The desert night howled like an offended god, wind shrieking through the Qirathi camp, slapping loose tent flaps and rattling bone charms that hung from wooden poles. In the center of a large group of tents, Elder Zahrek sat before a low-burning fire, his fur bristling from the cold—or possibly from the weight of the story he was about to tell.
The younglings huddled in front of him, twitchy and expectant. It was one of those rare nights when the chores were done, the sand vipers hadn't eaten anyone, and nobody had started a fistfight over the last decent scrap of lizard jerky. Perfect storytelling conditions.
Zahrek poked at the embers, letting the silence stretch just long enough to make them uneasy. "All right, kits," he said at last. "I'm going to tell you the story of how the world ended."
Instant regret. Three of the smaller ones immediately clung to each other, tails puffing up. One of the older kits, Vashar, rolled his eyes. "You always tell that one," he muttered.
"Because it is a good story," Zahrek shot back. "Now shut your snout and listen, or I'll make you tell it next time."
Vashar grumbled something about Zahrek "not having memorized the rest of the Book of Fables," but otherwise obeyed. The younger ones watched Zahrek with wide eyes, and he allowed himself a slow, satisfied nod.
"Long ago," he began, trying to make his voice gravely and deep, "the world was a paradise. Rivers flowed, trees grew, and water didn't have to be rationed like a miser's purse. People were fat and happy. It was disgusting."
A small chuckle rippled through the group. Good. He had them.
"And then came Arumatheus."
The fire flickered. The wind outside gave an ominous groan. Zahrek let the moment sit, watching as even Vashar leaned in despite himself.
"No one knows where the behemoth came from," he continued, lowering his voice. "Some say it was foretold. Others, say it was retribution from a god our people insulted. My personal theory? Some unfortunate cosmic accident, like when you try to cook three lizards on one spit and instead of dinner you get a fire the size of a warbeast."
The younglings nodded solemnly. Everyone had been there.
"What we do know is that Arumatheus was huge. And hungry. It devoured islands whole, swallowing them up like a drunk at a festival feast. Cities, mountains, people—gone." He snapped his fingers for emphasis. One of the kits yelped. Excellent.
"The kings and warlords threw everything they had at it," he went on. "Spears, swords, magic, prayer—none of it worked. Arumatheus just kept floating along, gulping down whatever got in its way, until finally, the greatest mage of our people decided enough was enough."
"The nameless hero," Sihri whispered.
Zahrek nodded. "He knew no army could stand against the Sky Devourer. So, he did the only thing he could." He spread his arms wide. "He took all the water in the world—rivers, lakes, everything—and used it to freeze Arumatheus in a mountain of ice."
The younglings gasped. One of the smaller ones looked horrified. "But… but that's our water!"
"Correct," Zahrek said. "Which is why we live in a desert now. A rather irritating trade-off, but one that kept us from being eaten, so, you know. Small victories."
There was a long pause as the kits mulled this over. Then, slowly, Sihri's brow furrowed. "But Elder…"
"Yes?"
"If the ice is the only thing keeping Arumatheus trapped…" Her grip on her pendant tightened. "And we've been drilling into it…"
Zahrek smiled, slow and grim. "Then, my dear, one day soon—the ice will break."
A gust of wind hit the tent, rattling the wooden poles. The fire flickered wildly, sending jagged shadows across the walls. Someone whimpered.
Vashar scoffed. "Yeah, right..."
Sihri looked to the old kit. "You don't believe that he's in there?"
"Of course not!"
"Now then," Zahrek cleared his throat and rubbed his paws together. "Some of you seem a bit skeptical about all this—" his gaze landed pointedly on Vashar, "—so let me paint you a picture. A story within a story, if you will."
The elder stretched, his joints popping like firewood, then settled back down with a satisfied grunt. He let the silence linger for a few heartbeats, then smirked.
"Well, it wasn't always doom and giant fish monsters, you know," he said, plucking gently at his wiry gray whiskers. "Close your eyes," he instructed. "Imagine a world of green."
A few of the kits obeyed, squeezing their eyes shut like they were trying to summon something magical. Others just stared at him, waiting. He smirked.
"I don't mean little patches of weeds, either," he continued. "I mean forests. Trees taller than the tallest sand dunes, so thick with leaves that you could sleep in the shade all day and never feel the sun. Rivers, running so fast and so full that if you fell in, you'd be swept away to gods-know-where. There were fields of golden grass, lakes where fish practically leapt into your paws, fruit so sweet it dripped down your chin when you bit into it."
Someone made a quiet, longing sound. Possibly Sihri. Zahrek didn't blame her.
"And rain," he went on, drawing out the word like it was something delicious. "Not that half-hearted drizzle we sometimes get when the sky decides to pity us. No, proper rain—fat, heavy drops that smelled like the earth itself waking up. Rain that sang as it hit the leaves, that filled the rivers until they overflowed. Rain that never ran out."
The tent was completely silent now. The only sound was the occasional pop of the fire.
"That was the world before the Mammock," Zahrek said. "That was our world."
There was a long pause before Vashar muttered, "Sounds made up."
Zahrek placed a paw over his heart, feigning deep offense. "Young one, would I—I, an esteemed elder of the Qirathi—ever exaggerate?"
"Yes," the younglings chorused.
Zahrek barked a laugh. "You wound me, kits! But I get it. It does sound ridiculous. The idea that water could fall from the sky whenever it pleased? That we wouldn't have to fight over it? That's the kind of tale you tell to kits when you want them to behave."
He pointed a claw at them. "But this time, I swear on my own tail—it was true. The kings of the old world had fountains in their palaces, great spouts of water that served no purpose at all except to look pretty."
