Howler POV

  Three albuhas swooped over the savannah. Howler led the small pack with Jaws and Teeth flanking him, flying in his slipstream. They had been given the role of scouts and took it very seriously. At least, Howler did. He growled at Teeth as said albuha playfully struck at Jaws.

  The younger male looked cowed, but as soon as Howler’s back was turned, he repeated the action. The leader growled again, flaring his wings to twist around and then snapping at Teeth.

  ‘Stop that!’ he told the offending young male. ‘We have mission.’

  Teeth looked remorseful and indicated with his body language that he’d behave now. Howler didn’t think it likely that that resolution would last much past the next few minutes, but since they were already approaching their target, that was acceptable.

  Though Howler hadn’t understood much of the discussion which had been held between the two-legged beings and his pack leader, he understood that it seemed to have gone well. His current mission had been given to him there and then: scouting out the other beasts.

  Howler wasn’t quite sure why they were choosing to side with the two-legs, especially when he sensed that there was strength to be earned with the other beasts. But ultimately he would follow his pack leader. He wasn’t strong enough to challenge the large male and his experiences recently had indicated to him that breaking away from the Pride would risk losing even more of his people.

  Howler was surprised at the strength of…something that welled up from within as he thought about their significantly reduced pack. Once, they had needed to take down a whole herd of prey beasts to fill their bellies, such was the size of their pack. Now, though, a fraction of the herd would suffice.

  There was little point ruminating on it, though – they had a more important role to fulfil. And with time, even sadly depleted as they were, cubs would once more fill the pack. As long as the adults became strong enough to defend their pregnant females and the cubs themselves.

  Ahead of them appeared to be a nest of insects, at least from the air. Multiple clumps of beings shifted and rolled over the dry earth of the savannah. Howler hesitated. He wasn’t sure whether to dive down and join them or to simply remain up in the air and watch. Their leader had indicated that he wanted as much information as possible, but perhaps they could get that from the air. His packmates seemed to feel his hesitation and flew close enough to playfully nip at his tail.

  ‘What we do?’ asked Jaws, always the more practical of the pair.

  Unsure how to answer him, Howler noticed a shape flying towards them. After hope briefly rose at the thought that it might be another of his kind, Howler’s heart sank when he saw that it was instead an unknown creature with two legs and clawed digits emerging from its front wing joints. He prepared himself to fight, confident in the chances of his success, but the other creature didn’t seem to be interested in a battle.

  The beast paused in front of them, using slow wing beats and little swoops from side to side to keep itself in the air. It expressed curiosity through its movements and the way it shifted its head slowly from one side to another. Although it did not communicate in the way Howler had become accustomed to since joining the big pack, he could still understand what it wished to convey.

  ‘What you doing here?’ it seemed to ask.

  Unsure about how to respond, Howler did his best to will his intentions to the other creature, hoping that his own body language would be equally understandable to the other flying being.

  ‘We come to join.’

  ‘You feel the call?’ It seemed that the beast was as able to understand Howler’s body cues as he was able to understand it.

  ‘We do,’ Howler confirmed as his leader had bade him to do. In truth, none of them felt anything that could be a ‘call’, unless it was that feeling of tempting strength he had sensed earlier, but his leader had seemed confident that it had something to do with this group of beasts. Apparently, he had been right.

  ‘Then come. I show you to the matriarch.’

  With that, the beast turned and started leading the way. Briefly glancing at his packmates, Howler wondered whether he should follow it or not. Then, with a chill that went through him from his claws to his wingtips, he realised that they were not the only beings in the air anymore. It seemed that while they had been communicating, others similar to the beast they had communicated with had silently drifted into the air and blocked them in.

  It would be possible to escape, Howler was sure – they couldn’t block the whole sky: there were not enough of them for that. But he couldn’t be sure to get all of his pack out with him – Teeth in particular was not one of the most agile or fast of fliers. And making the attempt might mean that they were unable to complete their mission anyway.

  ‘What do?’ Jaws asked urgently as the flying beasts started to close in on them.

  ‘We follow guide,’ Howler replied grimly, putting action to his words and following the first winged beast.

  They glided down through the air currents above the savannah in pursuit of the other. As long as they did that, the other winged beasts didn’t get any closer. Finally, the three albuhas closed their wings and dropped lightly to the ground in front of the other winged creature. On the ground, it seemed far more ungainly, its wings folding to create legs which allowed it to do an odd lolloping run across the earth. The albuhas were easily able to keep pace with it.

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  They approached a small rise in the earth. Around the rise were spotted brown and yellow beasts with obviously strong jaws and weak hindquarters. They had a ridge of fur on their backs and no wings. Howler recognised them from the fight near the big trees – there had been quite a few of them there. As the three albuhas warily approached, they made a low whooping sound, several pushing themselves to their feet and lowering their heads. Howler didn’t mistake it for a gesture of submission, though, and in return growled back, baring his teeth, his fur bristling and his wings rising into the air threateningly.

  Their guide snapped its long jaws together sharply, the clashing sound cutting through the whooping of the spotted beasts. Then, fearlessly, it charged towards several of the beasts. They scattered at its approach, snickering and giggling even as they opened the way.

