The arrow flew true, cutting through the dim air in a shallow arc. It struck the back of Snargrin's skull with a metallic *thunk* and the sharp crack of splintering wood. The shaft *exploded*, scattering fragments across Snargrin's back and tangling in his wire-like fur.

  It would have been a kill shot on anything normal. It would have been a kill shot—*if it had been a bullet fired from a rifle instead of an arrow from a bow.*

  A beat passed. Then Snargrin's head snapped toward the sky. The roar that burst from his throat was pure rage—so deep and violent it shook the forest itself. Birds exploded from the canopy. Small animals fled in every direction.

  He moved the instant the arrow hit, not waiting to see the result.

  Edric didn't let the shock freeze him. Panic clawed at the edges of his mind at the sick realization that the monster might be unkillable with his current weapon.

  His pre-planned escape route dropped him down the far side of the rise, the terrain breaking the line of sight.

  Snargrin spun toward the shot's origin. Edric heard the thunder of massive paws charging up the slope.

  But he was already gone—twenty yards away and still moving, using dense thickets for cover. He changed direction twice, never running in a straight line, always keeping obstacles between himself and the spot he'd fired from.

  Behind him came another roar, this one edged with frustration as Snargrin reached the abandoned position and found only emptiness.

  Edric slid in behind a cluster of boulders roughly sixty yards from where he'd started. He crouched low, forcing his breathing steady despite his racing heart. The bow was ready, another arrow nocked.

  Then Snargrin's disturbing voice boomed through the forest.

  "How long have you been hiding here, *coward*?" the beast shouted—spitting venom in every word. "Hours? Days? Skulking like a *rat*?"

  Edric stayed silent, unmoving. The insult was bait—to make him answer, to mark his position. He eased sideways until he could glimpse the monster through a gap in the undergrowth.

  Snargrin stood in the clearing near the earlier perch, his massive head sweeping side to side. His remaining eye glinted in the fading light as his nostrils flared with deep, testing breaths.

  *He's trying to catch my scent,* Edric realized. A spike of fear shot through his spine.

  "Nothing to say?" Snargrin called. "No brave words? No heroic speech?" He let out a laugh that turned into a snarl. "You're pathetic—a disgrace to your kind."

  Full darkness was closing in now, though it wasn't yet complete. The world's small moon had risen, faint behind slow-moving clouds. A thin fog crept through the low ground, pale wisps gathering among roots and hollows.

  Edric became acutely aware of his own body heat rising. The mud-caked clothes refused to breathe, and sweat beaded across his forehead and soaked into the muddied fabric. He worried the sweat might carry his scent, might betray him despite all his precautions.

  *Can't do anything about it now. Just have to hope the mud and marsh stink are strong enough.*

  Snargrin began moving again, no longer standing still. He prowled through the forest, his movements measured now that the first wave of rage had passed.

  "I know what you're thinking," the beast called, his tone shifting toward something almost conversational. "You think you can wait me out. Hide until I grow tired."

  Edric's grip on his bow tightened.

  "But what about your friend? Your precious woodworker?" Snargrin's voice turned cruel. "How long do you think he lasted? How long before the screaming stopped?"

  The words froze Edric, even though he knew they were bait.

  "He begged, you know," Snargrin continued with a poisonous whisper. "Cried out for help. Cried for his family. He called for you, hero—wondering why you didn't come, why you left him to die."

  Each word landed like a knife. Rage and guilt warred within Edric's chest—hot, uncontrollable, demanding action, demanding vengeance. But Edric crushed those emotions ruthlessly. Maryn had been beyond saving from the moment Snargrin took him. Acting on fury would only get Edric killed as well—and then the monster would move on to Larkenshire, to Wren, to everyone else.

  *I'm sorry, Maryn,* Edric thought for what felt like the hundredth time. *I'm so sorry.*

  Snargrin had been circling for several minutes, prowling in widening loops around the spot where Edric had fired, when suddenly the beast halted mid-step.

  Its massive head lifted, nostrils flaring with a deep, deliberate sniff.

  "Clever," Snargrin said, his tone edged with grudging respect. "Very clever, making yourself smell like the swamp." Another long inhalation.

  The next breath was deeper—longer.

  "*There* you are!"

  The beast charged—not toward where Edric was actually hiding, but to a spot perhaps thirty yards to his left. He heard the thunderous approach, the crack of branches, and the sound of earth being torn up by those massive claws.

  Before leaving his earlier position, Edric had used his knife to cut away his muddy undergarments—the layer closest to his skin, saturated with sweat. He'd left them artfully arranged behind a log, positioned to catch any breeze from his previous direction of travel.

  It had worked. Snargrin had followed that smell straight to the decoy.

