“And now . . . life for your war machine.” Angel walked back to the fallen hawk with the dead boy on its back. “Oh, S’Hivez,” she said, laughing, “even you must appreciate the symbolism of this!”

The Mage laid one hand on the hawk and the other on the dead farm boy’s arm. Beneath her hands the flesh of both began to shimmer and ripple, and soon the stench of cooking meat once again permeated the air across Conbarma. She moved back slowly, melted flesh sticking to her hands and flowing like thick honey, and then swivelled and thrust her hands at the stone sculpture.

Flesh flowed. Blood misted the air and moved as if blown by a strong wind. Bones cracked and ruptured, spinning through the air and impacting the rock, delving their way inside and crackling again as they fused back together. The flesh of the boy and the hawk melded and filled out the fighting machine, flooding hollows within its rocky construct and then building layer upon layer across its outside. Blood greased its joints. The dead hawk shrank as more of its flesh was scoured away, and the boy’s corpse came apart.

Angel lowered her hands and stepped back. Lenora saw that she was panting slightly, her shoulders stooped just a little too much, and she wondered again at how much this new magic was draining the Mages. But then Angel turned and looked at her, and behind her smile Lenora saw a strength she had never witnessed before. Not just physical strength—Angel had always been strong—but strength of purpose. There was no doubt in Angel, and no fear. She was unstoppable.

“Here it is,” Angel said. She pointed back at the machine. “And here you are.”

Lenora fell to her knees. She clasped her hands to her head and pressed, trying to squeeze out the thing she felt inside, the living, squirming thing. She was suddenly intimately aware of the life that had just been created, and even as she felt Angel’s calming touch and heard her soothing words, she knew that this was not something that was ever meant to be.

Take care, Angel whispered in her mind, you’re strong, Lenora, and this is feeble and weak—a machine, a tool for you to command and use. It lives like an animal down a hole, not like a proud Krote come to conquer and claim. Its life is less than a hawk’s shit, but you and it are linked now by this touch. And Angel left her mind, leaving that link in place.

Lenora gasped and went to fall forward, but Angel was at her side with a helping hand. The Mage helped her to stand and then leaned in close, whispering once again: “You need to be strong.” It was a command, not a request.