Chapter 4-7

“Wake up!”

Garkhen arose with a start at Almonihah's shout, just in time to hear his bow hum and a beast roar. Shaking off his sleepiness, the half-blue dragon hurried to his pack and spoke the command word for his armor. Even over the clatter of armor plates, he could hear Zakhin'Dakh's shrill shriek as he joined in the combat.

Almonihah growled quietly as he loosed another arrow. It was another Javni'Tolkhrah—this one like some sort of bipedal, winged shark, of all things. With, of course, obligatory non-symmetrical clawed appendages. Now that Zakhin'Dakh was circling around behind it, though, he figured it wouldn't last much longer.

Garkhen grabbed Silverflame as his armor finished putting itself on him. He was just about to join his allies when something heavy struck him from behind, knocking him to the ground with a loud crash. He gasped as the wind was knocked out of him, then gritted his teeth as a weight slammed down on his back. Claws scrabbled and screeched against his armor, trying to find purchase.

“Three!” Almonihah exclaimed incredulously, switching targets from the shark-creature to the vaguely ursine beast that had just burst from the ground. It seemed like a demented combination of bear, mole, and lizard, with a snake head on its furry tail. Its growl of pain as his arrow struck home in its shoulder sounded more like rocks grinding together than something living being should make.

Zakhin'Dakh, for his part, was faring well against the shark-thing. While its teeth looked deadly, so was the griffon's beak, and his taloned forelegs were longer and stronger than the flailing limbs of his foe. He had slammed into it from the air, digging his talons deep into its flesh as he bore it to the ground, where now it scratched at his legs while he sought to finish it with his beak.

Garkhen still had not caught sight of whatever had him pinned to the ground. It certainly had quite a bit of weight to it, however, as his struggling had yet to dislodge it, and even though it had yet to penetrate his armor, yet he was being slowly crushed simply by it leaning upon him. He flailed weakly with his tail, slapping ineffectually at his foe, as he struggled to free at least an arm.

There was a loud crunch, and then Zakhin'Dakh shrieked in triumph as the shark-beast quit struggling. He looked up and saw a big wolf-thing with way too many legs standing on Garkhen and scrabbling at his armor. With another shriek he charged over to help.

Almonihah had taken to the air, harrying the bear-mole with arrows. Flying around made it difficult to aim, but the thing was a big target, so he generally at least hit some part of it. He flew a bit further on, trying to ignore the thought of voices in the wind, then landed and took more careful aim. The stupid thing came running straight at him, which gave him plenty of time to line up a shot and stick an arrow right between its eyes. 

 

The surprising thing was that it didn't seem too bothered by the arrow sticking out of its head.

*******************

Apologies for the late post... so here, have a cliffhanger!