  ‘Come,’ the winged beast commanded and then lolloped forwards. Howler and his two companions hurried after it, watching warily as the spotted beasts closed in behind them. At least these ones couldn’t fly – if it came to a fight they could leap into the air and escape. He quickly looked up and checked for the other flyers, they were no longer there. Good.

  The situation repeated itself several more times before they reached the summit – and the matriarch they were due to meet. This proved to be another of the spotted yellow and brown beasts, but was unmistakable among them. She – for Howler's nose clearly told him it was a female – was at least twice the size of those around her and her eyes gleamed with an awareness which Howler had only seen in the strongest members of his own Pride. It wasn’t, perhaps, as bright as the gleam he had seen in the eyes of his own leader, but it wasn’t terribly far off.

  Worse, was the sense of unmistakable danger that he felt in her vicinity. Here was a creature who could kill him very quickly. It didn’t matter whether she was stronger than his leader or not: his leader wasn’t here and she was most certainly much stronger than he or any of his albuhas were – and probably more so than all of them added together.

  There was also an odd…presence to her. An attraction, a call to join the side of the conquering force and benefit from the scraps she left in her wake. Was this the ‘call’ of which his leader and the winged beast had spoken? The source of the promise of benefits which had tantalised him when he had been in the air above? Only the fact that Howler felt an even stronger connection with those he had left behind in the two-leg nest, his females and other male in particular, stopped him from immediately wanting to submit himself in truth to the matriarch right at that moment.

  His two leaders were stronger than him, he knew that, but in the presence of this being of power and promise, he found his confidence in them being tested. He could not say for sure that either one or both of his leaders could defeat this being in a challenge, and that troubled him.

  The matriarch casually stepped forwards and sniffed at Howler, walking around him to nose at his wings, his tail, his genitals even. The albuha didn’t dare to shift a claw or twitch a feather until he felt her presence move a little away from him. Turning his head cautiously, he saw her giving his packmates the same treatment.

  ‘You smell…familiar in some way. There is a scent on you that I recognise,’ the matriarch conveyed without any sense of intention to attack. Her body language was even easier to interpret than the winged beast’s had been and he felt the presence from before adding weight and clarity to it. It was like the meaning the matriarch wished to convey was shoved under his nose instead of him needing to sniff it out. Far from a mere display of body language, this was almost an attack, but one he dared not meet with aggression. Not when he still sensed the gulf of strength between him and the matriarch.

  ‘We have others of their kind here already,’ Howler saw the winged beast who remained attentively present communicate to the female. ‘Perhaps their scents are similar.’ This caught Howler’s full attention, even if only for a short moment.

  The matriarch did not appear convinced, eyeing Howler with a vicious glint in her eyes. Nonetheless, she stepped back, the weight of her presence leaving Howler and allowing him to feel that he could breathe again. ‘You have followed the call, my call,’ the matriarch communicated with small movements of her head and ears, her gaze lingering on each of the albuhas at a time. ‘Yet, do you know what it means?’

  Howler didn’t know how to answer her question. Fortunately, it didn’t seem like she needed an answer as she continued communicating a moment later. ‘It means power. It means territory. It means hot flesh and blood for our stomachs.’

  ‘Where…where do we get food?’ Howler didn’t know whether to admire or despair of the sudden courage – or stupidity – his packmate had just shown. Perhaps it had been a bad idea to bring Teeth with him – the young male had often been terribly impetuous when he had been younger. Howler had thought he’d calmed with age but so far on this mission….

  The matriarch stalked towards the suddenly-terrified albuha. Howler tensed too – if she tried to tear him to shreds, he would attack her, more powerful or not. If he could distract her sufficiently, Teeth and Jaws could get into the air and escape that way. Their leader would have to understand that they couldn’t complete the mission.

  But the large yellow and brown beast didn’t attack. Instead, she paused immediately in front of Teeth, practically nose to nose. The young albuha had frozen and didn’t dare to move.

  ‘Courage,’ the matriarch shifted approvingly. ‘That will serve you well in this fight. Perhaps, accompanied by strength, it can lead you to become one of my sub-leaders, fighting for rank and increased access to our kills.’ Then her eyes turned to slits and she growled threateningly. ‘But do not think that any amount of courage can displace me from my place as leader. Be satisfied with the scraps I leave for you. Or dare to try and die.’

  With that, she stalked back to her previous position on the very top of the hill and turned to the winged beast.

  ‘Show them to the others of their kind. Let them decide whether they will follow the current leader or challenge him for his position.’

  The winged beast lowered its wings briefly in a gesture that Howler could only interpret as submission and then did as she commanded, leading the way down the hillside. Howler was only too happy to leave the heavy presence of the matriarch – he didn’t enjoy knowing that the other could kill him as quickly and easily as he would kill a small prey animal. His pack leader was strong enough to do so too, but there Howler was almost certain that he wouldn’t – most of the time, anyway. There were times when he became his other and got rather short-tempered. Howler had to suppress a shudder at that thought.

  However, there was another reason for why Howler followed the winged beast willingly, even eagerly. They had both conveyed the sense of others of Howler’s ‘kind’. Were there others here? Could he take them and revitalise his much-reduced pack even while following his leader’s instructions?

  here!