Chapter Six
The axe hit the wood with a solid, resonant thwack.
It was barely noon, and Siurad felt like he was moving through molasses. His limbs were heavy, his mana reserves were dangerously low from the morning’s training, and his head throbbed with a dull, persistent ache. He wasn't physically tired, at 6'4" and 240 pounds, swinging an axe was just warm up cardio, but the mana exhaustion made his bones feel like lead.
He leaned against the handle of his axe, wiping sweat from his brow.
"You look like death warmed over, big man," a deep voice rumbled.
Siurad looked up to see Zeus watching him. The massive lumberjack was resting his own axe on his shoulder, looking fresh despite having felled three trees to Siurad's one.
"Rough night?" Zeus asked, eyeing the dark circles under Siurad's eyes.
"Something like that," Siurad muttered. "Insomnia. Bad dreams."
'...WEAKNESS,' Obi helpfully supplied in his mind. '...YOUR RECOVERY RATE IS SUBOPTIMAL.'
Zeus grunted. "Well, you're swinging better than yesterday. Form is tighter. Less wasted motion. I'm impressed. Most guys your size just try to muscle through it, but you're actually learning the leverage."
"Thanks, Zeus. I'm trying."
"Come on," Zeus said, gesturing to a stump. "Lunch. My wife packed extra. Said a man your size needs fuel, not excuses."
They sat on the stump. Zeus handed Siurad a bundle wrapped in wax cloth. Siurad opened it to reveal thick slices of dark bread, sharp cheese, and a slab of cold roasted venison seasoned with rosemary. To Siurad, starving from mana exhaustion, it looked like a feast fit for a king.
"Thank you," Siurad said earnestly, tearing into the bread. "Seriously. Thank your wife for me."
Zeus watched him eat for a moment, chewing on a piece of jerky. "You've got potential, Siurad. You're strong, but you're careful. That's a rare mix."
He pointed his thumb toward the darker, denser part of the forest where the sunlight struggled to reach the ground.
"There's a patch of iron bark pine about a mile deep. The wood is denser. Harder to chop, but Lexaris pays double for it. We head in there, fill the cart, and we can call it an early day. What do you say?"
Siurad looked at the dark woods. His instincts, and Obi, screamed danger. But his wallet screamed rent and food.
"Double pay?" Siurad wiped crumbs from his mouth. "Lead the way."
The air in the deep woods was stagnant and smelled of damp earth and sweet rot. The trees here were massive, their bark grey and metallic looking.
They worked in rhythm for an hour. The Iron bark lived up to its name; every swing sent a shockwave up Siurad's arms. But he used the V-cut. He used leverage. He let gravity do the work.
'...EFFICIENT,' Obi noted, sounding bored. '...BUT SOMETHING APPROACHES.'
Siurad paused. "Zeus?"
Zeus stopped mid swing. The forest had gone silent. No birds. No wind.
A low, clicking sound echoed from the canopy above them. Like a thousand knitting needles tapping together.
"Down!" Zeus roared.
He shoved Siurad hard. Siurad hit the dirt just as a blur of chitin and legs slammed into the spot where he had been standing.
Siurad scrambled up and stared in horror.
It was a centipede. But not a normal one. It was sixteen feet long, its segmented body as thick as a barrel, covered in iridescent purple armor. Wings that were transparent and buzzing like a dragonfly sprouted from its back. Its mandibles dripped with a sizzling green venom.
"Chilovolaticus!" Zeus shouted, backing away and raising his axe.
"Chilo volata what?" Siurad yelled, scrambling for his own axe.
"Run, boy!" Zeus bellowed, his voice tight with fear. "It's an Alpha! Axe won't cut that shell! Go!"
The creature screeched a sound like tearing metal, and lunged at Zeus.
Zeus swung his massive axe. It connected with the creature's head with a spark of metal on chitin, but the beast didn't even flinch. It reared back and swatted Zeus with its tail.
The impact was sickening. Zeus, a man who looked like he was carved from granite, was launched twenty feet through the air. He slammed into a tree and crumpled, his axe flying from his hand.
"Zeus!" Siurad shouted.
The creature turned its many eyes toward Zeus’s prone form. It chittered, mandibles clicking, preparing to feast.
Siurad took a step back. His brain screamed run. He was still drained from the morning training session.
'...THE VARIABLE IS DOWN,' Obi said calmly. '...FLEE WE CANNOT WIN YOU ARE EMPTY.'
