The lights were closer now. The city, always growing, pushing back the wet earthy countryside. A hundred years ago it had been just a town. Now its newborn towers reached to Heaven and lights shone everywhere, killing all the dark places.

It was time to move again. He slouched across a field under the stars. Stars which humans in their tall glass cities could not see. The grass beneath his feet turned a sickly brown, as it always did. The life energy of the Earth sustained him. Ahead, a small copse of trees. Not large enough to be called a forest.

The humans would come here eventually. Of course they would. But hopefully, not for a few years. Until then the woodlife would nourish him and he could live safely in the wet dark places. It was unpleasant, not like living under a childs bed.

So it came as some surprise when he saw movement amidst the trees. A large group. There were elves here! Was that a banshee too? And there.. one of his kind?

A spectre drifted to him. “It’s getting crowded in here.”