A murmur of disbelief rippled through the younglings.
"That's wasteful," one of the kits muttered.
"Oh, immensely." Zahrek nodded sagely. "And the worst of it? They bathed every day."
Gasps. Horror. One of the smaller kits clutched his own tail in sheer disbelief.
"Every day?" Sihri asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
Zahrek leaned in, eyes gleaming. "Sometimes twice."
Utter silence. Then, Vashar, ever the skeptic, folded his arms. "That sounds dangerous. Wouldn't they—"
"Drown?" Zahrek finished for him. "Absolutely. I imagine hundreds perished. A tragic fate." He shook his head solemnly. "And yet, they continued their reckless ways. You see, back then, people thought they had all the time in the world. That nothing could ever change. That they could drink their fill and bathe their ridiculous soft pink skins forever."
He let the firelight dance in his dark eyes before adding, voice softening, "But nothing lasts forever, kits. Not water. Not cities. Not kings."
The humor in his voice faded, and the younglings sensed it. They were quiet now, ears flicking, waiting for the shift.
"Our ancestors thrived," he went on. "We Qirathi were not scavengers or traders back then. No, we were rulers. Builders of cities of gleaming polished bone under the sun."
He let them imagine it—the Qirathi in their grand palaces, tails held high, fur sleek and brushed instead of tangled with sand. For a moment, even he could see it again, the way the rivers had shimmered in the dawn light, how the floating islands had cast their shadows over golden fields.
He tilted his head toward Sihri. "Tell me, little one—have you ever met anyone who remembers such a world?"
Sihri hesitated, then shook her head.
"Of course you haven't," Zahrek said. "Because it's been gone for generations. And you know why?"
A few kits gulped. Sihri's eyes flicked toward the ice mountain outside.
Zahrek leaned in. "Because Arumatheus took it from us."
The fire crackled. The air felt colder.
"It started slow," Zahrek continued, his voice softer now. "A few missing islands, swallowed in the night. Then entire cities. Empires, devoured whole."
The youngest kit, barely more than a bundle of fluff, let out a tiny, horrified squeak. Zahrek tried not to look too pleased with himself.
Sihri's claws dug into her bone pendant. "But… but they stopped it," she said, almost pleading. "The hero froze it. In the ice."
"Yes," Zahrek said. "A great sacrifice. A mighty spell. A prison made of every last drop of water we had left."
The firelight wavered, throwing long shadows along the tent walls. The kits barely breathed.
"But tell me, young ones," Zahrek murmured, his gaze sweeping over them. "When you see the kings of today—when you hear the drills boring into the ice, chipping away at that ancient prison—do they seem any wiser than those before them?"
The kits had no answer.
The elder let the silence stretch, watching their little faces, the way their wide black eyes flicked nervously toward the distant peak, shining in the moonlight, as if Arumatheus itself might burst through at any moment.
Then, he spoke again—quieter this time, but with no less weight.
"You think this is just an old tale," Zahrek said, his voice like shifting sand. "A legend told to make kits behave, to keep them from wandering too far from the fires at night. That's what they want you to believe."
"They?" Sihri asked hesitantly.
Zahrek gave her a grim smile. "The merchants. The kings. The ones who need you to believe that everything is fine, that the ice will last forever." His eyes darkened. "Because if you knew the truth, you'd run. Get on one of those newfangled aetherships the humans come and go one and leave Oroth-Kai behind you."
A gust of wind rattled the wooden poles of the tent, as if the desert itself had leaned in to listen.
"What truth?" Vashar asked, trying and failing to keep the nervous edge out of his voice.
Zahrek leaned forward, his voice dipping low, conspiratorial. "The ice is melting."
The tent was utterly silent. Even the wind outside seemed to hesitate.
Sihri's tail wrapped tight around her feet. "But… but the mountain has been frozen for centuries," she whispered.
"Has it?" Zahrek's ears flicked. "Or have we simply refused to see the cracks?"
He gestured toward the tent flap. "Out there, the kings send their great drills into the ice, scraping away at its bones, bleeding the water from the mountain." His voice grew colder. "But there are other signs. Signs even they cannot ignore."
The fire crackled, and Zahrek counted the younglings' breaths—quick, shallow, waiting. Good. Let them wait. Let them fear.
"The Signs of the Thaw," he murmured. "The old ones speak of them, the few who still remember the world-that-was. The tremors beneath the ice, like a great beast shifting in its sleep. The water that runs red some mornings, as if the mountain itself has begun to bleed. And then…" He paused for effect. "The cracks."
Sihri swallowed hard. "What kind of cracks?"
"The kind that grow."
A faint whimper escaped one of the smaller kits. Vashar nudged him with an elbow, but his own ears were pinned back. "If… if it wakes," he asked, voice tight, "what happens then?"
Zahrek stared into the dying embers. For a long moment, he said nothing.
Then, finally, he looked up. His eyes were dark as the void.
"No aethership will be swift enough," he said. "No den deep enough. No king powerful enough."
His gaze swept across them all, his voice a whisper of smoke and truth.
"If Arumatheus wakes… we will all be swallowed."
The wind howled again, shaking the tent.
"Sleep well, kits," Zahrek added cheerfully. "Try not to dream about being swallowed whole."
Predictably, this had the opposite effect. The younglings scattered, whispering furiously to each other as they fled into the night, back to their parents' tents. Only Sihri lingered, staring at Zahrek, then at the distant mountain of ice that gleamed beneath the golden-magenta sky.
For a moment, just a moment, she could have sworn she saw something shift beneath it.