As it turned out, the elves were fine travelling at night as long as at least one moon was in the sky to provide some light. They said that when all three of them were present, it wasn’t much worse than travelling during the day, which could be difficult in itself since the heat caused mirages to form which made visibility difficult. The downside, of course, was that there were far more creatures active in the night than during the hottest period of the day. But for Dominic’s Pride it was often a welcome source for some Prey Points, and food.

  Leo snarled as he realised they had been lured into a trap. While drinking and resting at a waterhole, they had been surrounded by enemies. How dare they interrupt my mating! he thought angrily to himself. Two other females were coming into heat and he needed to give them his full attention, not dozens of ugly, slimy, wart-covered toads!

  ‘I think the spikes covering them are of more concern,’ his brother’s voice said with levity that was made thin by the undercurrent of tension also present.

  Leo growled and struck out at a beach ball-sized one with a claw filled paw. His testing blow ripped away a large chunk of the toad’s skin.

  It croaked miserably, then hopped backwards, landing on top of another one behind it and then wriggling to find a space between its brethren. Somehow it managed to not be pierced by the other toad’s spikes.

  But Leo was forced to admit that he hadn't come off unscathed either. His paw had been pricked by some of the toad’s spines and was now throbbing painfully. Venomous spines, he realised a moment later as the pain pierced more deeply and the red bar in the corner of his vision gained a green tinge. It started reducing with alarming speed.

  ‘It’s a strong poison,’ Dominic informed him grimly. ‘There are two drops above our health bar.’

  Leo backed away a little bit more from the toads before him – the stubby spines had barely pierced his skin, yet it was apparently enough for the venom to infiltrate his system. Fortunately, it didn't last long: the effect wore off within a few more breaths.

  Baring his fangs at the loathsome amphibians before him, Leo gathered a ball of acid in his mouth. He wouldn't risk biting the things, but melting them with acid from a distance? That, he would happily do.

  The ball of green liquid landed on its target with a satisfying sizzle, the unfortunate amphibian unable to get out of the way. Leo watched in satisfaction as it, too, scrambled backwards – rubbing the corrosive liquid onto its companions.

  Seeing the success of that acid ball, Leo started firing off more. The damaged toads retreated away as quickly as they had replaced their companions. Unfortunately, they moved quickly enough that he hadn’t yet managed to kill any of them – his acid wasn’t strong enough to kill in a single blow.

  ‘They’ve probably got armored skin, or maybe that shiny substance on their backs neutralises the acid somehow,’ Dominic warned him.

  ‘Protector, help!’

  The voice of one of his females pulled his attention away from the toads he was melting. Looking around, the lion saw that while he’d been distracted, the rest of his Pride was getting pressed by toads suddenly emerging from the waterhole as well as penning them in on three sides. While Leo had practically been able to halt the advance of the spiky amphibians on his side, the same wasn’t true for everyone else.

  The amesheks were putting up a good fight, using their vocal attack to good effect – though they hadn’t yet killed any due to the same issue of the toads switching positions as soon as they were injured, they had managed to make the advancing line start retreating slightly.

  On the other side, the elves were using their weapons to attack the toads without risking contact with the poisonous spines. To Leo’s disgust, they were actually the most successful front, with several toads already lying dead.

  ‘Don’t moan about it, Leo,’ Dominic scolded him. ‘We need all the help we can get.’

  ‘We’re supposed to be the help,’ Leo grunted at his brother, his lips lifting to bare his teeth as he realised that the lions were the group coming off worst. Not only did they not have any ranged attacks, but they tended to be some of the weakest members of the Pride meaning the poison was ravaging their health bars. Previously, they’d been at the back of the group and most protected, but with the toads emerging from the water behind them and no way to stop their advance nor any space to evade them, the situation looked grim.

  At least the primates were helping out a bit – they were intermingled with the lions, throwing rocks at the advancing wave of enemies. It was helping, but it wasn’t enough. Leo looked up with irritation at the winged-canines – they had managed to escape the whole thing by soaring into the air, but were now unsure how to help.