  Edric had set himself well away from the now thoroughly brown breeches, with a clear shot at the spot where Snargrin would stop to investigate his filthy trap.

  *He found the decoy.*

  Before the beast could process the tactical insult, Edric already had his bow drawn and an arrow trained. This second shot was coated with poison as well. He aimed for center mass—the largest target, where the vital organs lay.

  *If the head didn't work, the chest cavity will have to. Heart or lungs—something vital.*

  He released.

  The arrow flew true, striking Snargrin square in the chest, just below where his heart ought to be. This time, the shaft didn't shatter; the angle was better, the impact point less shielded than the skull. The arrow sank deep—perhaps six inches—lodging between the beast's ribs.

  To his dismay, even that wasn't deep enough to reach anything vital.

  Snargrin *roared*—a sound that merged pain, fury, and wounded pride. He spun toward Edric's last position, and for one terrible heartbeat, Edric thought he'd been spotted. But a tree blocked the line of sight, and he slipped behind another.

  He ran. Part panic, part preplanned retreat down the routes he'd scouted earlier. Routes where sight lines broke, where the uneven ground would hamper a charge, and through gaps the monster couldn't fit through.

  Behind him, Snargrin was moving too, only a little slower than before. The arrow in his ribs was having an effect—not enough to stop him, but enough to matter.

  *The poison should finish him,* Edric thought desperately, though doubt gnawed at him. *But how much would it take to kill something that size? What if demon beasts are resistant to poison?*

  His pulse hammered as anxiety surged through him.

  *It just needs time to work,* he told himself. *But how much time? Minutes? Hours? And will he bleed out first—or stay alive long enough to tear me apart?*

  Edric's mind raced as he moved through the trees. Snargrin was wounded but far from finished. The arrow between his ribs would slow him, and he hoped—*prayed*—to the Herald that the poison would eventually take hold.

  *I need another advantage,* he thought.

  The sound of rushing water reached his ears—a substantial stream he'd seen earlier. Not deep, but fast-moving and loud enough to mask noise.

  He adjusted his course, using every bit of terrain knowledge he'd gathered: a sharp left behind a cluster of trees to break the line of sight, a scramble over a fallen log. Always moving, always thinking three steps ahead.

  The shallow river came into view through the undergrowth—perhaps fifteen feet across, the water dark and swift. Edric paused at its edge, scanning the ground. There—a sturdy length of deadfall, a section of trunk roughly four feet long and heavy enough to make a convincing impact.

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  He hauled it up, muscles straining under the weight, and positioned himself where a gap in the trees would hide his next move from anything following his trail.

  Behind him, Snargrin's pursuit grew louder. The beast was slower now, his breathing rasping and uneven, but still coming. Still hunting.

  Edric heaved the log into the stream. It hit with a tremendous splash, exactly the sound a man-sized body might make. The current seized it immediately, sweeping it downstream with smaller splashes and rolling gurgles as it tumbled through the flow.

  In the next instant, Edric moved backward from the bank. Using the river's noise to cover his movement, he slipped into a dense tangle of thorny undergrowth about twenty yards away. It wasn't comfortable, but the snarl of branches and briars provided workable concealment.

  He pressed himself deeper into the thorns, ignoring the pricks and scratches against his mud-plastered clothes, and went absolutely still.

  A moment later, Snargrin appeared at the river's edge.

  Through narrow gaps in the brush, Edric watched the hulking form stalk from the trees. The arrow still jutted from between the monster's ribs, the surrounding fur slick with dark blood. Snargrin favored that side now, each breath harsher than the last.

  *The poison's working. Or the bleeding. Or both.*

  The beast studied the stream, his remaining eye narrowed in suspicion. Then he waded in and thrashed violently, claws raking through the current as he searched for the prey he thought had fled the same way as before.

  "*COWARD!*" The roar split the night and echoed through the trees. "HIDING IN WATER AGAIN!!! YOU WORM!"

  Snargrin's fury was palpable. He moved downstream, still searching, still convinced his prey had escaped the same way as before. Water splashed violently as he tore at the current, as if he could drag Edric out by sheer force of will.

  Then the thrashing stopped.

  Silence fell—awful, absolute silence broken only by the burble of the stream and the distant calls of night birds.

  Edric didn't move. Didn't breathe. Instinct screamed at him to run, to seize the moment, but he forced himself to stillness. Snargrin was too smart. This could be a trick—a test.

  The silence stretched. One second. Five. Ten.

  Then Snargrin spoke, his voice low and deadly. "No."

  The single word sent ice through Edric's veins.

  "No, you're not in the water." The beast turned slowly, water streaming from his wire-matted fur. "I can't smell you in the water. Can't smell you downstream." Another drag of air, deep and deliberate.