Siurad looked at Zeus. The big man was groaning, trying to push himself up, blood trickling from his forehead.
"No," Siurad growled.
He gripped his axe.
"Hey!" Siurad yelled, picking up a rock and hurling it. It bounced harmlessly off the creature’s carapace.
The beast pivoted toward him with a sharp hiss. It unfurled its wings, the air vibrating with a violent buzz as it lunged. Its elongated frame snaked through the forest, pulverizing saplings and undergrowth in its wake. It moved with a speed that defied its size.
"MOVE," Obi's command echoed in his mind. "VOID STEP NOW".
Siurad didn't hesitate. Locking onto the shadow cast by a downed tree behind the predator, he grabbed the metaphysical tether and pulled.
POP.
The centipede's jaws clamped shut on nothing but air. Siurad appeared ten feet to its rear. Nausea rolled through him, making him lurch, but he forced it down; he had successfully flanked the monster.
The creature let out a confused shriek, its massive body twisting as it searched for its vanished prey. Realizing it had lost its advantage on the forest floor, its wings began to blur as it sought the sky.
"IT IS LEAVING THE GROUND," Obi warned with sudden urgency. "IF IT FLIES, YOU DIE. GROUND IT. TARGET THE WING JOINT. USE THE SPIKE".
"Shit," Siurad grunted.
Discarding his axe, he hoisted his right hand. He could feel the absolute dregs of his mana, a hollow ache at the bottom of his reserves.
He focused on the blur of the creature's right wing joint.
Command reality, he thought.
"Shadow Spike!"
He thrust his palm forward.
THWIP.
The shadow spike whistled as it cut through the atmosphere, sailing wide of its mark.
"Dammit," Siurad spat, his frustration mounting.
High above, the massive winged terror spiraled, its plated tail carving through the air. It swept low over Siurad’s position before banking sharply back toward the forest roof.
As he scrambled back to a standing position, he projected a thought to Obi: That hurt.
'...TRY AGAIN,' the Entity’s voice rang out with cold authority.
Raising his arm once more, Siurad summoned another jagged shard of darkness. He calibrated his aim and loosed the strike. This effort struck true, burying itself into the creature’s translucent wing joint with a sickening, wet snap.
The Chilovolaticus let out a piercing shriek as its lift vanished, sending its gargantuan form into a violent descent. Its armored tail lashed out like a massive iron bar during the fall.
The impact hit Siurad directly in the sternum. By any standard of human biology, the sheer kinetic force should have pulverized his ribcage and destroyed his organs. Instead, though the strike propelled him twelve feet across the mud and knocked the breath from his lungs, his body remained intact. The unnatural chill anchored in his skeleton simply would not allow his frame to break.
'...STAND,' Obi’s command was frigid and absolute. '...THE TARGET IS DOWN, BUT THE THREAT REMAINS.'
Despite a staggering, all-encompassing ache that threatened to pin him to the ground, Siurad’s legs drove him upward. He stood before the pain could even finish registering in his mind. A short distance away, the grounded behemoth lunged, intending to use its immense bulk to flatten him into the earth.
Reacting on instinct, Siurad snatched up the fallen logging axe and set his feet firmly into the mire.
He drove the axe straight up into the creature's snapping mandibles and locked his elbows.
The collision was like catching a falling boulder. The beast's momentum should have folded his arms backward and put the shaft through his own chest. It didn't. His elbows held. His boots carved two long trenches through the mud as he gave ground, but he gave it slowly, and then he stopped giving it at all, forcing the creature's clattering head up.
'...THE NECK.' Obi commanded. '...THE SEAM WHERE THE PLATES PART. YOU HAVE CUT THIS JOINT A HUNDRED TIMES THIS WEEK. IT IS SHAPED LIKE A TREE.'
And it was. Siurad shoved upward, the creature's head went back, off balance, and in that half second, his eye did the thing Zeus had drilled into him. It found the grain. Not the broad, armored curve of the neck, the plate that would turn any blade; the seam. The thin dark line where one chitin segment met the next, where the armor became a hinge instead of a wall.
He ripped the axe free and stepped into it.
He swung for the line, the same economical, leveraged stroke he'd put into tree trunks, hips and back and shoulders flowing through one point. The V-cut. The first bite split the seam wide. He let the axe rebound, rolled his wrists, and brought the second stroke down into the exact same groove without looking, because by now his hands knew the motion better than his eyes did.
Thunk-crack.
