It’s eye was red.

Sabba spun back toward his mother, and caught the glint of a round eye that was far too close, that belonged in a sleek, black feathered head which crowned the largest bird he’d ever imagined.

Almost as large as him.

He squealed and bucked, kicking off with his hind legs and feeling the wind of the bird’s passing just above his back.

“Run, Sabba!” His dam’s voice quivered with her terror. She galloped straight for him, and her hooves beat an angry staccato against the grassland. “Run to me.”

The tearing screech of the big birds devoured her cries. Sabba shied sideways at the streak of movement to his right, just at his shoulder. A pair of taloned feet swept past his muzzle, barely missing, formed of scaly branches tipped with curving, thorn claws. He’d caught his mane on a thorn once, and had been forced to struggle free from the thing’s terrible grip.

These thorns looked build for holding and keeping, for tearing, for feeding the horrible red-eyed birds.

“Down.” The order rang loud and bright against the cold air.

Sabba bent his forelegs and fell to the grass, not quite graceful enough to avoid banging his hocks. The raptor swept over him again, screaming in fury while its twin circled around to take its place. His mother let loose a nostril-quivering rumble that was all battle cry. She appeared before the colt, a wall of bone and muscle, rising onto her hind legs and threshing the air with her fore hooves. Her ears pinned against her skull, and she tossed her muzzle defiantly at the birds.

The raptors widened their circles, rising as easily as pollen on the breeze. They watched with their red eyes, and though they’d missed an easy opportunity, one look up at their hooked beaks and angry, clenching toes told Sabba they had not given up.

They would not give up.

“What do we do?” he cried.

“We must find cover,” his dam’s words were tight as his skin, and she kept her eyes on the sky, even when she dropped back to all fours again. “Stay close. What do you see?”

Sabba glued himself to the mare’s flank, using her body as a shield as he turned his long neck, gazing at the empty grassland which had seemed so wonderfully wide only moments ago. Now it was empty, devoid of shelter or aid. Hostile.

The raptors screamed again, closing their circle until they spun around the speckled mare and her colt. Too high for his dam to reach with her hooves. An enemy out of range and impossible to fight unless it chose to dive.

“There’s nothing,” Sabba said, sagging. “Only grass and…”

“And?”

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Sabba squinted at the shadows on the horizon, the clumps of sparse brush which dotted the plain. They seemed to thicken in one direction, but the bushes were far too short. They might reach his shoulder if he was lucky. There was no way at all they would shelter the mare.

“There’s brush,” he said. “But it’s too small.”

“It must do.” She shouldered him in the direction of the shadow.

They moved together, one step at a time while the birds circled. Every six or so steps, one of the birds would draw nearer, but each time it did, Sabba’s dam reared, pawing a warning at the diving bird. The colt could not help but wonder why they took turns. If both raptor’s attacked at once, his mother could not fully protect him.

Even as his fear raced, turning his blood icy, Sabba questioned their strategy. Had it been him on the offensive, he would have attacked the horses from both sides, dividing the mare’s attention or forcing the colt to defend itself.

He knew better than to share this observation, though he believed his mother would take pride in it. The birds were fierce and better armed than a Wind Singer, but he suspected they had lesser brains. That they were not built for battle so much as survival.

One at a time, they harried the mare, and little by little the horses closed on the patchy brush. It still looked like poor shelter for them, but Sabba trusted his mother knew her business. He believed in her, for she was all he had in the world to place his faith in.

When their objective neared, however, the raptors seemed to catch on. Just when Sabba’s muscles relaxed, when he could see the individual branches of each bush, one of the birds shrieked a new, higher-pitched sound.

“Ready,” Sabba’s dam whispered fiercely. “They mean to attack at once.”

How she knew this, the colt could not have guessed. That she was correct, however, could not be denied. The bird let loose another battle cry, and both dove simultaneously, one toward the mare’s head, and the other, straight for her rump. Sabba wheeled to face his mother’s tail. When she reared again, he mimed the posture, teetering more than she, but remaining on his two hind feet.

The raptor appeared claws first. While its partner dealt with the mare’s front hooves, it reached, greedily for her round rump. Sabba squealed as those weapons made contact, as bright red gouges appeared in his mother’s speckled pelt. The mare barely flinched, but a rage filled her son’s mind. Gripped with a new fury, Sabba struck, churning his legs and landing a glancing blow against the raptor’s wing as it flapped to drag its owner upwards.

His foe screamed at him, and the colt whistled back. A long, enraged trumpet played through Sabba’s nostrils as the bird banked sharply, struggling to regain its poise in flight. He longed to press his attack, to step away from his dam’s side, but instinct or wisdom held him in place.

As the raptor lifted out of sight again, he felt the impact of his mother’s hooves up on the ground. She’d dropped again, and now that the attack had paused, staggered a half step against the pain of her injury.

“You’re hurt.” Sabba’s voice still held a trace of the whistle.

“I’m fine.” The mare’s voice, too, was full of anger. “They’ll need to gather themselves after that, little love. Now is your chance.”

For the space of one heartbeat, Sabba believed she meant for him to attack. They her words solidified. Your chance. His mind paired the words with a patch of brush much to short to shelter a full-grown mare.

“Mother,” he tried.

“Now, Sabba.” Her order was iron and flint, a hard as her hooves. “Run. Run and run and don’t stop.”

“But you—”

“I’ll catch up. Now, run!”

The mare pivoted, using her hip to press him into motion. Sabba could not hesitate in the face of her order, could not argue no matter how his heart seized. She was all he knew, and her words had always led him.

He leapt away, rear hooves biting into the ground as he sprang. Galloping, streaking for the brush as his dam demanded, Sabba fled. His legs settled into a panicked rhythm, his neck stretched long and low, and his velvet nostrils widened, taking in more air, fueling his flight.

He ran, and even when the raptors screamed their next attack, he knew better than to look back.