Free The Ancient Enemy by Christopher Rowley Page A

pyluk's lower jaw. The head snapped up and the intended bite for his throat never came. The other talons missed his face by a hairbreadth.
    He got a leg up, hooked his ankle around the pyluk's throat, and pulled it away, then rolled, got his knees under him, and pushed himself up. The blood was running down his ruined cheek, but he could still see well enough, and his sword was in motion in time to meet the pyluk's next rush.
    The blade went home in its deep chest, but the creature seemed to ignore it as it caught him around the shoulders with its long arms and snapped at his face with its jaws. The stench of its breath filled his nostrils, and the terrible glare of hate in its eyes almost undid him, but he ducked at the last moment and the jaws snapped down around the crown of his skull.
    It was as if he'd put his head into a giant mousetrap. He saw stars, and fell to his knees. It would have ended there, but even as Thru looked up, he heard the pyluk's death scream and saw it spin away, one arm still flailing, while Utnapishtim stood over them, covered in blood, the small sword still in his frail hand.
    The pyluk were dead. Thru struggled to get back on his feet but every part of him seemed to hurt. There was blood running from his face and the top of his head as well as his arm. His vision was blurry. It seemed Ual Gillo was right—her eldest son did have a hard head.
    "Well-done," the Assenzi said. Thru nodded, but then everything started to spin around him, and he put out a hand to the tree to support himself. He leaned back against the tree and slowly slid down it to the ground.
    When he came around a few minutes later, the Assenzi was crouched beside him.
    "These pyluk are dead."
    He nodded. Those steel heads had done the job. Ware's new bow had served him well in a stern test.
    Thru shook his head and a clot of blood, partly dried, flew off his chin. Blood had soaked his shirt and matted the fur down his chest to his belly. His trousers were ruined, too.
    He found his sword still in his hand, caked in pyluk blood.
    "Sassadzu Rendilim will be happy to know what a good pupil you are, young Thru Gillo. First-class archery kyo you exhibited."
    "My thanks for your compliment, Utnapishtim, but I should have done better."
    "Perhaps one day you will, but by then I should think there will be legends told about this."
    The Assenzi paused. "Do you think you can make it to the village?"
    "I think so. Let me stand up for a moment."
    Slowly Thru got to his feet. His head swam, but he could stand. The wounds on his face and chest were deep and needed attention, but he could walk.
    He cleaned off the blade, sheathed it, then retrieved the bow and the steel points.
    As they started forward, he could feel the left side of his face flapping in the wind. When he moved fresh blood welled up in the chest wounds.
    Utnapishtim was unhurt, the blood on his robe was all from the pyluk. Flawless sword kyo had dealt with one pyluk, the other he had stabbed from behind.
    They staggered out of the forest, made it to the farm of Yeezer Damb, where they found the donkey, and Meu with his arm in a sling. Damb put Thru and Meu on his donkey cart and carried the pair of them down to White Deer.
    In White Deer Utnapishtim oversaw the cleaning and binding of their wounds. Pyluk bites could easily infect, so distilled white spirit was splashed on the wounds and stitches put in by a skilled seamstress, who winced at the sight of the left side of Thru's poor face. From the edge of his eyelid all the way to the bottom of the lower jaw he would bear a scar. Likewise, he would have scars on his chest, his arm, and the top of his head.
    Later, when Meu's arm had been set and put in splints and their wounds cleaned, stitched, and treated with honey and disinfecting herbal rinses, they gave statements to the local royal agent, who wrote them up and sent them off under the Crown Seal to the capital of Ajutan. Evidence was brought in by the posse from White Deer