  ‘We need to get out of this trap,’ Dominic told him grimly, recognising the severity of the situation.

  ‘I know that! But even if I could leap across all the toads, there are too many of them for all of my females to be able to do the same,’ growled Leo. He still leaped into the air, gliding over to join his trapped females. They squashed together to give him enough space to land and he had to be careful with his wings so as not to knock them into anyone. As soon as he landed, Leo dropped some carcasses for the most injured to absorb, and released Healing Cloud for those he was rubbing against to benefit from, sharing Healing Cloud with Luna who was on the other side of the group from him so she could heal those around her too.

  Opening his mouth, Leo released the ball of acid he’d been building, causing two toads in front of him to let out pain-filled croaks as they scrambled backwards. Leo considered striking at them to kill them, but quickly reconsidered it – his health was already dropping due to it fueling Healing Cloud. The lions rubbing against him switched with each other, making sure everyone who needed more healing than the carcasses provided got access to it.

  Meanwhile, Leo tried hard to think of a solution that would get everyone out alive. He might not be as fond of the canines – winged or not – as Dominic was, and he’d willingly abandon the male lion, but he refused to have them taken from him. Everyone here was his and he would be damned before he let a bunch of croaking, slimy toads take them away when he could stop it. Especially when there was no closing door that threatened to trap him in a flooding room with crocodiles in it.

  ‘If we can’t get everyone out over the toads, we have to go through them,’ his brother told him.

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  Leo snarled mentally at Dominic. ‘You think I don’t know that?! But how?’ Then a thought occurred. ‘Maybe we can use that new Ability of ours – Poison Cloud,’ he said to his brother thoughtfully. It would clear out his venom stocks and be unusable again until they’d replenished, but if he could clear a way through the toads….

  ‘The elves aren’t part of our Pride,’ Dominic reminded him. ‘They don’t have immunity, and we don’t have enough time to try to convince them to join. We can’t use any area of effect Abilities unless they’re out of the way!’

  ‘If they’re not part of our Pride, they’re not under our protection!’ declared Leo firmly. ‘And if we have to choose between them and our females, I know what I will decide!’

  ‘You always do this!’ raged his brother with an impressive snarl – for a human. ‘Either it’s the amesheks or the young male lions or the albuhas or the elves. Somehow there’s always someone you’re willing to sacrifice! Well, I’m not! The more allies we have, the stronger we are. I wish you’d just realise that already! The elves are doing a decent job with their weapons. The amesheks are having an effect too. Even the kesh. We need to work together to get out of this!’

  Leo forced himself not to respond angrily. Even he could admit that having an internal fight between brothers was the wrong thing to do at that moment.

  ‘Then what is your genius plan?’ demanded Leo, unable to completely rid himself of his snide tone. If the human didn’t have one….

  Dominic had apparently been trying to calm himself down too, as when he started speaking again, it was more levelly than before. When Dominic related his plan, the lion had to reluctantly admit that it might work. It wouldn’t kill all of the toads, which was his preference, but that was of secondary importance. Ultimately, getting his Pride out was the most important thing – his females as a priority.

  Working together, Leo and his brother communicated with the two groups, Leo electing to use the Pride chat, Dominic using telepathy to contact the elves.

  The groups shuffled around to face the area where the toads were the thinnest – where the elves had been attacking.

  The amesheks and Leo stepped forwards first, the albuhas gliding towards them from behind the Pride. As Leo started to Roar with a focus on doing damage and chasing the toads away, the amesheks joined in with their own vocal attack.

  The toads directly in front of them took the brunt of the damage and were frozen in place. Notifications started flashing in front of Leo’s eyes, but he dismissed them irritably.

  He cut out the Roar as his stamina bar emptied past the halfway mark and the amesheks stopped shortly after. The elves ran forwards to flick the dead toads out of their way with their weapons. As soon as space was cleared, the albuhas came in to land, howling at the toads as they did so.

  The advancing wave of amphibians halted and then started recoiling quickly as they were hit by the repelling power of the vocal attacks, particularly that of the albuhas. Unfortunately, the winged coyotes had been a bit over-eager and the elves got caught by the effect too. They started running – straight towards the spiky toads.

