The moon continued across the night sky, bright and unblinking in the face of whatever went on below. When it had set, it was to a dawn that came in shades of orange and teal which turned the hills dark. The floor of the valley was awash in a wan morning light and a thick, dirty-looking yellow fog punctuated by plumes of foul smoke that rose quietly from the shells of burned-out cars. Everything was very, very still on the valley floor now.

Teige, now in the shape of a thickset fallow deer, bounded through the dirty mist, a black shape racing past other still black shapes. He was yelling for Hawk, hoarsely, hearing no response.

Further up the hill, the peryton was now sitting on the overhang at the abandoned gas station.

"They butchered a lot of them on the spot," he was saying quietly, crouched like a stone gargoyle on the peeling sheet metal, his antlers preventing the morning sun from reaching his eyes. "Everyone they didn't butcher, they took with 'em. All the cars are smashed or overturned. Most were burned. This is it," he added. "This is all of us."

This was met with silence. The only others to have gotten up the hill to the gas station were a small, curly-haired brownie and a smoky three-eyed creature. The werewolf, having left his shirt over the form of the tanuki under the overhang, had stepped off away from the rest. Kim sat silently with Aram, who was propped up and asleep, his leg wrapped. Abi rested her head on Minnie's shoulder; the two of them sat on the low curb outside the very small, featureless garage. Parker--now missing part of the outer layer of her skirt--had been standing very still for quite some time, long arms wrapped around Hawk's messenger bag, merely looking up and down the dirt road, and at the misty valley below.

Teige changed again as he ran past the hulking form of the camper--it sat, blackened and silent, windows and doors broken open, smoking. The green fire flickered over Teige briefly and he barreled upright in the form of a bear, standing as tall as he could, looking around wildly, headlamp eyes glowing.

No response; nothing moved. He stilled, realizing how many of the dark shapes in the fog around him were not cars but instead bodies.