He returns home, blood dripping from acid burns and radioactive teeth. His breathing is labored but he knows he will recover in a few days’ time. It was worth it, to shed some of the rage that brewed between his ribs and overflowed into his daily thoughts. Ghaul wanted to smother the life from each of them but found himself oddly merciful in the end. Briefly, he mulls over the idea of finding them later and snapping their necks like twigs beneath his talons.

But then Virgil peers over the edge of the nest. His halo teeters left and right as he giggles mischievously. The awful king steps closer and nudges the boy back into bed.

“You’re bleeding! How!” the boy demands, his golden eyes wide with wonder as he touches his nose to a wound. Ghaul sucks in a sharp breath and gingerly pushes the boy back. “My scales are not perfect. Some enemies have ways of rotting or corroding them,” he explains in a grave tone, hoping his young son remembers this lesson. “Now, lay down for your nap, so you grow big and strong. You’ll need to fight soon.”

The boy huffs in annoyance as he lays down once more. He is at least obedient, Ghaul thinks as he kisses the child’s temple. And then he turns toward Pangea. The autumn afternoon is not gentle on them, here in the desert. The dry ground is still hot enough to conjure mirages in the distance and send the wildlife seeking shade. He flexes his wings and judges their strength to be too poor to fly, so he chooses instead to walk to the center of his kingdom. There is much work to be done.

Along the way, he issues short croons for the others. He watches their outlines as they drift in from whatever corner of Pangea they hide in. Ghaul arrives in the widest canyon where he comes to a stop, tracing a talon idly across the red clay. He gives one last summons and shifts his great weight.

“We’ve grown quiet, family,” he begins, observing them with a grin of crooked fangs. “The autumn weather has dried our enemies’ homes, turned them all to pyres. We need only to light the match.”

And then his wings spread wide, eclipsing the sun behind him and sending drops of his blood to sizzle on the desert dirt.

“I will go south, to begin the fires in Loess and rid them of their dead weight. My sons, Yadigar and Virgil will go north to tear down their walls and punish them for their prideful ways. And what of you, family? Where would you go? How will you hunt?”