Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 410 of 619

The ground split. Dirt heaved up between the trees, and the creature came with it. It was pale and long, twice the width of any beast Ajax had hunted. Roots hung from its jaws. It rose head-first, blind, tasting the air for heat and sound. Ajax stood his ground with his father's blade raised. Rowan drew his bow beside him, an arrow already nocked. "Now," Ajax said. Elara pulled back her sleeve and thrust her wrist forward. The gold band flared. White light burst from it, sharp as noon, straight into the creature's eyes. The beast reared and screamed. Its head froze in place, held by the light, jaws gaping. "I have it," Elara said. Her voice strained. Sweat ran down her face. "Not long. Strike." Chalam struck the soil with his oiled staff. "It thrashes underground still," he said, flat and quick. "The tail. Watch the tail." He did not look up from the ground. The staff held. No crack, no split. His reading stayed true. Rowan loosed. His arrow drove into the soft flesh below the jaw, above the throat. The beast jerked but could not turn its blinded head. "Neck's slowed," Rowan said. "Mouth's open. Go." Ajax ran three steps and drove his father's iron blade up through the open mouth. He felt it bite past the soft palate into whatever held the thing alive. The creature convulsed. Its tail whipped from the ground behind them and caught a young oak, snapping it clean. But the light held its head, and the iron held its throat, and Ajax pushed the blade deeper until the great body went slack. It dropped. The ground shook once, then stilled. Elara let her arm fall. The band on her wrist had gone dull and gray, spent to nothing. She sat down hard in the dirt, pale but whole. "It's out," she said. "All of it. But it worked." Chalam lifted his staff from the soil. He turned it in his hands and checked the grain. "It held," he said. He sounded almost surprised. "The oil held. I read it clean through the fight. Nothing underground now. It's dead." Rowan walked to the carcass and set a hand on the pale hide. He pressed, then pulled his knife and tested a scale near the shoulder. "Thick," he said. "Thicker than the root-beasts. This hide's worth more than the beast that grew it." Ajax pulled his blade free and wiped it on the dirt. His men had done exactly as he set them. The staff had not failed. The band had not failed. The grove line held. He looked north, past the fallen tree, into the quiet woods. The creature had come from there, driven south by something worse. He knew that now. But the thing at his feet was dead, and his walls still stood, and he had a hide to fill a ship's hold. "Take the hide, teeth, and bones with us," Ajax said. "We'll learn what sent it after."