Thyssa felt at peace to be back in Grendel Pack. She was safe, and she was loved, and best of all, she was human. Tsigon and mom were still getting used to the change, but as the novelty slowly wore off, things were calming down. They would accept it, because one of them would have to fold, and Thyssa’s tenacity was infinite. Thyssa would win by being the less reasonable person. (That was how she usually won). Things were pretty good.

And then came the messenger.

Thyssa was perched on the Ogre Queen’s shoulder as a soldier was carried into the room by the long, invisible cords of Vlila, the Shadow’s Embrace.

“We found this one around our territory,” said Vlila. “It surrendered immediately.”

“Then it is smarter than most.” She was using her gentler voice, not for the soldier’s benefit but for Thyssa, who was perched on her shoulder.

“Check if it’s armed,” said Tsigon.

“We did,” said Vlila. “She carried no weapons at all.”

“Then release her, so she may stand before me.”

Vlila obliged, letting the soldier crash to the ground. They stood up, and Thyssa recognized them from the bloodstained crack on her mask, right over their eye. Bloody-eye was back.

Thyssa whispered into the Ogre Queen’s ear. “Stormwatch. That one tried to kill me.”

The Ogre Queen considered this. “I would know why you’ve come.”

“I am Mignon of the Stormwatch, and I come here in peace, representing the Walled Garden.”

“Just kill it,” said Thyssa. “It’s a trick!”

Mignon smiled. “You could kill me, but don’t you want to hear how to get out of the Land of Monsters?”

“I thought we were too dangerous to live anywhere else.”

“As you are, yes. But there is a way to become human. As one of you already knew.” She leered at Thyssa. “Shall I tell them, or do you want to?”

Thyssa scoffed. “I already told them everything. Every horrible thing your people did to me. Everything I was complicit in.”

“Then you surely told them that anyone can use the Benevolent Heart. That any malform in this cave can be just as human as you are, and all they have to do is take it from you?”

Thyssa felt cold. The cavern filled with whispers, and she looked away.

“Oh dear. It looks like you haven’t told them everything.”

The Ogre Queen snorted. “Irrelevant. Your pretty stone is worthless to us.”

Mignon laughed. “Then you won’t mind giving it back?”

“No. You have taken more than enough from us. You can have it if and when my daughter throws it away like the refuse you deserve.”

“Have it your way, then,” said Mignon.

A vicious grin. “I always do. Now run back to your vaunted city and weep to your masters.”

“Very well. I will have to tell them none of you want to be citizens.”

“Then do so before I get hungrier.”

Mignon bowed and turned to leave, slowly walking to the exit.

“Citizens?” asked a creature of molten flesh.

Mignon stopped. “Well, naturally. Whoever brings back the Benevolent Heart will have done humanity a great service. It would only be fair, then, to allow them to use it.”

“With a catch.”

“Under our fiduciary care, of course. But you could use it for the rest of your life, with our blessing. You’ll become human. You can live with us. You can be beautiful and healthy. You can eat delicious food. You can make friends – maybe even lovers! And all you have to do is bring us the Benevolent Heart. And we don’t even care how you do it. Get it with brute force or cunning or, if you want to be terribly civil about it, you can hold a little malform lottery. All we care about is that we get the Heart.”

Thyssa felt the gaze of her Pack. She knew that look – that was the look they had when they saw a juicy bit of meat, but not enough for everyone. She took a deep breath.

“She’s lying!” yelled Thyssa. “They wouldn’t let me keep the Heart, and they won’t let you keep it if you go to them!”

“That may be so,” said a malform advancing on fleshy wheels – Thyssa didn’t know their name yet, they were one of the new blood that joined in her absence. “But why should you keep it?”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Why should anyone keep it?” asked the melty malform. “You heard the message! Anyone can use the Benevolent Heart. As long as any of us have it, there’s a target on our backs!”

“I won’t just give it up,” said Thyssa.

“It’s not your choice to make,” said the wheeled malform, anxiously rolling back and forth. “This concerns us all, so we should all get a vote.”

“Everyone would just vote for themselves,” scoffed Tsigon. If anybody disagreed, they didn’t share it.

“I quite liked the little malform lottery idea,” said Vlila. “It seems as fair as anything else.”

“If luck was on our side, none of us would be here,” said Tsigon.

“You are all weak!” came a deep growl. It came from a malform whose face was mostly teeth – more new blood. “For the first time in your lives, you get a chance to be human, and all you do is bicker about how to decide who ought to get it. You put your own humanity up to a damn committee! The people who deserve the Heart are those who fight for it. Thyssa fought for it, and I’ll fight her for it."

“Then come fight me,” growled Thyssa.

Malforms shouted in agreement, in dissent, in shut the fuck up. Malforms prepared to fight, and other malforms prepared to fight the malform who were preparing to fight. Thyssa’s eyes scanned the crowd, and then she looked back to Mignon.

With her one perfect eye, Mignon looked at what she had done – turned kin against kin, shattered a hard-won peace, sown hatred where there was love. And she looked upon it with pride. She had gotten her revenge, and she savoured it, for the moment before the Ogre Queen picked her up and devoured her.

The cavern grew silent, save for the sickening sound of armour and bone cracking in her terrible teeth. As she chewed, Ogre Queen picked up Thyssa and held her high above her head, far above the discordant crowd, a gesture that gave Thyssa distance from her thunderous voice while daring anyone who wanted her daughter to come take her.

