Aldric Starweaver's Arc

Chapter 7 of 10

The bear filled the doorway. Two arrows stuck from its shoulder. Galahad stood between it and the stone table, sword up, but the space was too tight for a knight to swing. The bear swiped. Galahad's blade caught the blow and skidded. He slammed into the wall. The bear pressed in, ribs heaving, mouth red from its last kill. It was starving, and hunger drove it harder than pain. Aldric knew now that no arrow and no sword would turn it back. Galahad's voice came ragged. "I can't hold it alone. It wants meat." He shoved off the wall and struck again. The bear barely flinched. Faelan and Sylvra had backed to the table, arrows nocked, but there was nowhere to send a shot that mattered. Aldric's mind raced. The beast did not care about them. It cared about food. That was the only lever he had. Then he heard it. A low growl from beyond the gate, behind the bear. Shadowpaw. The direwolf had followed them across the valley, and hunger had turned him savage too. Aldric had fed the wolf scraps for a week. Now the wolf's eyes were fixed not on the bear but on the wall creature's carcass outside, half-eaten and steaming. Two starving beasts. One kill between them. Aldric grabbed the empty iron box off the table. He would not use it for this. He set it down and instead snatched Faelan's belt pouch, the one holding the last of their dried meat. "Throw everything through the gate," he said. "Past the bear. Onto the carcass." Faelan did not ask why. He flung the meat over the bear's back. It landed in the open ground, on the wall creature's body. Shadowpaw lunged for it. The bear whipped around at the movement behind it, catching the wolf's scent and the meat both. For one moment the bear stood torn between the people it had cornered and the food behind it. "Push it," Aldric said. "Now. All of you." Galahad roared and drove his shoulder into the bear's flank. Faelan and Sylvra loosed together into its haunch. The bear shrieked and spun toward the open ground, toward Shadowpaw and the fresh kill. It chose the meat. The two beasts collided over the carcass outside, snarling, tearing at the body and at each other. The gate stood clear. "Move," Galahad said. Aldric grabbed his empty box, the grey shard still locked in his fist, and ran. They spilled out through the gate and away, keeping to the wall while the bear and the wolf fought behind them. They did not stop until the keep was small behind them. Aldric opened his hand. The grey shard sat there, safe. He had it. But Shadowpaw was gone, left snarling over a corpse with a starving bear, and Aldric had no way to call him back.