Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 329 of 619

The three carcasses rode home strapped across spare horses. Ajax pushed the party through the night and reached Black Oak by dawn. He led the horses into the yard and called for the men who knew how to turn dead beasts into silver. The vault was empty of stock. Ships would come at thaw. What he could make from these three hides would carry his house until then. Aldric came out first, tunic already dusted with chalk from his morning ledger. He walked the length of the largest carcass and stopped at the head. "This one is older than the others," he said. He pressed a thumb to a scar in the gray hide. "Bound once. The hide thickened where the binding held it. Look here." He turned to Ajax. "That thickness is worth more than the beast itself. No healer's coat wears through it." Tarron knelt at the belly and ran his hands along the flank. He had shepherded before he ever wove, and he read a hide the way Rowan read a track. "Clean pelt," he said. "Two long coats from the big one. Boots and gloves from the smaller. The third gives me trim." He looked up. "Good work is slow work. Give me six days." Rowan set his bow against the wall and drew his skinning knife. He said nothing. He simply started the first cut, quick and straight, the way the dryads had taught him. Tarron nodded once and joined him. Two men who spoke little did the most. Chalam opened the throats and pressed his fingers into the glands. He drew out three vials of the sound-muffling oil, the kind merchants paid silver to carry. "Full," he said. "No harm in the beasts. The binding did not spoil them." He capped the vials and set them apart from the rest. Tucker leaned in the doorway, chains catching the low sun. He watched the work with a trader's eye. "The big hide," he said. "Don't cut it into coats yet. A master saw one like it once and never forgot. Show it whole first. Let him name a price before you shape it." He looked at Ajax. "Whole, it's a story. Cut, it's just goods." Ajax weighed it. Tarron wanted the hide for coats. Tucker wanted it shown whole to a buyer. Both were right in their own trade. He decided. "The two smaller hides go to Tarron for coats and boots," Ajax said. "The big one stays whole in the vault. Tucker shows it to the first master who docks. If no one meets its worth by the second ship, Tarron cuts it." Tucker grinned. Tarron shrugged and went back to his cut. Ajax stood over the work. Three beasts became coats, oil, and one hide worth a fortune. His stock was full again. But the whole hide was a gamble now, and the first ship would decide whether it paid.