"Oy!" A heavy brown boot kicked my shoulder. "You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here!"

"What...?" I rubbed the sleep from my eyes. "Oh, yeah. I'm going." I heaved off the old wooden bench tucked away in the back of the bar.

"You play a good tune there, Bard," the barkeep waddled around the empty tables, bussing up the empty mugs. "Come back tonight. It's the end of the week. Both our purses will be bursting, so long as you keep that hood of yours cinched up tight."

I took a deep bow and then cocked my head up quickly, tossing my speckled leather hood loose off my pale head.

"Gah!" The barkeep winced. "Those ears. If'in you ain't an albino goblin, what in the blasted endless stars are you?"

"I am a Razkur, dear friend," I spread my grin, letting the pudgy human behold my pale teeth while slinging my guitar strap over my shoulder.

"Yeesh," he shook his head. "The fates must have an awful sense of humor, pairing a nightmare mug like that with the voice of celestial seraph."

"On my homeworld of Menthla," I splayed my long floppy ears wide and raised their pointed tips proudly towards the ceiling. "I was often told my appearance was quite fetching."

"Well, my alien friend, that was there, and this is here. And here, you is one tall pale scrawny freak," the sweaty human guffawed, letting slip a sour quacking fart as his body shuddered. "I mean no disrespect, Mr. Mourning Crow. Just speaking honest."

"Miss."

"Huh?"

"My people rarely use gendered honorifics, but since we are, as you say, here," I explained. "I am a Miss, not a Mister."

The human couldn't contain his laughter. "You're a..." He had to put down his tray and wipe away a stream of tears. "A lady! HAHAHAHA! But you're so tall?!"

I crossed my arms, attempting to avoid openly rolling my eyes while waiting him out and making myself comfortable atop an empty table.

"I stand corrected, Miss," the barkeep had trouble catching his breath. "The fates played no joke. You are outright cursed."

I could only smirk. "Well, there's no arguing that."

...

The daylight hours tumbled by as I roamed the quiet hamlet streets. I told myself it was hunting for signs of a Graven presence, but mostly it was me lurking around the church making up excuses not to enter.

The trail always led into a church. It's where those fuckers thrived.

I loathed churches and priests, and anyone robed in their hypocritical attire. Maybe there were a few decent believers scattered across the stars, but I've never met one. Not in over a thousand years.

"It's close," I mumbled to myself. "Just a matter of time until the Graven devours this planet."

None of these humans had a clue there was a monster nearby, biding its time until it was ready to eat them all in one go.

My stomach growled, signaling it was time for me to leave.

Not for lack of coin. The tavern crowd tipped well and the barkeep gave me a bonus.

Money didn't matter.

My departure had everything to do with how my species ate. Humans are scared of anything too violent and different.

I lost sight of the town a little past evening. All was silent, and the forest beyond the dreary town stretched on for miles. There were minor hints of the Graven sprinkled throughout the town, but the scent was weak.

"That church was tingling with evidence," I shuddered. "No, thank you!"

I strolled along the quiet forest for at least another hour, pursuing the faint scent of moldy fur until a sharp, familiar burning sensation surged through my skull, followed by a peculiar sound.

No, more than a sound, a shape.

I didn't have oversized articulate ears perched on the sides of my head for symmetrical decoration. They were my most valued sensory organs. Like all formally subterranean dwelling razkurs, my cranial thermal bands and front-facing eyes gave me access to a wide variety of visual wavelengths, but it was my hearing that allowed me to see everything. Including the large man crouched up in the tree behind me.

Well, not quite a man.

He was muscular, wide in the shoulders, slightly larger than buff human or an average male razkur, but definitely not human.

Five clawed fingers on each hand and four clawed toes curled at the ends of his hulking feet. He wore a mask, a smattering of jewelry and a few sparse chunks of armor, some scantily-clad rubbery straps buckled around his chest and limbs, and his hair... Was it even hair?

The slender tendrils wriggled and had a pulse like a wild mane of snakes.

His head was hard, with two pairs of narrow horns stacked and spiked backwards on either the side.

Not quite a reptile. Scales but not tail. And his body heat was either masked by technology or limited due to being cold-blooded.

The man's head was draped in a long mane of thin prehensile quills swaying independently down his back. Two extra-long tendrils twitched forward over his shoulders while three little quills fanned in front of his ears.

Unlike his other long quills, the smallest were tucked inside his metal mask. Each tapping like tiny digits operating the monitor built inside his helmet.

He kept himself hidden behind the branches and slowed his breathing to nearly nothing.

I skipped and hummed a little, feigning ignorance as I enhanced my vision via a little echolocation.

His face beneath the mask rang out as angular with two large fangs protruding from his bottom lip, guarding a mouth filled with rows of razor sharp fangs.

There were bits of metal decorating his entire body, from flat little ringlets coiled into his squirming cranial quills, to the ornate metal flakes embedded into his torso and limbs, and down to six barbell frenum piercings running along the underside of his dormant cock.

His armored vest and bulky utility belt sang out as an advanced compact armory, accessorized by two hidden daggers nestled within the underside of his gauntlets.

"Tsk, tsk," I shook my head and clicked my tongue.

Did he really think I couldn't see him?

A shame I'd have to burst his bubble and tell him hiding was pointless.

We both froze at an incoming sound.

"It's about freaking time," I reached for my narrow chain sickle. "I'm starving!"

.

.

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...

Author's Note:

Hi! A. E. Shelly here.

We'll be hopping into a big fight over the next two chapters. 

Combat is all Mourning Crow and Eh'kt have known their entire lives.

However, before now, they've always fought alone.

Keep scrolling to find out if they survive and learn to work together...

...

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