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Swallowing to loosen the tension in his throat, he pressed his knees to the beast’s side. The creature swung its horned head round to confirm that this was what he wanted. That was the first time the beast had ever, in all the time he’d been on it, hesitated about anything. And that made him very uneasy.

"Go," said the demon. So they went.

"You know what did this?" the demon asked.

He did not answer. He was looking at the buildings on either side of the street. They seemed to have been ripped out from the inside. Blood and soot marked the walls. There were no people to be seen, or indeed anything living. The faint tinge of smoke still lingered on the air.

There was a smell, though. A smell he remembered, from a very, very long time ago.

"I don’t know," he said, though he knew.

"I think you do." The demon’s hand fell away from his thigh. "And you know why I brought you here."

Without replying, he swung himself off the beast’s back. It was a long time since his feet had touched the ground, and he could not afford to be unsteady on his legs. "What did they do?" he asked. "The people? What did they do to deserve this?"

"Nothing." The demon shook her head, and her hair danced like fire. "They didn’t have to do anything. Just being is enough."

He thought about that a moment, and nodded. "How do I stop them?" It would have to be him, of course. The demon was powerless to help in this instance.

"They’ll come to you," the demon said. Her pointed ears twisted. "In fact," she added casually, "They’re here. Can you not hear them, Man?"

"No –" he began, and then he could hear them too. A high, singing noise, at the threshold of hearing, almost like music. Almost, but no quite.

"I can’t look at them," he said. "Can I?"

"You can, here. Outside, they would have burned you. Here, it will be as sport to them to face you. And, so close, they do not burn."

He pulled on his gauntlets and reached over his shoulder.

"You had better be swift, Man," the demon said.

The sword was of a metal so old that it no longer had a name. It lay, as always, heavy in his hand, so heavy that it felt that he could never use it for anything. And then, as always, when he raised his arm, it suddenly became an extension of his body, black as the gulfs between the stars and hard and bright as starlight itself.

There was a knife, too, in the top of his boot, an ordinary knife, of old, polished steel. He hoped he would not have to use it. If things came to the point where he had to depend on the knife, he would probably be beyond help.

"Wait," the demon said. "Before you go...there’s this much I can do for you." She scraped at her breasts with her talons. Golden-orange blood welled, and she wiped her fingers across his brow and down his cheeks.

"It won’t help you defeat them," she said. "But it will give you a measure of protection – for a while."

He tried to smile to show his thanks, but the smile would not come. Turning, he trudged away down the street, his armoured feet heavy in the dust.

He saw the blood trail on the ground before he’d taken twenty steps. It led to the left, down a side street, and was still so fresh that when his boot touched it the blood smeared. He followed it till it ended abruptly at the foot of a wall in a little pool. A drop fell into it, with a tiny ripple. He looked up.

It squatted on the wall, looking down at him. A few of its wings held a human figure between them, twisted and tore at it absently, while its lion face leered.

"So," it said. Its voice sounded like old, rusty machinery, as though it wasn’t used to talking. "A knight, of all things. Why have you come?"

His lips moved, numbly. "Because I wanted to."

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