Hope stood and threw something in the same movement. Her aim was unerringly true. It struck the hawk just above one fist-sized eye, and something dark and fast spread down across the white of its eyeball, turning it instantly black. The creature screamed, its cry one of pain now rather than rage, and started to thrash itself free of the broken ribs.

The machine squeezed. It seemed to be using its wound to its own advantage, holding the hawk in place, crushing, the raw ends of the snapped ribs piercing the animal’s skin and slipping inside.

The shape on its neck was a woman, heavily armed and armored, tall and strong and scarred, no doubt one of the Mages’ fighting Krotes. She sat down to avoid being thrown out into the open air, staring through the ribs at the people she had come here to kill.

Kosar stood, drew his sword and smiled. The Krote hissed. The thief felt so empowered by this that he took several steps forward until he was standing within reach of the hawk’s trapped head.

“Who the fuck are you?” the Krote said. Her eyes were a shining, pale blue, even in the weak moonlight.

“A friend of anyone you go against,” Kosar said, and he lashed out. His sword parted the flesh of the hawk’s head and he stepped back as the thing tore itself free and spun back into the night. The Krote watched him as she fell away, and though Kosar knew that this fight had just begun, the brief sense of victory was invigorating.

“Trey!” Kosar called. “We have to protect this breach!”

“Gave the bastard a blinding!” Hope said triumphantly.

“What was that?” Trey asked.

She smiled. “Poison ants.”

“Are you crawling with these things?” Kosar asked, partly in disgust but mostly in admiration.

Hope’s smile diminished. “That was the last.”

There were two more impacts on the machine’s construct, one directly above them where the ribs met, the other below, out of sight, down where the ground had torn itself away. Kosar and the others went sprawling again, and the sound of the vicious hawks baying for blood seemed to shut out the moonlight.

Kosar looked up. Silhouetted against the death moon a hawk was standing on the pinnacle of the curved ribs, hacking with its huge beak and crushing them with hooked claws. Blood and flesh spattered down, and then something harder as the ribs were quickly rent asunder. If only I had A’Meer’s bow and arrow, he thought. The attacker was way too high to reach with a sword, and they could do nothing but watch as it tore into the machine.