and were four strides in width from tip to tip. And he had not seen
Athelvok, for the great bull was on the far side of the little pool, and
Athelvok could not creep round to him for fear of meeting the wind (for
the gariachs, who can see little in the dark forests, rely on hearing and
smell). But he devised swiftly in his mind while the bull stood there with
head erect just twenty strides from him across the water. And the bull
sniffed the wind cautiously and listened, then lowered his great head down
to the pool and drank. At that instant Athelvok leapt into the water and
shot forward through its weedy depths among the stems of the strange
flowers that floated upon broad leaves on the surface. And Athelvok kept
his spear out straight before him, and the fingers of his left hand he
held rigid and straight, not pointing upwards, and so did not come to the
surface, but was carried onward by the strength of his spring and passed
unentangled through the stems of the flowers. When Athelvok jumped into
the water the bull must have thrown his head up, startled at the splash,
then he would have listened and have sniffed the air, and neither hearing
nor scenting any danger he must have remained rigid for some moments, for
it was in that attitude that Athelvok found him as he emerged breathless
at his feet. And, striking at once, Athelvok drove the spear into his
throat before the head and the terrible horns came down. But Athelvok had
clung to one of the great horns, and had been carried at terrible speed
through the rhododendron bushes until the gariach fell, but rose at once
again, and died standing up, still struggling, drowned in its own blood.

But to Hilnaric listening it was as though one of the heroes of old time
had come back again in the full glory of his legendary youth.

And long time they went up and down the terraces, saying those things
which were said before and since, and which lips shall yet be made to say
again. And above them stood Poltarnees beholding the Sea.