He tried to put it from his mind and concentrate instead on the latest information from Yalotlan. Pyramids were being built in the south, and once those tall, unmissable sentinels of the Empire of Songs marched across the land, they would claim it more fully than Pechaqueh words or spears – or even Yaloh lives and ancestors – could. When the magic in the pyramids came to life, the song would choke the land like a strangler fig, entering the bones and bellies of those who heard it, never to be forgotten.

The song would permeate the soil, the trees and plants and animals. The song would enter all who heard it and bring them under its sway. And the Empire of Songs would grow, its borders marked not by the gold stone and bright paint of the pyramids themselves but by the limits of the song that breathed inside the air and lived inside the living. The eternal presence. The Singer’s will.

Parasite. Master. God.

A single howler monkey screeched an alarm and Lilla’s Paw leapt to their feet and fanned out, ducking behind the smoke racks or into the shadow of trees. The sound of fighting erupted a short distance away as part of Kux’s Paw engaged an enemy and Lutek looked to Lilla. He nodded and signed ‘five’ and she led four warriors at a run towards the noise.

The rest waited, alert, straining every sense. Another of Kux’s Paw called the alarm, from the east this time. ‘Snake’s tongue attack,’ Lilla bellowed. He sent a piercing whistle into the jungle, calling back all those who could extricate themselves so they could stand together in the clearing.

A heavy javelin whined through the trees, and then a dozen more, flying hard and fast, before any of their allies made it back. Another skimmed past Lilla so close it stirred the hair by the side of his face. He jerked sideways, tripping on a root and sprawling to one knee. The javelin buried itself in the tree behind him.

‘Empire!’ Lilla shouted as he recognised the distinctive pattern on the bannerstone halfway along its length. Though of course it was the Empire; they were still in Tokoban and their own people wouldn’t be attacking them. There was a screech as a woman was caught on the thigh, a javelin’s point ripping into and then out of her doeskin leggings, leaving a bright slash of blood and torn flesh behind.

A third volley and the enemy hard after it, sprinting along the game trails from two, then three directions. Impossible to tell their numbers as they lunged out of the jungle or loosed arrows and darts from its shelter. The clearing erupted into motion – the stabbing whirl of spear fights, lightning fast, the hard clack of haft on haft, grunts of impact, screams of pain.