Sadrahan’s first task after that was to prepare a place for his daughter to lie in safety. ‘I’ve never tried this on stone before.’ He contemplated that and approached an outcropping of level rock close to the water. ‘This will do.’ He told himself, running his hand along the hard granite surface, it had a natural dip in it already, a drop of water fell from above, and a small puddle resounded the steady dripping of the timeless thing. ‘How long did it take for drops to cut this? Centuries? Longer?’ He wondered and looked around again in even greater awe as he realized how ancient the ‘room’ in which he now stood must have been. “Like being brought to the dawn of time…” He whispered out in reverence for the aged rock.

He then activated his skill, [Cutting Claw] and began to sweep his free hand down against the stone again and again, and as if the act of striking itself brought out his buried emotions, he began to rage against the rock as if it were responsible for the death of his mate. “No one will take you! No one will hurt you! If I ever see them again, I’ll kill them all! Kill them all!” he roared his rage and the stone gave it back to him in turn as he slashed and cut and slashed and cut against the timeless rock, his claws began to crack despite their headway, and when one snapped he simply focused his use on another. Bloody tears pooled in his eyes as he dreamt of human flesh beneath his claws and not dead stone that he could never avenge his loss upon.

His body shook with vented rage, he didn’t notice when his finger broke carving out the cradle for his daughter, nor the second break, nor the third. His claws gouged onward, scattering rocks aside to splash into water or clatter off the walls of the wide cave to skitter away out of sight and out of mind.

Then it was done, and Sadrahan felt the pain in his fingers. A dull, steady throbbing, he wiped away the bloody tears blinding his eyes and took a look at what he’d done to himself. “It will heal.” He muttered when he looked at the bent shapes of the first three fingers.

Lamashi wiggled only a little when he laid her into place, confirming that he’d built an adequate crib of stone. The slope was ideal, but he quickly realized that the steady drip would prove a problem. ‘Can’t have that, I’ll need to dam it up…’ Then the memory came back to him of one of Midas’s stories. ‘Right, the village tried to dam a river like beavers, but better… the water backed up, then broke it… washed away several children… no, I’ll just divert it.’

Thus his work went on. Using the bones of the dead goat he created a canopy over his daughter’s sleeping place, using the ribcage to bridge the two sides to cover her and then draping the fur over the top. The water would drip down onto the fur, but then follow the path away and drip down onto the stone floor.

“Well, Lamashi, I’m done with that.” He choked back his emotions, biting his lips and stroking her cheek with the back of one claw while she wiggled where she lay. “Now I have to set about making this work… better. What was her phrase?” He tried to recall it…

“Good enough, isn’t.” He nodded, “That’s what she said, and… it finally makes sense to me.” Sadrahan watched his daughter wiggle and grasp for his forefinger’s claw. “I’ll make it better. I promise, the danger is at an end.” He said, and cracked his bent fingers straight, then set out to keep his promise.

And in that end, there came a new beginning. A routine for Sadrahan which he held to for several days without distinction.

His fingers were bound together by strips of cut goatskin and splinted against goat bones, leaving only one hand for use, but it proved more than enough as he explored the mountain range.

Each morning he would rise, feed his daughter a mix of goat blood and water, settle her into place until she fell asleep, then venture out of the deep cave to fly around the mountain and learn its patterns, find other caves, search for danger, food, or other valuable resources he could make use of. Gathering what he could, he would return to his daughter, feed her again, store whatever he’d found such as wood, animal bones, fruits, vegetables, in a shallow segment of cavern near his ‘home’, and tend to her again before taking his rest.

Little by little, Sadrahan settled in, and for weeks, nothing changed.

Until it did.

“What the…?” Sadrahan asked himself when he saw from high in the sky what could only have been a demon walking the long empty path. ‘Why is he walking?’ Sadrahan wondered, the demon on the ground was clearly an adult, almost Sadrahan’s height, male, but he was frail looking, weak, and leaning on a thick walking stick while his other arm hung limp at his side, seemingly useless, given how it swayed back and forth.

The stranger also hadn’t seen Sadrahan. ‘Leave him. He’s a stranger.’ The voice in the back of his mind reminded him. ‘He might be dangerous.’ The voice of caution warned Sadrahan again.

‘No. That is the opposite of dangerous.’ He retorted to himself as he watched the frail figure struggle to remain upright for one more step.

The debate ended when the walker wavered, his head tilted back, and he fell forward onto the ground with his arm stretched out and his staff rolling quietly away until it came to a gentle stop at the bottom of a small slope in the grass.

Sadrahan straightened up, staring down at the limp body below, it remained unmoving, as if dead. ‘Who knows where he came from… maybe he can give me some news… and he’s in no shape to be a threat…’ That settled it, ‘Ignorance of what was coming, cost us the village, wherever he’s coming from, he went through something, what if that something comes this way and I’m not ready for it?’ He shook his head, denying the future the reality he could not abide, and slowly descended to the grass where the limp figure lay.

The demon who sprawled unconscious at Sadrahan’s feet looked even worse up close. He was thin, very thin. The limp arm was obviously broken internally, two fingers were gone, one horn was broken, and the reason he walked rather than flew was immediately evident. The folds where the wings would have emerged were scarred over. ‘Someone cut off his wings…’ A chill went up and down Sadrahan’s spine. If there were any lingering doubts about what to do, those were gone.

“Come on, let’s get you out of here.” Sadrahan said and crouching down, he pulled the demon up onto his back as best he could and launched himself into the air again. It was a slow, ponderous flight, the air blew cold wind into their faces, and whether he intended to or not, he jostled the limp body around on his back a great deal.

Still, neither movement nor sun nor icy wind disturbed the unconscious form on Sadrahan’s back, and the demon farmer brought the stranger into the mountain stronghold, carrying him all the way to the deep mountain lake.

When he had the stranger laid out on the stone shore, Sadrahan retrieved a crude skin full of goat’s blood and after tilting the demon’s head back, he poured a trickle into the unconscious figure’s mouth. He then rubbed his finger back and forth along the demon’s gullet to force him to swallow, and repeated the process until the skin was empty and he cast it aside to land with a splash at the edge of the shore. He then stood up and heard his Lamashi start to cry, her little voice made louder with the great echo of the cavern.

“There, live or die, stranger, I gave you a chance.” Sadrahan said and went to pick his daughter up from her crib of stone to wait and see whether the stranger would move again or sleep forever.