The barge nosed its way through the open sluice gate. An unassuming block of wood and metal, it ebbed quietly along, only just fitting through the aperture and passing under the massive outer wall of the city like a piece of flotsam. Dark figures scuttled along the bank, tracking the craft's progress, as the sluice gate creaked shut behind it.

They knew they did not have long.

The journey had been arduous, riding the continent's waterways, circumventing the main canalways that led into Wildhearth's main docks, and instead slithering under the cover of night into the recesses of the underdocks. While the main berths hummed with activity and commerce, these lower levels serviced a different world. Smugglers and gangs frequented these shadow spaces. There were no great cranes of industry, no polished dockyard offices and no easy banter among the workers.

Instead, shifty-eyed crews skittered back and forth, guiding rickety ships that barely looked like they should be able to float to moorings that were hardly in better shape. Some of the trade was legal, some of it not, servicing the forgotten and destitute that lived in the shadow of Wildhearth's great walls. Harsh words were whispered; scuffles broke out as trades were disputed, violently. Strong lasher greased loose tongues.

Every city, no matter how great, has its marks of shame.

Standing at one jetty, a tall, heavily-muscled otterkin watched the barge through narrow eyes. His fur was almost black, but marred by a map of scars on his bare torso. The dark blue kilt fastened at his waist twitched in the breeze; his arms stayed folded across his chest. He could have been a statue for all the life that seemed to emanate from him, but no-one in the underdocks wanted to get any closer than they had to. Bodies parted around him as through avoiding a cone of radiation. His eyes narrowed. The blade of a longclaw thrust through his belt glinted in the twilight.

Having judged that the barge was now close enough, he inclined his head to it. A pair of slender otterkin behind him scampered forward. Grasping long, metal-tipped punt poles, the duo leapt off the jetty and disappeared soundlessly into the water. Only the faintest ripples remained to betray them.

The otterkin looked around. His nose twitched. He smoothed back his rigid crop of dark headfur with one paw and breathed out, long and slow. His heart was racing. After all this time – after years in the planning – the day had finally arrived. He could barely believe it.

Steady, he told himself. This was a momentous occasion, but the arrival of the barge was just the first step on a long road. There was still much to be done. He watched carefully as the workers directed the barge towards the jetty, the dull thunk of the punt poles striking the hull muffled by the water. With aching slowness the barge turned, gliding soundlessly into its berth. A deckpaw – wolfkin from the look of her – tossed a rope to a waiting dock worker to tie them securely into place.

After a moment of tugging and manoeuvring, the barge was snugly positioned against the jetty. The two otterkin handlers emerged dripping from the water and stood to attention, watching and waiting as a door opened in the barge's flank. Like the calm before a storm, a quiet suddenly seemed to envelop the docks.

Then he stepped off onto the slime-slick jetty, footpaws as sure and stable as a rock. Tall and gaunt, the newcomer straightened up, breathing in a deep lungful of the rank air of the underdocks. He wore two black armwraps, leaving a bare torso of bone and fur the colour of charred wood above a ragged longkilt that looked like it was sown together from hide.

Not quite vulkin, not quite wolfkin, this individual was something else altogether. Large, leaf-shaped ears extended out of a ragged mane of dark brown headfur that curled and coiled like a living thing. Eyes the colour of a furnace shone dangerously in the gloom; a broad mouth opened in a smile revealing two rows of sharp teeth, punctuated by long, vicious-looking canines.

A satisfied sigh slid from between those teeth.

"Do you smell that?" he rasped. His voice had a curious rattle in the back of the throat. An accent the otterkin had not heard for an age cut into his ears – a sharp, harsh voice that hammered every consonant into your brain. "That is the smell of a world that needs a guiding paw."

Feral energy seeped out of the creature, infecting the very air around it. Kin near the jetty stopped to look. Some workers exchanged baffled looks. Others stared on, those who knew exactly who this was, and why he had come.