“AT THIS POINT, THE HUMANS EXPECT WE WILL HAVE A VERY EXCITING AND GLORIOUS BATTLE. THEY EXPECT WE WILL KILL EACH OTHER."

The malforms gazed up at their leader.

"THAT IS NOT WHAT WE ARE GOING TO DO. WE ARE GOING TO THINK. THE HUMANS FEAR US. THEY WANT US TO BE WEAK. ASSUME THEIR EVERY WORD IS A TRICK MEANT TO BRING ABOUT OUR RUIN. I HAVE LED YOU FOR MANY YEARS, AND I HAVE MADE YOU STRONG. THE BENEVOLENT HEART WILL MAKE YOU WEAK. FIGHTING EACH OTHER WILL MAKE YOU WEAKER STILL. NONE SHOULD ENVY MY WAYWARD DAUGHTER."

Thyssa looked down, still feeling the gaze of her pack.

"LET HER KEEP THE CURSED THING UNTIL SHE WEANS HERSELF OFF OF IT. SHE DOES NOT NEED IT. NEITHER DO YOU. IN TIME, WE WILL THINK OF HOW TO SURVIVE IN THIS NEW SITUATION. BUT NO MATTER WHAT, OUR BEST CHANCE IS NOT TO FIGHT EACH OTHER.”

“But what about the other packs?” asked the melty creature. “Even if we swear not to fight each other, as long as we have the collar, they will surely go after us.”

“LET THEM. IF THEY HAVE FORGOTTEN OUR SUPERIOR STRENGTH, THIS WILL BE AN EXCELLENT CHANCE TO REMIND THEM. GRENDEL PACK IS STRONG!”

The cavern echoed with shrieks and cheers of pride. “Grendel Pack is strong!” Somehow, the Ogre Queen had kept her pack in line. And, knowing that the might of most of the Land of Monsters would soon be turned against her, Thyssa felt ready to face the fiercest malforms that had ever crawled out of the Muckpool, knowing her mother and her pack were right behind her.

That night, the Ogre Queen laid out her palm, and lifted Thyssa up all the way to the top of her head, where Thyssa stepped down and curled up in her mother’s thick hair.

“I missed this,” she said.

“I missed you, too. When you ran from me, so did my joy.”

“I’m sorry. I’m glad you stood up for me.”

“It was as much for their sake as for yours. See how quickly they fight over the Benevolent Heart. They don’t fight so easily over the meat that keeps us alive. There is something very wrong with that thing.”

“If it’s so bad, why haven’t you gotten rid of it?”

“If I take it by force, you will become embittered. You will curse me and yourself and the world. That is the pain I hoped to heal when I made this pack.” She sighed. “I spent years fostering a place malforms can accept what they are.” She clenched a fist. “And then the humans bring us this.”

“But, with the Heart, I don’t have to just accept being wrong.”

“Exactly. And the pack is thereby undone.”

“Grendel Pack is strong.”

“Yes. You are strong. Strong enough to live and thrive without Lili’ magic.”

“Strong enough to thrive with her magic, no matter how many come to take it from me.”

“It does matter who tries to take it! Cerberus Pack is as strong as us, and Widow Mantis Pack more expendable. War with one would be a bloodbath. War with both would be extinction. Use your head while you still have it!”

“That’s how they control us! Like every tyrant, they makes it sensible for you to give in to theirevery whim. If I give the humans what they want now, after they’ve turned us against each other, they’ll see our weakness. And so will the other packs. They’ll keep on stepping on us again and again. That’s how the pack is undone.”

“There is one way you can defeat them.”

“How?”

“Give up the Benevolent Heart. In front of the whole pack. Cast it aside. Show them that you’ve been human, and it’s not worth fighting over. Give the word, and I’ll wake them up and we can be rid of it right now!”

“I can’t do that.”

“You can! You’re strong enough. And once you’ve done that, you’ve won. Lili won’t have any power over you anymore. You’ll be free, and Grendel Pack will be safe once more. You can save yourself and everyone else, and all you have to do is want to.”

Thyssa sighed. Her mother’s words got under her skin. A weak part of her wanted to heed her mother’s advice and go back to being her favourite little monster – everything back to normal. Then a cold part of her remembered going to take water and seeing her own reflection, too disgusting to look away from.

“But…being a girl is worth fighting over. I’d be sacrificing everything just to lie to my pack.”

“Even if it’s a lie for you right now, it’s a lie that will make the world a better place.”

“Would it? If I pretend to be happy being a malform and I’m not…what about the others who aren’t happy? If they’re fooled, they’ll think they’re wrong for not being happy with themselves. They’ll feel like monsters among monsters. Is it their responsibility to lie, too?”

“Thyssa. Is it really the pack you’re concerned about here? Or are you just scared to change back, and scared to admit that?”

Thyssa blinked back tears. “I…I don’t know. Is it so wrong to be scared? It’s not my fault Lili did this. The only reason people want to fight is because they want it too. Why can’t we tell them to give it up? It’s not like any of this was fair!”

She sighed. “I can’t imagine it’s easy. Giving up something like that. Still. I have faith you’ll make the right decision. When you’re ready. For now, let’s get some sleep.”