Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 586 of 619

The seer came to Ajax at first light, her eyes still fogged from scrying. She had bound herself to his house days ago, her chain warm at her throat. "I have found the next weak door," she said. "North and east of here, past the ridge. Two days by horse. Less by moon." She drew a line in the dirt with her finger. "It leaks already. The soil there is sick." Ajax knelt beside the mark. "How long before it breaks." "Days. Not hours. But not many days." Elara flexed her hand. Light answered, full and quick. "Then I go ahead," she said. "Tonight, under the moon. I survey it before you arrive. I hold the corruption back if it spreads." Ajax looked at her. The old fear rose in him, the sight of her slumped against a slab with nothing left. But her band glowed deep now. "You don't drain yourself doing it," he said. It was not a question. "I won't need to. Holding a leak is nothing to me now." She met his eyes without flinching. "Send the crew by horse. I'll be there when you come." That night the moon rose clear. Elara stood in the open, raised her palm, and the light took her. She was gone between one breath and the next. Ajax rode at dawn with Rowan, Kael, Torren, and Chalam. Rowan led, reading the ground. "Deer went around this ridge," he said, pointing at churned earth. "Nothing crosses toward the door. They know." Kael rode with his hand near his knife. "How far." "Half a day yet," Rowan said. He did not soften it. They pushed through noon and past it. By late afternoon the smell reached them, rot where no rot should be. Chalam lifted his staff and held it steady. "The binding is failing," he said. "But it holds. Something holds it." They crested the last rise and saw her. Elara stood before a cracked stone seam, both hands raised. White light spilled from her palms and pressed into the seam like a wall. The dark leak strained against it and did not spread. She had held it a full day and did not shake. "You made it," she called, not turning. "The rot stopped at my line. It's yours to close now." Ajax swung down and drew his father's blade. Torren and Kael took the flanks. Chalam knelt at the seam with lodestone dust ready. "It works," Ajax said. He looked at Elara, steady and whole, light still pouring from her. "You reached it two days before we could. And you're not spent." "No," she said. "Now show me the map after this. There are more." Ajax pressed his hand to the cold stone. The old way of chasing doors was finished. Now they would beat every failing seal to it. He set the blade and gave Chalam the nod.