Two more kin emerged from the barge. A lean-limbed wolfkin male brandishing a claw-headed axe bared his teeth, a low growl of challenge cutting through the low hum of activity in the underdocks as he took up position to the newcomer's left. The second figure was a female felkin, a barbaric, sensuous specimen with her svelte frame scantly clad in a short, wispy kilt and a sleeveless, high-collared bodywrap that cut off beneath her ribs. A plume of long headfur blazed a cobalt trail down the side of her neck and across her chest, but the otterkin's eyes were drawn to the glint of metal in her right paw. Three tiny blades shone there; throwing claws.

He took a deep breath.

Clearing his throat, the otterkin stepped forward, raising his head and trying to keep his voice level. The two bodyguards edged forward to either side of their leader.

"You made it," he said, speaking before he could find a throwing claw embedded in his throat.

"Mehrs." The newcomer's predatory smile widened, eyes lighting up in recognition. His head turned and he raised a paw to his guards. The pair reluctantly lowered their weapons, their fearsome stares daring anyone on the dock to threaten their charge.

"It has been too long, old friend," their leader declared stepping forward. He extended one paw, a paw with gnarled, hooked claws that shone in the half-light.

"That it has, but the Fire's patient," Mehrs replied, accepting the grip. The pair embraced, firmly but not warmly; the embrace of comrades, of brothers in arms with a singular purpose ahead of them. "It's good to see ye."

"I trust we are ready?" The newcomer said as they stepped apart. "You have done as I asked?"

The brawny, scar-backed otterkin inclined his head. "Aye, all is prepared."

"Good." Sharp eyes flickered at the kin that had assembled expectantly on the jetty. Some eyes were wide with awe; others twitched with hunger. At the dockside it was mostly otter and beaverkin, but there were a few felkin and foxkin scattered amongst them. Longclaw daggers were stuffed through belts and strapped to thighs, and home-made armbows were clearly in evidence.

His eyes rose, beyond the crowd and beyond the docks to the lights of the city above. Noise filtered down from the haze, carried by the glow that cascaded between buildings. Above the underdocks the life of Wildhearth pulsed on, a sea of unnatural sights and sounds, from the hedonism of its bars and clubs, to the decadence of the Silk, to the political machinations of the Conclave.

The newcomer curled his lip disdainfully, exposing the yellowing hook of a fang. He nodded to no-one in particular. "Let us walk."

With his bodyguards flanking him, he set off, and Mehrs quickly fell into step behind, gesturing for the others on the dock to accompany them. His claws flexed and he watched the new arrival examine every crack and crevice of the dark as he walked.

A shape scuttled out into their path and Mehrs tensed. In the gloom it took a moment to recognise the figure, but once he did, he let out a snort of annoyance. It was a scrawny, muck-furred foxkin named Vaan; a trader in highs and shines that would melt your brain if you used them for too long. Down here, it was not uncommon to find those gibbering addicts. Kin like Vaan made Mehrs' fur prickle with disgust.

"New to the docks aintcha," Vaan blabbered as he hobbled into view in front of the newcomer. The felkin bodyguard twitched; the wolfkin's axe rose fractionally. "I can always tell, always tell, yesyes." The stunted fox swept open his ragged coat, eyes glinting lecherously in the night. "Got the best of shine for ya, sir. Just a few coppers and ye can be wherever the mind could take you. C'mon now, Vaan'll show you a good time."

Mehrs saw the stiffening of the spine of the newcomer as he observed the foxkin. The powerful kin's muscles tensed and he took a small step forward.

"Vaan, is it?" he asked softly.

"Oh, aye, sir, they all know me round the docks."

Idiot, Mehrs thought.

"Vaan, I'm afraid it's too late for you."

"Say what now?"

The foxkin died so fast that Mehrs barely saw it happen. One minute the drug-peddler was standing in front of their visitor, the next the newcomer flashed forward and tore his throat out with a single rip of his hooked claws.

Vaan's mouth opened and closed for a couple of extra seconds, blood bubbling out over his throat and chest before he collapsed, his feeble body hitting the jetty with a wet crunch. The newcomer stood over the corpse and shook his claws clean with a deft flick of his wrist.

"It's worse than I thought. This city is sick," he murmured, shaking his head sadly. He turned his gaze on Mehrs, his eyes hardening to diamonds of black fury. "We have work to do."

***

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