Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 535 of 619

At first light the crew rowed to the sand. The bay was still. Rowan led them up the river channel to the far bank where the four-toed tracks ran fresh. Two beasts, he had said. A pair. Ajax carried his father's blade. Kael carried a knife in each hand. Chalam kept his staff close and the scent oil on his skin. Rowan crouched at a bend in the river where the water ran shallow. He touched the wet prints. "They drink here. Both of them. They come at the low water." He pointed at a stand of trees above the bank. "We wait there. Wind comes off the sea into our faces. They will not smell us." He set an arrow to his string and climbed into the branches without a sound. Chalam knelt behind a boulder. He held the staff flat across his knees. "Ground is soft here," he said. "When the second beast comes, I root its legs. You will have three breaths, no more. Do not waste them." He did not soften it. Ajax nodded and set his back to the boulder beside him. The first beast came down the channel with the sun. Gray fur, tall at the shoulder, long snout swinging as it walked. It stopped at the water and lowered its head to drink. Rowan's arrow took it through the throat. The beast reared. Ajax broke from the boulder and drove his father's blade up into its open mouth. It dropped in the shallows and did not rise. The second beast burst from the trees behind them. Kael turned before Ajax heard it. "On me," Kael said, flat, and stepped into its path. Chalam struck the ground with his staff. Roots snapped up and gripped the beast's hind legs. It lurched, held. Kael slid under the swing and drove both knives deep behind its foreleg. Rowan's second arrow found its throat. Ajax finished it in the mouth. The beast fell against the bank. The bay went quiet again. Two beasts down. No man cut. Rowan dropped from the tree and knelt over the larger carcass. He pressed the gray hide between his fingers. "Thick," he said. "Thicker than the southern kind. This one is worth two of them." Ajax stood over the kill in the shallow water. The southern grounds were spent. This bay was full, and no hunter had ever touched it. The gamble on empty rock had paid. "Skin them here," Ajax said. "Load them by dark. Chalam, mark this bay for the Council. We come back for the whole ground." He wiped his father's blade clean on the sand. "Send word to Marcus. Tell him the holds fill again. The house eats through the thaw and past it."