Chapter 43 Two Problems With Horns

The first ramshield spat out the broken shield.

It struck the pit wall beside Jin's head.

He stopped thinking of the creature as a large pig.

Its stone frill ran from the ridge between its eyes to the shoulders. Two horns curved forward beneath it. When it lowered its head, almost everything vulnerable disappeared behind that slab.

The second beast pushed through the gate, scraping stone from both sides.

“Separate them!” Dessa shouted.

Kessa's first arrow struck a foreleg. The ramshield turned toward her.

Jin waved at the other one.

“Breakfast!” someone above the pit screamed.

“Not helping!”

The beast charged.

Jin flung himself behind the low central wall. Horns struck the stone with a crack that drove grit into his teeth.

The wall moved.

He scrambled sideways as a whole section folded inward behind him.

From the neighboring pit came a roar of approval. Lark's team had already turned its first beast against a corner, a netman holding its head while a hunter with a short club worked at its rear leg.

No one was waiting for the famous fish barber to demonstrate.

Kessa had climbed the sloping end of the wall. Her second shot struck behind her beast's frill. It jerked toward the sting, giving her room to move.

Then it stamped.

Clay broke away beneath her boot. She jumped to the pit floor before the slope collapsed.

The ramshield followed her down.

Dessa took one step toward her.

“Mine's coming around!” Jin shouted.

She stopped, torn between the two.

Kessa waved her back without looking up.

“Keep him alive. I can move.”

She put another arrow into the pursuing beast's flank and made it chase her along the outer wall.

Jin got his feet under him.

His ramshield hauled its horns free and swung around.

He caught a glimpse beneath the frill: wet skin, a fold at the throat, then stone again.

“Under the neck!”

Dessa was circling toward it with her cleaver.

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“I know! Keep it looking at you!”

Jin considered asking whether anyone else had a less personal plan.

The beast answered by coming through the broken wall.

He ran.

Five strides along the firmer edge of the pit, turning past a waist-high post. He put his weight through the last step before recording the route.

The horns missed his hip by less than a hand.

He could have kept running. He almost did.

Then he saw where Dessa was standing.

Jin doubled back toward the route's first mark.

The ramshield followed, plowing a deep furrow through the soft center.

Its head couldn't turn far without bringing its shoulders around. Each time Jin changed sides, the whole front of the creature swung after him.

He stopped at the mark.

“Come on.”

It came.

Jin activated Braced Waypoint.

His feet carried him along the curve past the post. The beast tried to take the shorter line straight through it.

Wood burst against the stone frill.

Jin reached the end, planted his foot and drove a fist into the edge of the lowered head.

Pain rang up his arm.

The frill shifted an inch.

An inch was enough.

Dessa's cleaver struck the throat fold from the other side.

Red heat ran along the iron. The creature jerked toward her, exposing the wound beneath the tilted slab.

Jin pulled his bent knife.

He went in low, one shoulder nearly scraping the dirt, and drove the point behind the jaw.

The ramshield threw its head up.

His knife hand went with it.

He couldn't hold that weight overhead. He let his knees bend, kept the blade buried and turned with the movement instead of letting it wrench his arm straight.

Blood spilled over his wrist.

Dessa struck again.

The beast's forelegs folded.

Jin pulled the knife free and fell back as the frill struck the ground.

A pale sweep crossed its body.

Stone, flesh and horns dissolved together. The broken shield it had carried clattered onto the bare dirt.

He put four into Strength, three into Agility and three into Endurance.

His thighs tightened beneath him. He stood more quickly than he'd meant to and almost stepped onto the dropped shield.

Dessa caught his collar.

“Still need to look down.”

Jin opened his mouth.

Kessa shouted.

The second ramshield had driven her toward the unbroken side of the central wall. An arrow stood in its flank; another shaft lay snapped beneath its hooves.

She fired at the eye.

The head tilted. The arrow broke against the frill.

Kessa moved sideways, reaching for another.

One horn caught the lower limb of her bow.

She let go at once.

The creature lifted its head. Wood struck stone.

There was a small, unmistakable snap.

Kessa stopped reaching for the arrow.

The bow twisted between horn and frill. Its string recoiled across the pit. A broken limb spun away and struck the wall beside Jin.

For half a second he saw only Kessa's hands.

Still held apart where the bow should have been.

Then the ramshield lowered its head toward her.

Jin ran.

She was on the other side of the pit. He took the shortest line.

Kessa drew the steel knife from her belt.

Dessa shouted for her to get behind the wall.

Kessa shook her head.

“The wall's what it wants,” she said.

The beast drove forward.