"Chief," a voice whispered. "I mean, Rain-Born, get a load of this."

She had heard what he had in the dim dew that had settled over the dead world at twilight: the rattling of something heavy. The grunts of pain belched from unwilling throats. And the crack of something singing through the air to pierce broken, blistered flesh. She had put it down to a dream she had as she caught up on some sleep before they headed back out on their journey. But now she knew it had been real. She heard it in the shaking voice of the ordinarily confident dog.

They had company.

She immediately awoke and stood to the left-hand side of the window beside Jespar, motioning for him to stay down and keep quiet. She peeked through what remained of the moth-bitten curtains and saw them: five standing at the foot of the ruined statue. Two women, three men. She registered numbers before anything else. It was part of the hunter's intuition that had helped her survive thus far.

But then she looked closer and saw that these were not normal humans. They were the realization of one of the stories she had heard. This was a story she knew only too well.

Chainmen.

One woman stood at the head of the pack, gnarled grey hair clinging to her scalp, observing the area through two glass spectacles that adorned her eyes and whistling some tune Rain-Born had never heard. Beside her, another woman and man held the heavy chains attached to the necks of two men who seemed barely human. They staggered behind the trio as they made their way around the statue, their forms gaunt, emaciated, bruised, and bloody from head to toe, with pieces of shrapnel embedded in the small folds of their ribcages. These skeletal beings shambled to keep step with their masters – heads bowed and eyes staring at the grey ground that their blistered feet trod on. The three at the front wore long trench coats and black gloves, and their partially shaven heads bore witness to the fact they had been caught in many a rainstorm in these lands. The one at the front – the woman – fingered her glinting spectacles and then turned to face her comrades.

They began to converse.

"Bastards," Jespar whispered. "Listen, now's the time to leave. We can be out the back and down the alley outside in ten. Then we're home free."

Rain-Born didn't move. Something about one of the slaves stopped her. She could not quite place it, but something about the face of one of the men gave her pause.

The woman barked a command at one of her companions, and he drew something long and thin from under his cloak that made Rain-Born's eyes shoot open.

He carried a deathspitter in his hands.

He checked the chamber that held the evil fire within his weapon, then stood behind one of the shaking slaves. He beat the back of his head with the butt of the gun and watched him fall to his knees. Then the woman – evidently the leader of the chain-bearers – bent down and said something to the kneeling captor before slapping his face and letting him fall. The other slave merely kept his eyes on his toes.

"Let's go," Jespar kept saying beside her. "We can't take them on. It's two vs. three, and I'm not sure I even count as a full body."

Rain-Born was too preoccupied with the beaten slave. His matted hair and rotted flesh told her nothing of his heritage. But her eyes did pick out one thing. It was something only those of her tribe would know even from such a distance: the wing-shaped tattoo on the male's left cheek.

It was the tattoo of a farmer—one of the Hanakh.

The three slavers were laughing at him, writhing there on the ground in agony under their firm grip. He struggled against their chains meekly and received another blow to his forehead for his troubles.

The laughter of his captors wailed throughout the suburb as the daylight of the world melted. A crimson streak adorned the skies that watched this tragedy unfold. Rain-Born looked upon one of her own reduced to this vile, dishonorable wretched thing that must have groaned under the boots of these creatures that wore the shapes of humans but felt no compassion for their kind. She felt rage overtake her.

"I will not leave him," she said.

"What?" Jespar shouted as loud as a whisper allowed.

"I cannot leave them like this."

"Now ain't the time for chivalry, girl," he replied, measured and controlled. "Now's the time to use that brain knocking around in your Tribal skull. You're outnumbered and outgunned. You've got your goal, and it's not this. It's inside that crappy city, and I'm not gonna come this far and let you throw your life away for this, OK?"

She looked at him, exasperated. And he was shocked to see the conflict etched upon her face.

"He is one of us!" she wailed, pointing to her arm tattoo – the mark of the fanged serpent, the quiet hunter. "You would have me leave him?"

"It's for the best," he said quietly. "Think about this."

"If it was someone you love, could you leave them to a fate like that?"

