White heat reached Aylin's bandages.
She dropped Valea's shaving into her coat and caught the doubled cord around a shell cleat instead of letting it burn across her palms. The line pulled hard enough to bend the wet root braid into the stone.
"Something has it," she said.
Jiang heard the female emperor's warning call break around a harsher sound.
Not the chick. Not the injured male.
The Bellwyrm rasped through a mouth that could not close cleanly.
"Do not pull," Jiang said.
"The heat is coming toward us."
"Warn them before we move it."
Aylin slapped the cord against the cleat twice, waited, and struck it once more. Danger beneath. Do not drag.
On Red Aeries, Hest felt the changed rhythm through his iron bar.
The Bellwyrm still had the pale feeler between its jaws. White fire crawled along old tears and turned the wet edges gray. Behind it, a black root leader wound around the messenger cord and vanished into the scar slit.
Valea moved beside the animal's wounded head.