  *Oh no.*

  Snargrin's head turned, his remaining eye sweeping the forest. Not randomly—methodically. Section by section, outward from the streambank.

  Edric realized his mistake. The wind. It had shifted—just slightly. Instead of carrying his scent away, it now eddied unpredictably, tossing faint traces back toward the clearing.

  *He's going to find me.*

  Snargrin climbed from the stream, water pouring off his massive frame. He moved with terrible patience now, rage tempered. His nostrils flared constantly, testing the air from every angle.

  "Clever trick with the log," the beast said conversationally. "The splash, the sound downstream. Convincing." He took three heavy steps toward the tangle of thorns where Edric lay hidden. "But you forget—I've hunted in many woods. I know every trick."

  Five more steps. Closer now. Too close.

  "And I know the smell of *fear*."

  Snargrin was perhaps thirty feet away, his solitary eye fixed on the shadows of the undergrowth. He was trying to see through the dark, through the layers of thorn and brush.

  "I can hear your heartbeat," he murmured, voice almost tender. "Fast. Frightened. You think you're hidden, but you're not. You're *never* hidden from me."

  Twenty feet.

  Edric had an arrow nocked but couldn't draw without revealing himself. His muscles were tensed to move—but the instant he did, Snargrin would charge, and there wasn't enough distance to survive it.

  The beast stopped advancing, now only fifteen feet from his hiding place. Snargrin inhaled slowly through his nose, then exhaled with a low, rumbling growl. Despite the posturing, the sound dripped with frustration rather than triumph.

  *A bluff?* A spike of hope caught in his chest.

  Then, unexpectedly, the monster laughed—a deep, horrid, humorless sound filled with vindictive amusement.

  "I might have killed you quickly," he said. His lone eye gleamed in the darkness. "But you've been so... *irritating.* Running. Hiding. So many stupid tricks."

  He turned from the tangle, facing the direction of Larkenshire.

  A different kind of dread twisted in Edric's gut.

  "I grow tired of your game!" Snargrin snarled. "I think instead I'll visit that town of weaklings." He began walking, his stride deliberate despite the arrow still lodged in his ribs. "I'll start with the craftsman's family—the wife and the children. Then perhaps that spoiled castle brat. I wonder how that plump halfling baby tastes. Anyone who smells like they know an elf."

  It wasn't a bluff. Edric knew it.

  He frantically searched his mind for anything—*anything*—he could do. *What chance do I have?* The image of every arrow in his quiver buried uselessly in that armored hide filled him with despair. *Demon beast* wasn't hyperbole.

  In raw desperation, Edric began channeling mana into his hand, forming another compressed pellet of air. *What for?* He had no plan. *All it'll do is give away my position.*

  "My favorite thing about this swamp," Snargrin went on, his voice a lazy snarl, "is slaughtering the weak little half-folk." He continued to pace away. "Plenty of time to hunt you later. But first, you'll pay a price for daring to think you could kill me."

  He was really leaving. Heading for Larkenshire. Edric stayed hidden. Safe. Useless.

  Every axiom Rennard had ever drilled into him screamed to *stay down*. Don't engage. Survive.

  But if Snargrin reached Larkenshire…

  *Wren. King Browen. All of them.*

  Edric burst from the thorny tangle, branches ripping at his clothes and skin. The bow was in his hands, a clear shot at Snargrin's broad back.

  *What good will another arrow do? Put one more hole in him before I die?*

  He drew anyway.

  *God, what I'd give for a real gun right now.*

  In that instant, the realization hit him—Snargrin's one glaring weakness. The single, proven hole in his armor.

  Edric exhaled slowly, then unleashed the false gunshot spell he'd been building at his fingertips.

  The thunderclap split the night—louder than ever, powered by adrenaline and desperation. The sound cracked through the forest, scattering wildlife in its wake.

  ---

  Snargrin knew immediately who had made that unmistakable sound.

  He knew it was the elf's magic—the same trick that had startled him the first time they met.

  But this time he knew exactly what it was, who had done it, and most importantly, exactly *where* that bastard was.

  It was *precisely* what he wanted to hear.

  This time, he was going to take what he wanted—and give that pathetic worm exactly what he deserved.

  The beast turned on a dime and erupted into a charge the very same instant, moving at a speed that should have been impossible.

  An ugly, fang-filled grin split his snout. His remaining eye locked on Edric, eager to brutally murder the elusive prey.

  He wasn't about to let the sniveling weasel escape alive and well. No. The thought of what came next filled Snargrin with wretched joy.

  Thunderous bloodlust poured off him in waves—pure, primal will to kill, so potent it seemed to stain the darkness red.