He spared a look at the tired thing that tried to rise from the ground and was pulled by its neck chain back down, whose head was kept pressed to the dirt under the boot of the guy with the rifle in his hand. The thing looked old. The wooden stock told him that. Probably bolt-action. That was something in their favor, at least. But how many bullets did he have in that chamber? How good a shot was he? Jespar wasn't waiting around to find out.

"Watch it," he growled back at her. "You don't know what you're talking about. And you don't wanna mess with that thing. Not out in the open."

Rain-Born was about to make some retort – she didn't know what – when suddenly a yell sang through the air.

"Martha! Maaaartha!"

It was a voice made cold and gruff from years of shouting and barking commands at those who trembled beneath her gaze. Yet there was a kind of sadistic joy mixed in there, too, like a child who giggled as they stepped on ants or crushed beetles under their heel. The woman-leader of the Chainmen yelled again, this time walking directly towards the house both Rain-Born and Jespar watched her from.

"Martha!" she wailed excitedly. "It's dinner time! Come get your din-dins, sweetie!"

Both silent onlookers sat stupefied. Then, they heard the sound of frantic barking from behind, followed by the sounds of skittish paw steps on the stairwell.

Then they saw the pug and its four puppies run toward the chain-bearing woman.

"Oh, shit", Jespar mouthed.

"Aw, my little darlings!" the woman howled, kissing the faces of each yipping dog that pawed at her skirt and bloodied trench coat, still holding the chain of her prisoners behind her who looked on, petrified.

"Kisses for mummy, yes, that's it! That's it!" she yelled. "Mummy missed you so so so much, and she's sorry she had to go away for so long. But look!" she screamed and yanked the Hanakh prisoner forward, who gave an impish yelp as he obeyed her command with no alternative. "Mummy brought you a nice big piece of meat! That's right. Just like always. One for you, one for mummy. Nice juicy meat, just the way you like it! Hee hee!"

Her giggling and frantic smooching of the dogs, slavering their faces in just as much saliva as they drooled on her, turned Rain-Born's stomach. Jespar looked on, incredulous. For once, he recognized, he didn't know what to say.

The puppies started pulling at the woman's long overcoat and continued their incessant yipping. Then the mother pug ran to the house and returned to her mistress. She repeated this process several times, barking maniacally as she did so.

"Fucking bitch!" Jespar yelped. ""Never have a one-night stand", they said."You'll regret it", they said. I didn't know it could get this bad! She's ratting us out!"

"What's that, honey?" the woman said. "Are you inviting us in? Why, sure! Mummy and her friends will come inside and tell you all about their adventures. And then we'll chop and cook this tasty meat up, and you can have as much as you want."

She pulled a fierce machete under her coat and eyed her "meat" hungrily. Neither of them had the strength left to struggle, and as they both felt the butt of the deathspitter's stock slam against their heads, they began to follow the woman and dogs into the house.

"We shoulda' ran," Jespar mewled. "Now we're about to be dessert. Alright, just shoot 'em. Take down as many as you can, and I'll back you up."

"No," Rain-Born whispered, kneeling and sheathing her bow.

"Oh, come on, girl!" he yelped. "I just can't get through to the youth of today. Will you make up your goddamn mind?"

"It is as you say, Jespar," she replied calmly. "In the open, the deathspitter triumphs. But now they come to us, and I will let them."

She surveyed the room before her and then cast her mind back to the other areas of the house. The downstairs contained only a flea-ridden carpet and broken furniture. But there was also a room with a bed and cabinets next door and one with a large oval tub and curtain. She thought about this and made her decision in a split second.

"We hide," she said to Jespar. "And wait."

She drew her knife and began to stealthily creep from the room, urging the dog to follow her as quietly as he could. He was about to protest further, but then he saw in the eyes of Rain-Born that it was not really her who was talking to him. He got the sense, looking at those intense eyes, full of fire and the desire to kill, that this was the Hanakh huntress doing the talking. Cold, detached, and resolved. He had seen the same look in another pair of eyes once before. They were the eyes that belonged to a man who would burn the entire world all over again if it meant getting what he wanted.

He stalked next to her as she commanded, and as she turned to him, he felt nothing but terror.

"Follow my lead," she whispered like an emissary of death. "This woman will not leave this place alive."