The head came free and dropped into the mud. The massive body went rigid, shuddered once down its entire sixteen-foot length, and was still.
Silence returned to the forest.
"By the gods..."
Siurad turned, chest heaving, wiping green slime from his face. Zeus was leaning against the tree, clutching his ribs, staring at Siurad with eyes wide as saucers. He looked from the dead monstrosity to the greenhorn who had just teleported and cast a shadow spear.
"You..." Zeus coughed. "You're a Mage?"
Siurad dropped the axe, his legs shaking as the adrenaline crash hit him. "Something like that." He rushed over to Zeus. "Are you okay? We need to get you some help."
Zeus groaned as Siurad helped him up. "Ribs are cracked. Maybe broken. Amphara’s temple isn't far."
They began the slow limp back to the cart. Zeus leaned heavily on Siurad, his breathing ragged.
As they reached the edge of the deep woods, Zeus paused. He looked back at the massive carcass of the centipede.
"Boy," Zeus whispered, a pained grin breaking through his grimace. "We're coming back for that."
"For the bug?" Siurad asked, disgusted.
"The venom sacs," Zeus rasped. "And the chitin. Alchemists pay a fortune for Chilovolaticus parts. You just made yourself some coin, kid."
'...PROFITABLE,' Obi noted with satisfaction. '...ACCEPTABLE OUTCOME.'
Siurad just laughed.
The walk back to the cart was a slow, agonizing shuffle.
Zeus was heavy. The big man was built like a draught horse, and with his ribs cracked, he leaned almost all of his weight on Siurad.
"So," Zeus wheezed, breaking the silence. "That magic. Teleportation. And you're working for copper in a lumber yard?"
Siurad winced, adjusting his grip on Zeus’s belt. "It's... complicated."
"Complicated," Zeus repeated, spitting a glob of blood into the ferns. "Usually, 'complicated' means I'm running from the law, or I owe money to a guild.”
He looked at Siurad sideways, his eyes sharp despite the pain.
"That wasn't normal magic, kid. I've seen Mages. That was different, you... you just punched a hole in the air."
"It's hedge magic," Siurad lied quickly. "My grandfather taught me. It’s messy. Unstable. That’s why I threw up."
"And the black spike?"
"Mining trick," Siurad improvised. "For... cracking rocks."
Zeus snorted, which immediately turned into a groan of pain. "Right. Rock cracking. That decapitates flying nightmares."
'...HE IS SUSPICIOUS,' Obi’s voice cut in, cold and detached. '...HE HAS SEEN TOO MUCH. THE VARIABLE IS A RISK.'
Siurad stiffened. Don't start, Obi.
'...SILENCE HIM,' Obi advised. '...AN ACCIDENT IN THE WOODS. NO WITNESSES, NO QUESTIONS. IT WOULD BE EFFICIENT.'
No, Siurad thought back furiously. He's not a variable. He's a coworker.
'...HE IS A LOOSE THREAD. XARA WOULD HAVE CUT IT.'
Xara didn't have a guy who shared his sandwich, Siurad countered. The pork was seasoned, Obi. You said it yourself. Caloric density.
'...THE PORK WAS ACCEPTABLE,' Obi conceded, sounding almost pained by the logic. '...BUT SENTIMENT IS A FLAW.'
"You okay?" Zeus asked, feeling Siurad tense up.
"Just a cramp," Siurad muttered. "We're almost to the road."
Zeus was quiet for a moment. Then he clapped a heavy hand on Siurad’s shoulder.
"Look," Zeus said quietly. "I don't care if you're a hedge mage or the King's bastard. You saved my life. In the lumber business, that wipes the slate clean. I won't ask questions if you don't want to answer them."
"I appreciate that," Siurad exhaled, feeling the tension in his chest loosen slightly.
"But," Zeus added, a greedy glint returning to his eyes. "You are helping me harvest that bug tomorrow. I don't care how magical you are; nobody walks away from a gold mine."
"Deal," Siurad promised.
They reached the cart. As Siurad helped Zeus into the back, the Ring hummed, a low, satisfied vibration that warmed his freezing finger.
'...FINE,' Obi grumbled. '...LET THE VARIABLE LIVE. FOR NOW.'
Generous of you, Siurad thought sarcastically.
'...HOWEVER,' Obi continued, the tone shifting to something that sounded suspiciously like pride.
'...THE CORRECTION OF THE VERMIN. THE VECTOR WAS PRECISE, AND THE USE OF LEVERAGE.'
