vordor. Adult, preferably. Late Origin Realm. With the rest of our stock, it will suffice for a week’s worth of meals.”

Then he gestured to his side. “You’ll be accompanied by hunter Aloc! One of our finest. A worthy guide. He knows more of the Hunter’s task than any of you. Listen to him well. The desert is unforgiving, after all—especially to those with reason to feel overconfident.”

Right. I wonder who that might be.

Hunter Aloc nodded. The man was tall, wiry, and didn’t look much older than the rest of them; his hair was cut in a mohawk, giving him an even younger look. Late Origin too, but Dorian sensed a coiled nature to the qi within him. Dense, full of energy. He looked around at them like a shepherd tasked with corralling a young flock.

“Let’s make this fast,” he said in a raspy drawl.

“Any questions?” said Tuketu, running his gaze across each one of them. Nobody said a word. Hento looked somewhere between anxious and excited; he’d taken to twirling a strand of hair, feigning a look of calm. Kuruk seemed like he always seemed these days: at least a little pissed off but hiding it all behind a crinkling of his nose. The other newbie Hunters both seemed wide-eyed. They were fresh recruits, and they looked too much the part.

“Good,” said Tuketu. He licked his lips. “Dinner’s in five hours. Cooking starts in four. Return before then, will you?”

He paused. “Oh—and congratulations once more, new Hunters. You’ve exciting things ahead of you.”

Throwing Aloc a nod, he turned and left with both hands clasped behind his back.

“Well then,” said Aloc, unsmiling. “Shall we?”

***

Spirit Beast densities were highest near Sinkholes, so they set off in the direction of one nearby. There wasn’t much talking. Hento and Kuruk didn’t much like each other. The newcomers had little to say to either them nor Dorian. And Aloc was content to scour the horizon wordlessly.

Dorian needed to play this right, he knew. This was a routine exhibition. He was nearly certain Aloc was sent along as much to observe him, the new unknown quantity, as he was to aid them in their new hunt. Now that he did have some power he was inclined to stretch his arms a little, throw his weight around. Establish himself somewhere in the Tribe’s hierarchy. Near the top, sure, but not so much that he made Tuketu and the Chief antsy enough to take serious action.

There was also the matter of the team and his new brethren. Dorian was by nature suspicious of team play; it was all a charade in the end, after all. Teams functioned because they were a net positive for each individual. At his age pretend concepts like loyalty were wines drunk only by fools.

But it was in his best interest to get the rest of his team, and the rest of the tribe, drunk. Metaphorically and perhaps literally. This awkward silence wouldn’t do. Ever since he’d returned he felt people looking at him as though he were some unhinged weapon.

Even Hento, who usually paid him special heed kept quiet. When Hento looked at Dorian, he was a little tense all over. Tight. His gaze lingered on Dorian a little longer than usual. Must’ve been the new Bloodline. Or maybe his whole transformation had gone a step too far for his comprehension. The whole time they walked, Dorian pretended not to notice.

Until he abruptly whirled around and looked Hento straight in the eye. The pretty boy yelped and took a half-step back.

“Whatcha looking at me for?” Dorian grinned. “I got something on my face?”

“No,” stammered Hento a little too quickly. This was new. Even when Dorian had bested him he hadn’t shown fear.

“What’s wrong?” he said, stepping in. He cocked his head curiously. “Is it maybe… this?”

A sliver of black drifted over a finger; it hissed as it met the air. Hento yelped and stepped back.

“It’s just qi,” noted Dorian, still grinning. He snuffed it out.

“Qi with a very strong death aspect,” noted Aloc from the side. His thin brows were mushed together.

“Seems so,” shrugged Dorian. “I’m still figuring it out myself.”

He turned back to Hento, who seemed to have graduated from fear to cautious concern. “Hey, wanna see me do a trick with it?”

“I’m very much fine, thank you, dear!” said Hento. He’d wrestled back control of his vocal pitch, but still couldn’t arrest the bit of tremble.

“Really?” said Dorian, raising an eyebrow. They kept moving along, spotting nothing. “You’re still scared this easy? Thought you’d gotten that patched up.”

“Scared?” huffed Hento. His pitch had ran away from him again, disappearing somewhere far in the upper registers. “Of you! Ha!”

He flipped his hair. “I don’t much care how many bones you find—to me, you’ll always be a pipsqueak!”

His body language said otherwise, but Dorian let things drop. At least the weird tension had been broken.

“Shut up,” snapped Kuruk, glaring at them both. “We are on a mission. Less talk. More hunting.”

“Oh, stop it! What do you know of hunting, you oafish lump?” snapped Hento.

Kuruk spat at him. Hento sidestepped it with a hiss of disgust. Kuruk resumed scouting the horizon.

“Well…” said Dorian slowly. “Maybe you’ve both got a point.”

