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The monster clambered over the wall he made with ease, its claws letting it climb as fast as it ran. Kirima pulled more water from a nearby trough and smashed at the beast’s shoulders, trying to knock it off-balance. Rangi kicked low sheets of flame at the places it tried to land its forepaws, reasoning that it was as effective to break an animal’s root as it was a normal opponent.
That’s right, Kyoshi thought. I’m not alone this time.
The street was wide enough to accommodate her earthbending weakness. She knifed at the air in front of her, and the entire surface of the road began to grind and shift. A fissure opened, and one of the animal’s paws fell in. If she could close the gap fast enough, she could pin it by the—
The monster, rather than avoid the jaws of her trap, dove headfirst into the rift. Its entire body disappeared belowground, leaving a pile of castings behind.
“This thing can burrow!?” Kirima sounded more aggrieved than afraid, like an experienced gambler discovering the table they’d joined was blatantly rigged against them.
Kyoshi felt vibrations beneath her. It was impossible not to, with a creature that size, but they were indistinct and directionless. Not a help in this situation.
“Spread out,” Rangi said, eying the ground.
“Shouldn’t we stay close?” Kyoshi said.
“No,” Rangi said. “Then it’ll get more than one of us in a single bite.”
Kyoshi may have been feeling warm with newfound camaraderie for her gang, but no one had told Wong and Kirima. After hearing Rangi, they immediately leaped onto the roof of the nearest house, elements trailing below the soles of their feet, leaving her and Kyoshi down below.
The soil loosened around them, a perfect circle caving in. Rangi tackled Kyoshi out of the center of the formation, boosting herself sideways with flame jets from her feet. They landed hard on their sides, shoulders bruising. The creature burst through the surface, rearing toward the sky, the ground giving birth to a shape of death that blacked out the sun above.
There was a zipping sound, and then a thud. The animal screamed, and its claws came down short of Kyoshi and Rangi’s bodies. It shook its head furiously.
Another impact, and this time Kyoshi saw it. A smooth, fist-sized stone had struck the beast hard on the tip of its sensitive nose, sending it reeling. She looked up and made out Lek’s silhouette on the roof of their inn, the sun behind him shrouding his face.
“Move, maybe?” he shouted.
A hail of perfectly aimed stones gave them cover, each missile landing uncannily on the one spot that the animal seemed to feel pain, no matter how much it thrashed about. It backed away, trying to hide its nose. As Kyoshi and Rangi fled toward Lek, several arrows struck it in the hindquarters. It turned to face the new threat.
The daofei had gotten over their surprise and were now mobbing the beast, thrusting spears at it and pricking its fur with shortbows. They sought the glory of bringing it down. The animal lashed out with its tongue, sending a row of men falling to the ground, but more swordsmen-turned-hunters stepped over their limp bodies to replace them.
Kyoshi didn’t care to understand the bizarre scene playing out before her. She and the rest of the group ran for the hills.
They arrived at Pengpeng’s cave in the mountainside winded, their legs and lungs burning, to find Lao Ge feeding the bison a pile of cabbages. He tossed them one at a time high in the air for Pengpeng to catch between her broad, flat teeth. There was probably no use asking him how he’d acquired the produce.
“A lot of help you were!” Lek shouted. He was assuming, like Kyoshi was at this point, that Lao Ge was completely aware of what had transpired.
The old man gave him a pitying look. “Fighting a shirshu? That’s just a bad investment of effort. I left as soon as I felt it coming.”
“You knew what that abomination was?” Kirima said.
“It’s a legendary subterranean beast that hunts by scent,” he explained dismissively, like they would have known this if they’d paid better attention to his ramblings. “Supposedly it can track its quarry across stone, water, dirt, thin air. In the old days, Earth Kings would use them to execute their political enemies. For the traitor, let them be hounded by shirshu until they drop where they stand, far from their homes and the bones of their ancestors.”
Lao Ge fed Pengpeng another cabbage. “Or at least that’s how the saying went. Shirshu haven’t been seen in the wild for at least a generation, so I assume this one was being used to hunt a fugitive too. Same as in the days of yore.”
Kyoshi felt Lek’s gaze boring into her. “It was going for you,” he said. “I could see it from the roof of the inn. It was sniffing out your scent. You brought it here.”
She hesitated. Had she been as smooth as Yun, she could have come up with a convincing denial on the spot.
Before she could say anything, she was preempted by the metallic clanking of blades rattling in their scabbards. They leaned over the cave ledge to see a party of swordsmen down below. At the back of the group, exhorting them onward, was Brother Wai. Mok’s inquisitor looked like he wished to speak with whomever he was searching for, very much.
“I can explain,” Kyoshi said quickly. “But maybe once we’re in the air?”
There was silent and unanimous agreement as they scrambled onto Pengpeng. The truth took a back seat to survival.
THE AVATAR’S MASTERS
Pengpeng graced the skies over the plains of Ba Sing Se.
