Thalanar groaned as he slumped against Luenor's shoulder. The young man helped him sit up against the tree trunk, and he tried to catch his breath. He saw blood pooling on the trunk behind him, and he could feel he was laboring to breathe. In the distance, they could still hear the battle—Valdrak's agonizing cries and the booming, staggering steps of the Stone Tyrant shaking the clearing splintered their senses.
"We need a plan," he muttered. "Or we die here."
Luenor swallowed hard. "How did you kill the last ?"
Thalanar let out a raw chuckle and winced in pain. "We didn't. And then a human mage appeared. It took the thing just long enough to kill it, but they didn't feel like our attention was secure enough to allow us to get away."
"So... no weaknesses?"
"One." He moved his hand to indicate a place. "Just under the chin at the neck. Very soft flesh. But unless you are an elven marksman, there's no chance you will hit it."
"I can hit it," Luenor said confidently.
Thalanar looked at him sideways, "Sure."
"From point blank," he stated with determination. "I'll shoot it from below."
"You won't survive to knock the arrow."
"Yeah? I'll take the shot before it can kill."
Thalanar opened his mouth to object—but Luenor was already reacting.
"Just hit it hard when I call!" the boy called, yanking up his bow, and sprinting toward the hellion.
"Damn it boy—" Thalanar tried to push up, but his ribs were screaming at him.
In the glade, Valdrak barreled forward, claws raking into the flank of the Stone Tyrant. The beast snarled, turning and exposing its open maw.
Energy build up.
The mana beam exploded outward.
The tiger took the brunt of it, kicking off in agony and crumpling into a bunch of white fur and dirt.
The Stone Tyrant turned to its right, his burning eye still catching motion.
Luenor.
That boy was running too fast, too much for the beast to comprehend. One massive tail lifted and came crashing down at him.
Luenor dove, sliding under the tail strike, his mass dragging across the dirt and stone, mud flying up behind him.
He stopped short of the beast.
Heart in his throat, he nocked an arrow.
Above, Valdrak snarled and rose on trembling legs.
He saw Luenor. Understood.
The great beast raked its claws across the Stone Tyrant's side, scraping armor plates and drawing its head up with a hiss.
And Luenor thought of his father.
Thought of standing still. The guilt.
This time, he moved.
He let the arrow go.
The shaft flew—true and straight—and buried into the soft flesh just beneath the Stone Tyrant's chin, halfway in.
The Stone Tyrant screamed, recoiling, its head snapping up into the sky, jaws open in rage and pain.
And with that, Thalanar rose.
Wounded and bleeding, he half-climbed, half-rolled up on Valdrak's shoulder, balancing limply as his limbs shook.
He raised his staff, done of the ancient wood, drawing all of the forest mana still in his body.
The runes along the staff began nudging to life, twinkling out a verdant luminescence, glowing bright green and then bright green.
The runes along the staff lit up one by one, glowing a brilliant, blinding green.
He whispered a final word of power.
And with a mighty cry, he leapt—
—and drove the staff down, slamming it onto the embedded arrow in the beast's throat.
Mana exploded outward.
The arrow pierced deeper, now glowing, and the stone hide around it cracked like shattered glass.
The Stone Tyrant's roar turned into a choked, gurgling bellow.
It stumbled once. Twice.
Then, slowly, the giant collapsed to its knees.
And fell.
Dead.
__
The Stone Tyrant's body lay motionless—steam rising from the shattered plates of armor and blood pooling in the shattered glade.
Valdrak stood above the carcass, his fur smeared in gore. With a rumble of satisfaction, the great white tiger lowered his mountainous head and began to tear into the carcass, ripping flesh and stone alike.
Luenor turned to look—
—and immediately vomited onto the grass.
The sound of cracking bone, the wet squelch of torn sinew, and the disgusting stink were altogether too much. He fell to his knees, gasping for air, trembling uncontrollably.
A strong hand rested on his shoulder.
Thalanar, leaning heavily on his staff, quietly grunted as he dragged Luenor back to his feet.
"Not all warriors are born to see death this closely," he murmured.
Luenor wiped his mouth and nodded unsteadily.
They both turned to observe the ruined glade.