“Huh?” said Hento.

“We’re hunting Vordors, aren’t we?” Dorian looked around at them one by one. “Maybe we’ve got to focus. But we should come up with a plan first.”

“Plan?” Kuruk snorted. He crossed his arms; they looked like two fat hams stacked atop one another. “This is fighting. Not your play-time with Elder Hu.”

So Kuruk was likely a lost cause. Dorian doubted he was thinking very hard about what came out of his mouth—not that he thought much to begin with. This Kuruk still seemed ready to shove on anything Dorian said.

“Right,” said Dorian with a smile. “But we should still have some idea what we’re all doin’ when fighting time hits, yea? We’d make for a lousy team otherwise.”

“Team…” growled Kuruk. “Just stay out of my way. I will do it myself. Less thinking. More doing.”

“Actually…” Aloc cut in. “I was about to suggest coming up with some team strategies. It’s your first hunt. Without one you’ll run around like tailless scorpions.”

“Let’s put it to a vote,” said Dorian amiably. “Hanska? Nakai?”

The two looked surprised to be included. He knew what they’d choose, of course; Aloc had weighed in and he’d taken the upper hand by reaching out first and remembering their names—even if he still couldn’t say which was which. It was always good to maintain the appearance of democracy. It was, after all, how all democracies went about things: appearances mattered most.

“Uh. I’m for a plan.”

“Me too.”

“Are you in?” Dorian looked to Kuruk’s reddening face. “You know, Master Tuketu always says the Tribe that comes first...”

Kuruk spat again. “Shut up, runt. I know what my father says,” he rumbled. He hesitated. He looked to the rest of the team, plus Aloc. “Fine.”

“Great! Here’s what we’ll do…”

***

It was half an hour before they came across the first Vordor. As luck would have it, it was a two-for-one: it feasted on one of its own kind. The dead one was half-eaten, half-burnt.

They crept up to it, weaving their way around dunes until they were within a hundred feet of it. Dorian put three fingers to his lips for silence. Then, slowly, he unspooled a small Yama’s Chain around a finger.

With his other hand, he held up a fist. The Vordor’s head was still down, its back turned to them. It was time.

In one fluid motion, he threw the Chain.

The Chain barely made a sound as it flew. Even winnowed down it carried good heft to it, and so it fell in a wide, slow arc. No shrill whistling or low groaning of air. The Vordor’s head only snapped up when it had fallen to within ten feet of it. By then it was too late. In the blink of an eye it fastened around one of the Vordor’s legs.

The pain struck it immediately. The smoking as skin was turned to smoke in mere instants. Hissing, beating its wings, it tried to pry off the Chain—but it’d already latched onto the leg like a prison manacle. The Vordor tried taking to the skies next but found itself anchored by the weight and the string.

“Charge!” shouted Dorian. The rest of the crew didn’t need to be told twice. Four auras flamed up in qi. Slinging battle-cries, Kuruk went out first like the world’s meatiest bowling ball. Hanska and Nakai went after him, with Hento bringing up the rear, looking less like he was charging into battle than trying not to be left behind.

Notably, Aloc did nothing. Instead he sat back and watched with a raised brow, probably noting down things to report back to his boss. What’d he even say? As the Vordor turned in alarm, preparing an attack to greet its new assailants, Dorian tightened another Chain around the Vordor’s neck. It was by now a tried-and-tested way of choking off Vordor offense. Immobilized and neutered, it was easy work for the rest of the team to beat it up.

Of course Dorian could’ve taken it down himself—likely with ease. But doing that wouldn’t grant him affection, would it? That’d only isolate him from the rest of the group. It might even alienate him from them. Mark him out as a glory hog and a threat. This way, everyone got to play a role.

Plus—he avoided needing to show off too many tricks. To the side, Aloc was rubbing his chin with a calculating smirk.

Minutes later, the Vordor was dead and Dorian was free to chuck the corpse, and the carcass it was feasting on into his Interspatial Ring. Nobody had taken any damage. Hento was all amped up. “Yea!” He cheered, wiping off Vordor blood. “Hooray!” Hanska and Sakai looked pretty pleased.

Even Kuruk bore a feral smile-snarl. “That was fun,” he rumbled. “Again!”

“Most impressive,” said Aloc, his hands at his hips. “In good time, too. We’ve only spent an hour of the four! Very well. Let’s return—“

“Hold it,” said Dorian. Returning this fast most certainly didn’t factor into his plans for Tribe ingratiation. He glanced around in a circle. “Why not keep up the hunt? We’ve got some time left to kill and we seem to do pretty good as a team.”

He threw up a grin. “It’s the day before the Festival, right? It’s time to celebrate. Let’s hunt us enough Vordor to fill a feast for the whole Tribe tonight! What say you?”