  ---

  The enormous beast instantly zeroed in on the sound and turned to pounce. Edric glimpsed a glint of moonlight off Snargrin's remaining eye—that single, gleaming point of light became his target.

  He had drawn before the spell fully discharged. His anchor was perfect, the knot and sighting marks only barely visible under the moon. He adjusted his aim—just slightly—to account for the beast's turning head.

  Everything he'd practiced, every repetition, condensed into this one instant.

  Snargrin's grin, packed with rapturous bloodlust, hit Edric like a freight train. Pure terror ripped through every nerve. The demonic *need* for murder was overwhelming. If he'd waited even a heartbeat longer, fear would have paralyzed him, caused his hands to shudder, and would have made him miss.

  But the arrow was in flight, having already left the string.

  The bodkin point cut through Snargrin's remaining eye—punching past the socket deep into his brain—momentum stopped only by the back of his hardened skull.

  A primal roar tore from Snargrin's throat, cutting short his charge—the arrow now jutting from the second ruined eye.

  Raw panic smashed through Edric's body at the horrifying thought that even *this* might not kill him.

  Then the beast's legs gave out. The massive body crashed into the gritty riverside with a force that shook the ground. Trees shuddered. The stream rippled from the impact.

  Then—stillness.

  Edric collapsed where he stood, gasping for air, muscles trembling in the aftermath. His whole body shook—hands, arms, legs, even his jaw. The fading echo of Snargrin's final charge still pulsed through his veins, making his heart hammer so hard it hurt.

  *Is he dead? Please let him be dead.*

  Edric forced himself to his knees, then to his feet. His legs felt like water, threatening to give out beneath him. The bow slipped from his nerveless fingers.

  Snargrin lay motionless, his massive bulk sprawled across the riverside. The wire-like fur caught the moonlight with a dull sheen. Both eyes were ruined now—the old one scarred shut, the other freshly pierced with the arrow shaft still jutting from its center.

  Blood pooled around the beast's head, seeping slowly into the silt.

  Edric approached cautiously, another arrow ready.

  *Not that one more arrow would help if he isn't actually dead.*

  *Don't think about it. Just check.*

  He nudged the creature's shoulder with his foot.

  No response.

  He kicked harder, putting real force behind it.

  Still nothing. The body was slack, utterly limp, already cooling in the night air.

  *Dead. He's actually dead.*

  The realization hit him like a wave. He staggered back a step but stayed on his feet.

  Reality slowly reasserted itself. Night sounds returned—crickets, the gurgle of the stream, the whisper of wind through the trees. Edric's shaking subsided little by little, though his adrenaline still hummed.

  *Maryn!*

  The thicket—the place Snargrin had circled so many times. Edric forced himself upright, retrieved his bow with trembling hands, and started through the dark forest toward that grim center.

  He found it easily enough; Snargrin's constant pacing had trampled clear trails through the underbrush.

  The smell reached him first. Death. Blood. Decay.

  *Oh no.*

  Maryn's body lay near the fallen oak, half hidden by vegetation. Edric looked away. He'd seen enough to know the man had suffered—enough to know there had never been any hope of rescue. Enough to understand that Snargrin had taken his time.

  Rage, sorrow, and guilt twisted together in his chest until he couldn't pull them apart. He wanted to scream, to cry, to pound his fists against the ground—but he was too exhausted, too hollowed out.

  He stood for a long moment in silence, paying his respects to a man he'd hardly known—a man who had shown kindness and crafted him a beautiful weapon; a man with a family who loved him; a man who deserved so much better than this.

  Finally, Edric made himself decide. Recovering the body in darkness would be reckless. He'd have to leave Maryn here and let others bring him home in daylight.

  *He deserves a proper burial—whatever that means in this world, in this culture. His family deserves the chance to lay him to rest with dignity.*

  Though near collapse, Edric had one task left. *Wren. She's waiting for the signal.*

  He drew mana into his fingertips, compressing the conjured air, and sent it skyward. The simulated gunshot echoed through the forest. He repeated it twice more. Each time, the sound grew weaker.

  *Victory,* the signal said. *Snargrin is dead.*

  But "victory" felt like the wrong word.

  All that remained was to get back to Larkenshire—in the dark, exhausted beyond measure, covered in mud and scratches… and missing his underwear. But alive.

  Above, the clouds had thinned, revealing stars scattered across the sky. The moon hung high, painting the world in silver light.

  He'd done it. Against all odds, against a creature no one should have been able to kill alone, he'd actually done it.

  *Thank you, Rennard, for the training,* he thought. *Thank you, Maryn, for the bow. Thank you, Wren, for the map and the courage. And thank you, Sarah…*

  His throat tightened at that last name.

  He stood, gathered his bow, and began the long trek back toward Larkenshire.