'Asara! More of them!' Kaiku cried, and there they were, two of the creatures, hiding in the shadowy archways of the entrance hall. Asara clutched her mistress's wrist and they froze. Kaiku's hand was on the door, but she dared not tear it open and run, for the creatures would cut her down before she had gone ten metres. The raw, choking fear that had attended her ever since her eyes had opened tonight began to claw its way up her throat. She was blank with panic, disorientated, caught in a waking nightmare.
Slowly the shin-shin came into the hall, ducking their torsos beneath the archways as they angled their long, tapered limbs with insectile grace. They were the more terrible because Kaiku's gaze refused to fix on them properly, allowing only hints of their form; only the glitter of their eyes was solid and visible. She was conscious of Asara reaching for something: a lantern, dormant and unlit on a window-ledge. The demons crept closer, keeping to the deepest darknesses.
'Be ready,' Asara whispered; and a moment later, she threw the lantern into the centre of the room. The shin-shin whirled at the sound, and in that instant Asara brought up her rifle and fired it into the slick of lantern oil on the floor.
The room was suddenly bright, a roaring sheet of flame, and the demons shrieked in their unearthly tongue and scattered clumsily away from the brilliance. But Kaiku was already through the door
and out into the storm, racing barefoot across the grass towards the trees that surrounded the house. Asara came close behind, leaving the fire to lick at the wooden walls and paper screens. They rushed through the rain, cringing at the great screeches coming from the sky. Not daring to look back, not knowing if Asara was following or not, Kaiku plunged into the forest.