But it had been worth the risk. The giant they had felled was a treasure trove of food. Cade’s only regret was that they had not planned better for harvesting the great bounty. He now realized that their work had only just begun.

First, they had to breach the tough hide on the outside—thicker than a rhino’s and twice as tough, with a layer of yellowed fat beneath. It took almost an hour of hacking with Amber’s axe to cut a hole in its belly. Another to pull forth the folds of intestine and get to the nutritious organs within. There was no hope of cutting through the great bones and sinews of the legs, though Scott succeeded in cutting free a tail tip the length of a forearm. He dry-heaved when he was done.

Regardless, it was the fatted offal within that they needed in the first place. In the modern world, humanity had turned their noses up at anything but the muscles. Yet their ancestors would have fought for the nutritious organs within. The starving teens were no different.

Quintus had some experience in the butchering of meat, having rustled sheep from the Picts he had fought in Scotland. But he had never come close to processing an animal this size. Yet, to Cade’s surprise, the nimble boy crawled into the belly of the beast itself, gladius in hand.

Soon enough, Quintus shoved out the wobbling lump of purple flesh that was its liver, so heavy it took two of them to lift it. Next came the football-sized kidneys, and the heart so large that Cade could put his fist through the arteries. More organs followed, ones Cade could not recognize, but he trusted Quintus to know what he was doing.

As for Grace, she busied herself with attacking one of the giant legs, cutting away at the knee joint with Amber’s axe. All the while, the others worked at carving gobs of yellow, grainy fat from around the belly’s slit … And then the pterosaurs came. Circling overhead like vultures.

Once these flying scavengers arrived, Cade knew their time was almost up. Their arrival was the first sign carnivores looked for, if the smell of blood did not attract them first. When Grace finally succeeded in cutting free the leg, he accepted it was time to load up.

It was painful to leave before a carnivore was actually seen, but Cade knew by the time they were warned of one’s approach, it would be too late to take the meat with them. So he called it, wiping the blood and sweat from his brow, ignoring the disappointed groans of the others.

Exhausted, they succeeded in transferring their prize out of the pit and back to the keep in a single trip, hauling it up in makeshift wooden cages they had made specially for the occasion, and then dragged in sleds of sackcloth and sapling logs. It was a mountain of meat.

But they could not feast yet. Only a snack, to give them strength for what was to come next.