The Ring pulsed warm against his skin.
'...IT WAS ADEQUATE. PERHAPS YOU ARE NOT ENTIRELY USELESS.'
Siurad suppressed a smile. From a cosmic entity, adequate was basically a standing ovation.
"Thanks, Obi," Siurad whispered into the wind. "Now shut up. I need to get us to a healer."
The sun was dipping below the tree line when they reached the yard gate.
Lexaris was still there, counting logs on a wagon. When he saw Siurad practically dragging a bloodied, limping Zeus out of the darkness, the Foreman dropped his clipboard.
"What in the hells?" Lexaris marched over, his face purple with instant rage. He zeroed in on Siurad. "I knew it! I knew you were useless! You dropped a tree on him, didn't you? You city handed moron!"
Siurad opened his mouth to defend himself, but Zeus squeezed his shoulder hard.
"Back off, Lex," Zeus wheezed, forcing himself to stand straighter. "Wasn't the kid. It was a Widow maker. A dead branch snapped in the high canopy. Came down like a hammer."
Lexaris stopped, eyeing Zeus’s caved in side. "A branch did that? Looks like you got kicked by a mule."
"Big branch," Zeus grunted, sweat rolling down his nose. "Kid pulled me out before the rest of the tree came down. He did good."
Lexaris squinted at Siurad, looking for a lie. Siurad kept his face blank, channeling the same social Stealth he used on the guards in Pinehaven.
"Fine," Lexaris spat. "But if you can't work tomorrow, Zeus, you're not getting paid. And you..." He poked a sausage-finger at Siurad. "You finish his shift tomorrow. Double quota."
"Understood," Siurad said quietly.
"Get him to the temple," Lexaris waved them off, losing interest now that he knew no equipment was broken. "And try not to bleed on the road. It scares the investors."
As they walked away, Zeus let out a breath that was half-laugh, half-whimper.
"Why lie?" Siurad whispered. "The bug killed you. Not a tree."
"If I told him about the Chilovolaticus," Zeus hissed, "Lexaris would have a salvage crew out there within the hour. That chitin belongs to the company if we report it. But if we find it on our own time... it belongs to us."
'...GREED,' Obi noted approvingly. '...A USEFUL MOTIVATOR.'
Aphara’s Temple bore little resemblance to a majestic cathedral. Instead, it was a modest wooden longhouse, where the pungent aroma of dried sage mingled with the sharp scent of rubbing alcohol. In its practical design and atmosphere, the structure functioned more as a medical clinic than a traditional house of worship.
The healer was a bored looking acolyte in green robes who clearly dealt with lumberjack injuries daily.
"Cracked ribs. severe bruising," the acolyte droned, his hands glowing with a soft, verdant light as he pressed them against Zeus’s side. "And... trace amounts of neurotoxin in the blood?"
The acolyte looked up, suspicious. "A branch had venom?"
"Poison ivy," Siurad interjected quickly. "Nasty patch of it where he fell."
The acolyte rolled his eyes but didn't push.
"That will be five silver for a salve and set," the acolyte said, his tone practiced and indifferent. "Or two gold for Apharas’ divine light."
Two gold. Two thousand copper. It wasn't just a price; it was a gate kept securely locked against men who felled trees for a living. Even the mundane option of five silver was a devastating hit. It was fifty days of scraping by on a logger's surplus wiped out in a single breath.
"Five silver," Zeus grunted. He dug into his worn leather pouch, pulling out the coins and tossing them onto the wooden table. The metal clinked, heavy and finite.
The acolyte swept the silver away without a word. He reached under the counter, not for glowing light, but for a foul smelling jar of pungent paste and a roll of coarse, unbleached linen.
Zeus bit down hard on a strip of leather. His face drained of color as the acolyte stepped close, burying his hands into Zeus's side and aggressively shoving the cracked ribs back into alignment.
Siurad winced at the dull pop and the sickening squelch of the bones being manually forced into place. The acolyte smeared the paste over the bruising flesh, binding the ribs so tightly that Zeus's breath hitched. There was no divine intervention here. Just the bloody, mundane reality of what a working man could afford.
The temple doors shut behind them, cutting off the scent of incense and leaving them in the cold, muddy street. Zeus didn't walk so much as he dragged his right side. His breathing was shallow, strictly measured against the tight linen bindings already darkening where the pungent paste seeped through.
