Jason spent the rest of the ride with a grin on his face, eyes flashing as a floodgate opened in his mind. He could suddenly see with perfect clarity how badly he had been hamstringing himself. By the time the wagon turned off the embankment road and down a slope towards the farm, he was itching to begin. He was the first to vault out the back of the wagon.

Vincent had stopped the wagon on the outskirts of the farm. In the distance they could see a clutch of mudbrick farm buildings, past fields of a low, leafy crop. Vincent, still in the driving seat of the wagon, tossed Jason a far-sight crystal.

“We’ll watch from here,” Vincent said. Margolls had poor vision and aura sense, but their smell and hearing were highly sensitive. The group would see everything through the crystal without interfering with Jason’s fight.

As Jason marched away without pause, Humphrey followed. He maintained enough distance that he wouldn’t interfere either, but could still intervene if necessary.

Jason neared the farm’s largest building, a big, square barn. As he did, a margoll came wandering out, chewing on the remains of what, to Jason, looked like the family dog. Somehow, the idea of a dog-headed monster eating a dog made it even more disgusting. The monster sniffed the air, then turned to Jason, dropping its meal in the dirt.

Jason had never been this close to a margoll before. It had the face of a pit bull and the body of a power lifter, with sickle-claw hands. Its arms were drenched up to the elbows in blood, as was its wide mouth. It threw its head back, letting out a wild howl.

60. Making Music

60

Making Music

Jason and the margoll faced off outside the mud-brick barn. The margoll’s howl called out more, who emerged from in and around the building to join it. As they assembled, Jason and the first one remained where they stood, gazes locked. Jason was the first to move, walking closer to the wall of the barn.

That first step was like a starter’s pistol, the monsters lunging into a sprint. Jason kept walking casually as the creatures closed the distance, pounding over the dirt. When they were almost upon him, he dropped into the shadow of the building like falling through a manhole.

He rose up from the ground behind the monsters, silently emerging from one of the margolls’ own shadows. In the brief but crucial moment of confusion, Jason noticed the margoll in front of him had loose skin at the back of its neck, like a dog. He grabbed a fistful of skin and yanked back, pulling the monster off-balance.

The creatures were already wheeling on Jason, so when his dagger tore the throat out of the monster in his grip, blood sprayed over the others.

You have defeated [Margoll]

Would you like to loot [Margoll]?