Sixteen days before the Black Mausoleum
Jasaan saw the second snapper but none of them saw the third. It took Hellas from the side and bit clean through his arm. Hellas screamed and spun around. Blood sprayed across the lizard, and then the snapper lashed with a claw and ripped most of Hellas’ face off. An instant later its jaws came down again. It picked Hellas up by his head and shook him, threw him against one of the trees and hissed. Hellas landed in a heap of limp limbs. He didn’t move.
Jasaan caught glimpses, but mostly he was running. The second snapper burst forward and pounced, flying twenty feet through the air to land on a rider’s back and bear him to the ground. Before anyone could do anything, the snapper was ripping at him with his hind claws.
Jasaan stopped. He ran back to the dead snapper and started levering his axe out of its head. The fallen rider was screaming for help. He had armour, dragon-scale over metal, too tough even for snapper claws, but that wouldn’t stop the beast from crushing the man inside. It would find a way in, sooner or later.
He looked about for Nezak and the other rider but they were gone. Had the sense to flee like he ought to. Thing was, you never knew with snappers how many were out there. In the Blackwind Dales and up on the moors packs as large as twenty had savaged entire villages.
He had the axe out now. The rider on the ground was looking straight at him, eyes pleading. There was blood. The snapper had found a way in. The other one was busy shaking and shredding Hellas, trying to get him out of his armoured skin.
Jasaan’s hands were shaking. The snapper was looking at him too. They were both were. One man pleading with him to come, one monster daring him to try.
He couldn’t do it.
The rider managed to stab the monster in its leg with his sword and then the snapper finally flipped him on his back and ripped his throat out.
Scared. The one thing no Adamantine Man could ever be. He was frozen, shaking, part in fear, more in shame. He hated himself. Skjorl would never even have thought of running.
The two snappers settled in to eat, keeping half a watchful eye on him. Jasaan began to back away. When they didn’t follow, he turned and ran. Didn’t know where he was going. Just somewhere. Away. Nezak and the other rider were long gone; they probably hadn’t seen what had happened, but he couldn’t count on that. If they had, then what? They’d hate him, that’s what. They’d think he was nothing. Less than nothing and they’d be right.
It would be like it was before. The way it had been after Scarsdale.
Eventually, when nothing gave chase, he stopped running. He caught his breath and his head started to clear. He hadn’t the first idea where he was and he didn’t dare go back and look for Nezak. If there were any more snappers, the last two riders were probably both dead like the rest.
He’d lost his shield. He didn’t remember when.
Nezak. Stupid thing to do, learn a man’s name and a little bit about him. Stupid out here, the world being what it was. He sighed and sat on his heels. Where would you go if you were a rider? Get out of this blasted forest. Yes, a man with any sense would turn right round, and sure, they’d have to cross the plains to reach the Pinnacles, and yes, there were dragons out there but there were places to hide too. A man with any sense would turn right round and go home.
They’d been five. Now they might be three if he was lucky, one if he wasn’t. But it only took one man to make a difference, if he was a man in the right place.
Bugger.
Took a while, staring up at the canopy of leaves overhead, to get a rough idea of where the sun was. Good enough to tell his north from south and his east from west. The Pinnacles were somewhere to the east. As far as he knew, the Aardish Caves were somewhere to the west and the Yamuna would be to the south.
Home. He didn’t have a home. The Guard had been his home and the dragons had taken that from him. The dragons and then Skjorl.
He turned south, towards the river. The river would take him to the caves.