He saw, when he reached the first one, that it was dead. So were the other two.
Yet there was not a blaster mark on them.
Then he saw another thing. One of the monsters had fallen with its jaws slackly open and its teeth were visible. They were blunt and even.
Despite their ferocious appearance, the monsters were only herbivores.
The three fallen guards were getting to their feet, apparently unharmed. Along the north perimeter the attack was over as suddenly as it had begun; the leader of the monsters lying dead against the guard line and all the others still alive fleeing wildly back into the forest. Quiet came, broken only by the growling of the dog out near the two monsters Thane had killed.
He turned his light on her, then went closer to make sure he had seen rightly.
She was fighting something on the ground, green-eyed with fury as she ripped and tore at it. But there was nothing there. Nothing.
"Binkie!"
The dark haired woman was coming toward them, wraithlike in a white sleeping garment. The dog turned away, with a last rip at the nothing it fought, and saw the three guards the monsters had knocked down. She froze, like as though she saw something she could not believe.
Then, deadly with menace, a growl vibrated in her throat and she crouched to attack them.