  ‘Stop them!’ Leo growled and several of the lionesses sprang forwards. They bit at the fleeing elves’ clothes, dragging them backwards against their best efforts to escape. ‘Stop howling!’ Leo snarled at the albuhas. The winged coyotes hesitated, several taking the opportunity to suck in dearly-needed breaths. It was enough for the elves to come back to their senses and realise that the lions weren’t aiming to hurt them. It was a good thing too as one had already turned to attack the female stopping him from running headlong into the spiky wall ahead of him. Leo thought darkly that if the brown-furred elf had landed just a single blow, Leo would have taken it out of his flesh tenfold.

  The elves now clear, they tried again. The effects of the albuhas’ vocal attacks pushed the wave of toads back again – they had started creeping closer again while the elves were being retrieved. Unfortunately, they’d lost the momentum and the effect wasn’t as great as before.

  ‘Try using Fearful Voice with Group Enhancement,’ suggested Dominic. ‘Maybe they’re similar enough to work together.’

  Leo opened his mouth again and tried out Fearful Voice. Instead of the Roar he was used to, a far deeper and more resonant one appeared. Even behind the battle-lines, he saw the elves cringe away and almost start to run again as they were caught in the fringes of the sound; only when they clapped their hands over their ears did they appear to be released from the worst of its thrall.

  The toads had a much more obvious reaction. With fear-filled croaks, they redoubled their attempt to escape, leaving an open corridor in front of the Pride.

  ‘Go!’ Leo said to everyone. Even his mental voice was tired and strained. That Ability appeared to have taken something out of him which didn’t seem to be reflected in any of his bars. His Pride ran past him as he struggled to limp forwards, pushing through the exhaustion which had settled into his bones.

  Fortunately, it appeared that the side-effect was limited in duration – each forced step forwards was a little easier until, by the time he cleared the last of the toads, he felt almost none of the exhaustion which had been weighing on him.

  Ahead, his Pride had paused, far enough away from the toads that they weren’t likely to be caught again, but it would take Leo only a couple of seconds to catch up at a run.

  Instead of doing that, however, he hesitated, looking back at the toads. Although they had killed a few of the amphibians, they hadn’t killed nearly enough for Leo’s tastes, not considering the trap they had just escaped. Thinking about it, Leo now realised why there hadn’t been any other creatures drinking at this waterhole. It hadn’t been obvious at the time because the plains were emptier than Leo ever remembered them being, but it was still a mistake he shouldn’t have made.

  And attacking them was a mistake that the toads shouldn’t have made either.

  Turning, he ran back to the centre of the toads, regaining the still-empty space that his Pride had recently vacated.

  ‘Leo, what are you doing?’ Dominic asked urgently, then apparently he caught wind of what the lion was thinking. ‘Oh. Good idea,’ he continued brightly with a hint of bloodthirstiness in his voice.

  Crouching down, the lion waited until the toads piled in closely, almost close enough to touch him. Then, activating Poison Cloud, he covered all the space within one of his body-lengths around him with a choking cloud of his haemotoxic venom.

  ‘See, we could have used this Ability to get our Pride out of here,’ Leo couldn’t resist telling his brother. ‘It doesn’t go that far.’

  Leo was silent as he breathed in and out slowly three times – the duration of the Ability – and then leaped up in the air and glided out. The remaining cloud was spread further by the gust of air from his wings and affected even those toads who had been out of its range before.

  ‘Yeah, and then they could have been poisoned by that backdraft or if the wind went in the wrong direction,’ Dominic pointed out. ‘Anyway, we got them out.’

  ‘That we did, brother,’ Leo agreed with satisfaction.

  When the slightly yellow-tinged mist cleared, he’d left behind a field of bleeding, dying amphibians. The toads who had escaped his attack or hadn’t received enough of the poison to kill them retreated, some disappearing into the water, others burrowing themselves into the ground.

  ‘Perhaps they’ll think twice about taking us on in the future,’ Dominic said, his voice filled with the same satisfaction as Leo’s.

  here!