The sample started moving immediately, so fast that I saw only a blur of motion. The entities went underground, too fast for me to count them.

I expected them to emerge, like the creatures in the other experiments. But only one returned to the surface, and it was still quite small—no bigger than a hare. I wondered if it had reached its maximum size. After all, it had no others of its kind to devour.

The vartek had a long tubular body, the top covered with black scales, a short thin neck, and a round head with elongated jaws, a wide mouth, and two bulging eyes. It resembled a monstrous millipede, with a multitude of long, sticklike legs.

Three days passed, and each night the creature went underground, tripling in size each time it emerged. I was puzzled. What could it be eating that made it grow so rapidly? I felt very uneasy and decided to resort to scrying. It is fortunate that I did so; otherwise, the County would have suffered many violent deaths.

I had less than twenty-four hours to prepare for what I had foreseen. I had only just taken up position close to the trees when the vartek erupted from the ground outside the pentacle. It was a deep burrower, evidently capable of tunneling through rock.

The creature was now about the size of a bull, but perhaps five times longer; however, I believe that it had not yet attained its full size. At rest, its long belly touched the ground. As it moved, it extended its legs, which tripled its height. When it opened its mouth, I saw that its teeth were very unusual. There were three rows in both top and bottom jaws, and they seemed to be able to move; the creature could change the angle of its bite and lengthen and shorten the teeth.

As it chased me into the wood, it projected a globule of thick brown liquid. I dodged to one side, and when the liquid splattered on the ground, it boiled and steamed, giving off clouds of noxious fumes and eating into the vegetation and the earth beneath. It was now clear to me that the combination of the acidic liquid and the moving teeth helped the creature to burrow, and that they could also be used as weapons.

But these were not its only weapons: three long tentacles sprouted from its back and whipped through the air toward me. Each had a sharp piece of bone at its tip.

I ran deeper into trees, luring the vartek toward the trap that I had hastily constructed. The previous Malkin witch assassin, Kernolde, had often used hidden pits filled with sharp spikes to kill her enemies; I did the same here. I leaped across the long pit I had prepared, and the creature fell in. Its head and part of its body were impaled upon the spikes.

Next I had to climb down into the pit and end its life. It was not easy, but I managed to kill it before it could struggle free. The scales on its upper body were hard and difficult to penetrate, but its underbelly was soft. Its bulbous eyes were particularly vulnerable to my blades.