The first firelights appear in the sky overhead just as the moon reaches its zenith. Evie never saw them like that when the Sicclunan night force attacked her camp; by the time she was aware of them, tents were already ablaze. Hanging in the air as they appear to be, the volley of flaming arrows look as gentle and graceful and harmless as a flock of birds in flight. It isn’t until they begin their descent and she hears the flames crackle and whip in the wind that their violent intent takes form.

The first of the arrows strike a random tent on the other side of the camp, quickly spreading waves of flame across the brittle cloth in hungry streaks. Half a dozen more tents are on fire only moments later, and a second volley of arrows is already falling from the sky.

Evie steps forward, but Mother Manai raises an arm across Evie’s midsection, halting her.

“Wait,” Manai bids her. “Wait until all of ’em that’re near to us are fixed on the fire and runnin’ about, else we’ll have ’em on us as soon as we touch the horn.”

“But he’ll raise the alarm!” Evie insists.

“He’s starin’ at the pretty lights like the rest. His brain won’t catch up for a while yet, I promise. Just wait!”

Evie’s feet ache to rush ahead, but she halts them, trusting to the older woman’s instincts. The Skrain are all beginning to buzz around them, some standing and watching the falling fire while others run around in confusion and panic.

While Evie watches the genesis of chaos, Mother Manai keeps her eyes affixed to the soldier stationed at the warning alarm. She’s right, his first move isn’t to send a warning bellow through the horn; he’s watching the arrows descend like the rest.

Finally, some captain or another yells from a distance: “Sound the alarm! Blow the damn horn and sound the alarm!”

Mother Manai calmly approaches the Skrain soldier attending the horn as he turns to the massive spiral of polished bone. She’s more than a head shorter than him and slighter in frame by half, but from the way she carries herself you would have to explain the difference and its implications to her.

“Good evening, son!” she brightly bids him.

It’s enough to puzzle the soldier and give him pause for a just a moment. That span of time is more than enough for Mother Manai to extend the empty steel-fisted gauntlet attached to her right wrist up against the edge of his helm and tilt it back just slightly. Her other hand, already having deftly palmed a dagger, thrusts the blade into his throat. The soldier is dead before his feet even know it, and he continues to stand there, leaning slightly into Manai as his knees begin to buckle and his body wriggles beneath its armor.