Bran didn't panic; he remembered Sol's training from earlier. He dropped his hips, shifted his center of gravity low into the mud, and angled his shoulder-shield upward.
The hound hit the sloped bone-lining and glided right off his back, losing its balance completely. Before it could recover its feet in the muck, Torin lunged forward from the side, driving his heavy bone-knife straight through the soft skin beneath the dog's jaw, severing the vocal membrane before twisting the blade into the spine.
"One down!" Torin hissed, his face splattered with red fluid. "Keep the circle tight!"
Kael was right behind them, using a short, heavy wooden club to smash the muzzle of another hound that tried to bark from the high weeds.
The wood made a dull thud, shattering the beast's nose and forcing it down into the dirt, where Kael quickly finished it with a neat knife-strike to the throat.