Siurad stepped close, offering a shoulder. Zeus looked at it for a long second, then grunted and slung his heavy, tree-trunk arm over Siurad's neck. They started the slow, agonizing trek away from the temple district.
The evening air felt colder than it had before. Siurad looked around at the rough-hewn buildings and the dark tree line pressing in on the settlement.
"You should’ve taken the light," Siurad said, looking at the older man struggling just to put one foot in front of the other.
Zeus gave a short laugh, then immediately regretted it with a sharp hiss. "And spend two gold so I can swing an axe tomorrow instead of next week? I’m not rich enough to be stupid."
"You got hurt doing the job."
"Aye."
"So shouldn’t the yard pay?"
Zeus stopped walking. He looked at Siurad like he had just asked why the sky charged rent. "You really are new."
"Yeah," he admitted. "I am. New enough that I don’t actually know what country I’m standing in."
"You serious?"
"Unfortunately. I never actually asked," Siurad said, keeping his voice low to match the quiet street. "Where exactly are we?"
Zeus let out a breath that caught sharply on his cracked ribs. "Pine Haven. Logging town." He pointed a thick, calloused finger down the dark road toward a small, rusted sign. He shot Siurad a sideways, pain-tightened look. "Where did you think we were?"
"Honestly? I stopped guessing after the giant centipede."
Zeus managed a dry, wheezing chuckle that ended in a wince. They started moving again. "Pine Haven is on the smaller side of settlements," Zeus said between jagged breaths. "We are in the Kingdom of Vildris."
"Vildris," Siurad mouthed, nodding his head.
"Kingdom in name, headache in practice," Zeus said. "Nobles own the timber contracts. Krupp owns half the men who swing axes. Temple takes the coin to keep the rest breathing. Coin is the true king around these parts, lad."
"Have you ever heard of the Obsidian Authority?" Siurad asked.
"Can't say I have, sounds like the kind of name a man's better off not having heard," Zeus wheezed. "What is it to you?"
"I have to find it, or what is left of it."
"This relating to that mining magic?" Zeus gave him a worried stare.
"You could say that."
'...YOU TALK TOO MUCH, VESSEL.'
Shut up, Obi, Siurad thought.
"My advice, kid? Be careful who you speak to about that sort of thing."
Siurad nodded. They walked in silence for a while before turning down a narrower street, finally stopping before a small, sturdy cabin. It was modest, the roof patched but holding, and a warm, low light spilled from the front window. A small face peeked over the windowsill, eyes going wide at the sight of them before vanishing. The sound of hurried, small footsteps echoed inside.
Zeus leaned heavily against the doorframe, slipping his arm off Siurad’s shoulder. He looked exhausted. The weight of the five-silver deficit hung over him just as heavily as the physical pain. Fifty days of surplus labor, wiped out in a few minutes, with a family waiting on the other side of that door.
"Go back to the Boar's Den," Zeus rasped, gripping the iron latch as the door began to open from the inside. "Get whatever sleep you can. But be at the tree line at first light."
Zeus looked back at him, his eyes hard and completely uncompromising.
"We are going back for that Alpha. Every plate of chitin, every mandible. We're stripping it to the bone, and we're getting my silver back."
Siurad nodded, stepping back into the street. "First light."
Siurad slept like the dead. No spider pranks. No cold wake-up calls. Even Obi seemed to respect the absolute emptiness of his mana reserves.
He woke before dawn, not because of a nightmare, but because someone was banging on his door.
He opened it to find Zeus. The big man was bandaged, pale, and moving stiffly, but he was grinning. He held a large canvas sack in one hand and a pry-bar in the other.
"Sun's up, partner," Zeus whispered. "Let's go get our bonus."
'...THE SCAVENGER IS PUNCTUAL,' Obi observed as Siurad grabbed his boots. '...I TOLERATE HIM.'
"Let's go," Siurad said, grabbing his axe. "Before the flies get to it."
The woods were quiet in the grey light of dawn, save for the buzzing of flies.
Siurad and Zeus moved quickly through the underbrush, the big man moving with surprising grace for someone whose ribs were cracked less than twenty-four hours ago. They pulled a handcart behind them, a sturdy, iron-rimmed thing Zeus had borrowed, without telling anyone, from the shed.
When they reached the clearing, the smell hit them first. It was a mix of copper, nectar, and spoiled meat.
The Chilovolaticus was still there. It hadn't moved, but it wasn't alone. A few wolf-sized beetles were picking at the exposed neck meat.
