Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 451 of 619

Ten days after Marcus drew the boat, the small craft sat finished on the dock. Ajax walked the length of it at dusk. Flat bottom, low sides, two oars lashed inside. Marcus stood beside it with his arms crossed. "Built to beach," he said. "Ship stays at anchor. This lands soft." Ajax ran his hand along the hull. It held. The workhouse had filled its stores while the boat was built. Scent oil in sealed jars. Salt for hides. Rope, spears, dried meat for three days on the shore. Every crate the hunters would need sat ready by the sea gate. Rowan crouched at the boat's stern, testing the oarlocks with his thumb. He said nothing until Ajax looked at him. "Rows true," Rowan said. "I checked the balance twice. Two men can hold it in surf." He stood. "I'll take the two you gave me. We land at first calm." Chalam came down the canal steps with his satchel on his belt. He set a small jar of grove oil in the boat. "Enough to mask three men for a day," he said. "The beasts hunt by sound and heat. Stay low and they won't find you." He looked at the open water beyond the gate. "But I can't reach you out there. No staff will read that far. Once you land, you're on your own ground." Kael arrived last, in leather armor, a knife already at his belt. Ajax had chosen him as the second man. Kael studied the boat, the surf, the dark coast south. "Small," he said of the boat. Then, flatter: "It'll do." Ajax looked at the three of them. Rowan who could track any ground. Chalam who could hide them. Kael who kept fighting when a blade broke. He had turned his reckless hope into this crew and this boat. "You leave at dawn," he said. "The ship takes you south a day to the rocky water Marcus marked. You anchor. You row in. Rowan tracks, Chalam masks, Kael guards. One day on the shore, no more. Then you row back and the ship sails you home." Rowan nodded once. Kael touched his knife. Chalam closed his satchel. Marcus set his shoulder against the boat and shoved it half into the water to prove it floated. It rode high and clean. He pulled it back and tied it fast. "Ready," he said. Ajax stood at the gate as the light fell. The boat was built. The stores were loaded. The team was named. At dawn they would open a coast no chart showed and hunt beasts no other port could offer. He had spent months arguing himself out of the wreck he first wanted. Now the safe version sat ready under his hand, and his brotherhood would eat from a new shore. "At first light," Ajax said. The men went to sleep. The boat waited on the dock.