Chapter 65 Encore

The bell-eater stood.

Jin stopped bowing.

Its palms struck together.

He dropped behind the overturned tub. Sound slammed into iron and drove it sideways, scraping a bright scar through the stone.

His ears rang.

Across the pit, Lark reached the first stair. Kessa caught his sleeve and pulled him up beside her.

One.

Jin came around the tub, waving both arms.

“Excellent. A very supportive household.”

The creature swung toward him.

He hit the iron twice with his stone, then raised it above his head as though showing the audience a prize.

The throat ridges swelled.

He saw the arrow in its chest lift away from the fur. For an instant, a narrow seam opened beneath the lowest ridge.

Then the second clap hit.

Jin threw himself behind the cutting block's broken base. Grit scoured his neck. Something heavy struck the stone and bounced over his head.

Two.

“The chest!” he shouted. “Under the round plates. When it breathes in!”

Kessa leaned out from the stairs.

He pointed once, then jumped clear as the bell-eater brought a fist down on his cover.

The cutting block split.

His old start mark disappeared under falling stone.

No route out.

Jin ran on ordinary feet.

The creature followed him toward the tub, shoulders rolling, yellow teeth wet. He could hear each breath dragging through the chambers in its neck.

He turned before reaching the iron and faced it.

“One more?”

He slapped his palms together twice.

The bell-eater rose, answering the movement with its own.

Jin dived sideways as the hands met.

The third blast caught his legs and spun him across the stone. He hit hard, rolled and stopped against the tub's curved end.

He couldn't spare his eyes for the choices.

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The bell-eater was coming down onto its knuckles.

Kessa's third arrow struck beneath the lifted chest ridge.

The point vanished to the fletching.

Air screamed out around the shaft.

The creature lurched toward the stairs. Lark came down three steps and cut the outside of its wrist before the fingers could reach Kessa.

The hand folded.

Its weight fell across the forearm. Bone cracked beneath fur.

Jin hauled himself onto the tub.

Kessa caught his eye from the stairs and lifted one finger, then pointed at the arrow she'd buried. He nodded. The opening was still there, leaking air with every breath.

He drew the knife again.

Lark moved along the wall below her, putting himself on the creature's injured side. When its eyes followed him, Jin got a foot onto the tub's rim.

His legs shook. His back was a single furious complaint.

The creature turned toward him, dragging its injured arm.

He jumped.

His left foot hit its good shoulder. He caught the ridge above Kessa's arrow with his free hand and drove his knife into the open seam beside the shaft.

Steel sank through the stretched membrane.

The ridge pulsed against his palm.

He ripped downward.

A wet detonation threw him clear.

He saw the wall coming and couldn't turn fast enough.

Rusk hit him from the side.

They crashed down together, the hunter's shoulder taking the stone first. The broken shield skidded away.

Jin tried to get up.

Rusk shoved him down again.

A fist struck the slope above them.

The bell-eater was still alive.

It rose on the ruined arm, chest sagging where Jin had cut it open, and brought its hands together over their heads.

The clap sounded like two butcher's blocks colliding.

No blast came.

Lark's sword entered beneath the bare jaw.

He drove it up with both hands.

Kessa loosed from the stairs. The fourth arrow struck the creature's open mouth as its head lifted away from the blade.

It staggered once.

Rusk pulled Jin backward by his collar.

The bell-eater fell where they'd been lying.

Its good hand opened beside Jin's shoe, fingers wider than his ankle.

Light began spreading through the fur.

Jin lay still long enough to read it twice.

Then he laughed.

It hurt.

He kept doing it until Rusk asked whether the thing had broken his head.

“Improved it,” Jin managed.

Kessa came down the stairs and kicked his shoe.

Not hard.

“Encore?”

He lifted a hand in surrender.

“Retired.”

Lark sat on the tub's edge, wooden sword across his knees. His hand shook when he wiped the blood out of his eye.

“Good audience,” he said.

“Difficult acoustics.”

Nobody laughed immediately.

Then Kessa did, a little helplessly, and Rusk started swearing at all three of them while checking his crew.

Jin sat up. Rusk's shoulder hung lower than before. Rusk let Kessa help him toward the ramp.

Jin spent the twenty: eight Strength, seven Agility, five Endurance.

His fingers tightened. He tested his grip and stood slowly. The bruises still hurt. The ground stayed where it belonged.

Beside the vanished creature, something dark remained on the stone.

A narrow iron band, too large for a man's waist. The broken fastening lay open beside it.

Jin picked it up.

Two worn leather straps were riveted inside. On the outer face, shallow letters had been cut in neat rows.

“Lark?”

The swordsman took it, turned it toward the lantern and stopped smiling.

“This was a collar.”

“For that?”

Lark nodded.

“And there's a number under the maker's mark.”

“What number?”

“Two.”