As the man approached, Angela saw movement past him in the ridge of large rocks from where he’d emerged. A grey shape was coming up into the sunlight, moving slowly and with a strange, staccato gait. It was like watching a film with one in every five frames removed.

“What the hell is that?” Angela asked as the shape emerged fully into sunlight. “Does it have wings?” It was pale grey and fragmented like a statue cracked in the heat. She thought of Mallian with the scars where his wings had been ripped off, and the fairy Grace who, if she even had wings, never appeared to use them.

“Can’t see,” Lilou said.

“Mohserran?” Sammi asked.

It was the man who answered. He stopped a few steps from them, looking back and forth and panting hard. Older than her, he was fit, and otherwise nondescript. He looked startled, worried, but not outright terrified.

“Mohserran’s still down there,” he said. “This is one of the others.”

“Who the hell are you?” Lilou demanded.

The man focused on her, and in that unguarded moment he saw her for what she was. “Who are you?” he replied. Angela suspected that just for a second, any thought of danger and fear was purged from his mind.

“We can do this when we’re somewhere safer,” Sammi said. “We should run?”

“We should run,” the man said, glancing back at the figure. It was standing still by the pile of rocks, swaying back and forth as it looked around with one hand raised to shield the sun from its face.

When it turned towards them, Angela felt the full weight of its glare. She had been stared at with strange, alien eyes before, but this felt different. She felt the mass of its intelligence, and the burn of its madness.

They hurried back towards Longford. Angela ran close to Sammi, resisting the temptation to grasp her hand, and made sure that Lilou was between them and the man. Whatever had happened here was mixed up in her mind, and the appearance of the man, and the creature he was fleeing, made it even more confused.

“Holy fuck!” the man said. He was looking behind them, and Angela and the others skidded to a stop to follow his gaze.

Another figure had emerged close to the first. It was down on all fours and shaking its head as if something inside was loose. It was snorting, and dust seemed to be spurting from its nose every time it did so.

“Come on!” Lilou said. “We have to hurry.”

“Hurry where?” Angela asked.

“Anywhere but here.”

When they reached the half-buried remains of the first building Sammi glanced behind them and said, “They’re coming.”