Chapter 94: The Trap!
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She laughed softly. "You said it."
"I was unconscious. That doesn’t count."
Fenna shook her head and drew another arrow, the obsidian tip glinting. "Let’s make this clean. One shot, one squeal."
They looked at each other with narrowing eyes, breath slowing. They split.
Zephyr anchored the final cord with a precise twist of his wrist. His fingers moving in fluid, practiced knots. The spider silk twine shimmered faintly in the shifting light. It was almost invisible unless viewed at just the right angle. Stretched taut between two scarred, iron-barked trunks, the web-like grid looked fragile, but it could stop a charging beast three times his weight. The trick wasn’t just the strength —it was the give, the snapback. It would tangle legs, unbalance momentum, and force panic before prey even knew it was caught.
He stepped back, surveying the crude snare. Five horizontal lines, staggered at different heights, each leading to a central drop latch that bound to a tree bark hook. Anything the size of a boar pressing the lowest tension cord would release the entire grid downward, catching limbs and neck alike in a tangle of sticky, bone-strong filament.
Zephyr crouched at the base of the trees, then carefully pried open a moss-colored satchel tied to his belt. Inside, two clay spheres rested in padded loops, each filled with powdered resin. It was crushed dried ember-fronds, and a dash of silver phosphor from the volcanic ground for ignition. He buried one to the left of the snare path, another to the right, pressing soil over them with flat palms until only their disguised fuses like a dried reed bundle peeked out of them.
"Burn-snares armed," he muttered to himself.