Cautiously, it extended a thread of awareness, gently probing through the forest, remaining as tiny and inconspicuous as possible so as not to alarm its guardians.

It slipped along the slime trail of a glistening slug for a short distance. It hid beneath rocks, and tunneled in the damp underground as a blind mole.

Warm blood gushed through the mole’s body, pumped by its heart in a rhythmic throb the sentience found oddly comforting and familiar. The mole burrowed deeper, using its powerful shoulders and spadelike front feet to shovel aside soil.

It stopped abruptly, and twitched its nose. The sentience felt its hunger, and with unthinking instinct, it gnashed at something soft, damp, and wriggly.

Repulsed, the sentience expelled itself from the mole and traced its way back through the tunnel.

The mole had a body, but it was a dim, stupid creature that relied on instinct.

This did not seem correct either. The air could not be trapped this way, trapped behind walls and barriers.

The sentience resurfaced to the world above as moisture sucked from the ground by the roots of a limp, dark fern. It joined with an insect, which sped away on buzzing wings. Through multifaceted eyes, it spotted a young avian tearing into the carcass of some unfortunate prey animal, gulping down flesh to bulge out its sinuous, scaled neck.

The insect alighted on the avian to feed on its blood, giving the the sentience an opportunity to transfer itself to a new host. The avian flapped its wings in agitation at the intrusion, but the sentience stayed quiet, sensing the creature’s hunger and lust for blood, feeling the warmth of its prey easing down its gullet and into its gnawing stomach.

The avian was merely base instinct, aware of nothing but its own needs, a vicious creature on all counts, its very heart dark. The sentience decided to seize control of it.

The avian struggled mightily, waving its head back and forth and squawking in protest, but it did not take long for the sentience to overcome its small mind.

Through the eyes of the avian, the world of the sentience’s confinement sharpened—the contrast of dark tree shadows and gray mist, logs decaying into duff, insects hovering in the dim light, the fuzz of mosses carpeting the ground. Something slurped into a black pool, piquing the avian’s interest, and registering “prey” in its mind.

The sentience stilled the avian’s predatory excitement, and again sent out a pinpoint of awareness through the forest. The guardians had not yet noted its wakefulness. Something else had taken their attention; they strained to reach out to the other side of the wall.

Intrigued by their preoccupation, the sentience, too, wished to see the other side of the wall.

It released a measure of control over the avian so it could fly. The avian stretched its wings, flapped, and spiraled upward through the trees, deftly missing entwined branches, and surged above the canopy. Thick mist enclosed the forest below, except for the spires of tree tops poking through. Even above the forest, the mist was still thick, banishing the sun to a murky white disk.

The sentience forced the avian unwaveringly northward, toward the wall, seeking the place where it had once detected weakness.

It wasn’t long before the layers of mist peeled away, revealing the wall directly ahead. The avian wheeled away, barely in time to avoid a collision. The sentience reined the creature into a glide, the wall swirling past its wingtip.

A brightness shone where there should have been wall, signaling the place of weakness. The sentience forced the avian to land on the broken wall, talons scrabbling on stone as it backwinged. The avian extended its serpentine neck, and with a blink, peered to the other side.

The sunlight, so unfamiliar to the creature, was too bright. It dropped nictitating membranes over its eyes to protect them.

A myriad of structures billowing in the wind filled the world below, and moving among them were many creatures.

Men, came the unbidden memory.

They were scattered everywhere, these men, milling, moving, thriving. There was a power here, too. A power reminiscent of that which entrapped the sentience. Somewhere among these men, there was one who could speak with the guardians, one who could fix the weakness in the wall. One who could seal off the sentience’s prison forever.

Hunger roiled in the avian’s belly, and its gaze settled on the back of one who walked away from the wall.

The guardians chose that moment to become alert to the sentience’s wakefulness. Alarm buzzed through the wall and beneath the avian’s talons. Startled, the avian flapped its wings and launched into the air.

Come back to us, ancient one, the voices called.

Overcome, the sentience lost control of the avian. The creature angled its wings for maximum speed and soared toward the man’s back, talons extended.

Men pointed and shouted. The man turned, eyes wide as it took in the avian arrowing in on him. He dropped on the ground just in time to evade talons.

The guardians screamed at the sentience, or maybe it was the wind screaming past the ears of the avian. The sentience could make no sense of it. The billowing structures—tents—were but blurs below. Men scattered in all directions, yelling and running in confusion.

Fear radiating from so much available prey aroused the avian’s predatory hunger to a new height. It turned on a wingtip, screaming for blood, bearing down again on the man, but this time he held a shiny object.

The sentience wanted to avert the avian’s mad flight, but the guardians distracted it with their songs of peace and contentment, and promises of tranquil slumbering. All it had to do was return; return to the other side of the wall and end the struggle. Just rest. Rest and sleep . . .

The avian circled above the man, flicking its forked tongue, before stooping into a dive.

The man did not cower but slashed with his blade, cutting the avian above its talon.

PAIN! RAGE! REVENGE!

Maddened, the creature surged upward with great wing-strokes to gain altitude for another diving attack. A projectile whizzed by its head.

Stupid creature, the sentience thought, fighting the grogginess brought on by the guardians. With a mighty effort, it again exerted its will into the avian’s mind.

Survival, it urged the avian, fearing for its own survival should the avian be killed. Seek safety.

The avian tossed its head and screeched in angry resistance, and pursued prey.

This time it hunted for one without defense. Men scattered as it skimmed above their heads, and it lunged upon one who could not run fast enough. The man—no, woman—loosed a bloodcurdling scream as talons sank into her shoulders.

HUNGER!

The avian attempted to carry the woman away, but its wings had not the strength. It dropped her, and landed atop her back, spreading its wings over her to protect its prey from interlopers, screeching threats at the men who rushed toward it with shining, sharp weapons.

Survival! the sentience screamed in the avian’s mind, but the scent of warm blood overcame all else. It reared its head back, ready to lunge its raptor’s beak into the whimpering prey beneath it for the kill.

Fly! Survival! Panic allowed the sentience to exert the whole of its will upon the avian.

SURVIVAL—FOOD!

The men had projectile weapons among them, but the sentience comprehended their fear of using them lest they inadvertently kill the woman. They feared the avian, too. The sentience encouraged the avian in a fierce display to keep the men off.

The man the avian had attacked initially advanced with grim resolve. He wore green, and this sparked some memory of hatred.

The avian recognized him, too, saw its own black blood on his blade, and remembered pain. It launched from the woman.

Yes, survival, the sentience crooned. Safety.

The avian started winging toward the gap in the wall.

And now the guardians welcomed the sentience’s return in song, Come back to us, ancient one, come sleep in peace. . .

A volley of arrows hissed past the avian, arcing over the wall. The avian swung its head around to screech at the men below.

Safety, the sentience urged. Seek safety.

Just as the avian glided through the gap in the wall, there came another flight of arrows. A barbed head drove into the avian’s side, tearing muscle and tendon, crushing bone, piercing lung.

The avian careened into the mist of the forest and plummeted, trees coming at it in a mad rush. It crashed through branches. Wing bones snapped. It hit one bough, and tumbled to another, until finally it fell into a heap on the ground.

There it lay with neck limp, and wings splayed and rumpled. Nictitating eyelids peeled back, and the avian drew one last rattling breath.

The sentience flowed from the avian in its blood, soaking into the moss beneath. Exhausted by its striv ings with both the avian and the guardians, it let itself be drawn into sleep with one final lingering thought: What am I?