"Scavengers," Zeus grunted, picking up a rock. "Get out of here! Go on!"
He hurled the rock. It clattered off the carapace of the nearest beetle. The scavengers hissed, looking at the two large men, then decided there was easier meat elsewhere and scurried into the ferns.
The Chilovolaticus did not yield its treasures easily.
In Cassalia, looting a mob was a sterile affair. You clicked the glowing corpse, a menu popped up, and the items transferred to your inventory with a satisfying shing sound.
Real life, Siurad was discovering, was wet and sticky, and it smelled like burning sulfur.
"Leverage," Zeus grunted, jamming the iron pry-bar under the creature’s massive, iridescent dorsal plate. "On three. One, two... heave!"
Siurad gripped the bar, his boots sliding in the mud. With a sickening, wet tear, the plate popped free, exposing the pulsating grey meat beneath.
"Gods," Siurad gagged, turning his head away as the smell of meat and rotten eggs intensified. "That is foul."
'...ORGANIC MATTER IS INHERENTLY DISGUSTING,' Obi pulsed in his mind, his tone practically curling a metaphorical lip. '...IT DECAYS. IT STINKS. STONE NEVER SMELLS.'
"Not the time, Obi," Siurad muttered, wiping sweat from his eyes.
"You talking to the bug?" Zeus asked, pausing to wipe his own brow. He looked pale, the adrenaline of the previous day fading to reveal the pain of his freshly knit ribs.
"Just... hyping myself up," Siurad lied smoothly. "Okay. The plate is off. Where are the sacs?"
Zeus pointed his skinning knife toward the base of the creature's neck, where the chitin met the soft tissue. "Deep inside the throat gullet. Two of them. Green. Volatile. If you puncture one, the acid will melt your hands off before you can scream. I’ve seen it happen."
Siurad stared at the mess of alien biology.
"Great," he sighed."Operation: Don't Melt Hands. Commencing," Siurad sighed.
He reached in. The flesh was still warm, slick with a foul smelling ichor. He couldn't see anything. He had to rely entirely on touch.
'...HIGHER,' Obi commanded, suddenly becoming a backseat surgeon. '...TO THE LEFT. PAST THE TRACHEA.'
Siurad shifted his hand, his arm elbow deep in the beast.
'...STOP.'
Siurad froze.
'...DO NOT SQUEEZE. YOU ARE HOLDING THE VALVE. IF YOU PULL IT, IT RUPTURES.'
"Obi says... I mean, my instinct says I need to cut the valve first," Siurad told Zeus, cold sweat beading on his forehead.
"Your instinct is right," Zeus said, looking pale but impressed. “Careful.”
'...USE THE KNIFE,' Obi instructed. '...MAKE A THIRTY-DEGREE INCISION. SEVER THE DUCT.'
Snip.
He felt the tension release. Gently, slowly, he pulled his hand back.
He withdrew a pulsating, translucent green sac the size of a cantaloupe. The liquid inside swirled with a violent, glowing energy.
"Jackpot," Zeus breathed, his eyes wide. "That's pure grade. A quart, easy."
'...A POTENT SOLVENT,' Obi noted analytically. '...XARA USED TO DRINK DILUTED DRAMS OF IT. SHE SAID IT TASTED LIKE ANGRY LIMES.'
Xara was insane, Siurad thought back, carefully placing the sac into the padded crate Zeus had brought. And I'm never drinking angry limes.
They worked for another hour. By the time the sun fully broke the tree line, they had harvested all they could reasonably take.
Zeus had promised to strip the Alpha to the bone, reality had renegotiated the terms.
His ribs would not let him bend for long, the carcass stank worse with every cut, and half the plates were cracked from the fight. What looked like a fortune in the mud became a smaller, uglier calculation once they had to pry it loose and carry it home.
“I thought we were taking everything,” Siurad said.
Zeus spat into the mud. “I also thought breathing wouldn’t hurt this much. Plans change. We take the pieces that pay best and we get out. We can't haul this whole thing and I can't be limping past the foreman's window with a cart full of poached monster."
Siurad just nodded and continued packing.
They loaded the handcart, covering the illicit cargo with a layer of scrap wood and burlap.
"We look like garbage collectors," Siurad noted, surveying their muddy, blood-stained appearance.
"Rich garbage collectors," Zeus grinned, slapping Siurad on the back. "Now comes the hard part. The haggle."