The one hundred and twelfth Obscura died badly.
That was the only kind of death Kaneas had left to give.
His blade cut through black mist and something that might once have been bone.
The creature came apart with a sound like wet ash dragged across stone, collapsing into itself until only a small dark core remained, cracked and leaking smoke.
Kaneas did not pick it up.
He did not have room.
He stopped taking them nearly two days ago.
He did not even have time to organize his pack, let alone grab yet another core.
He barely had breath.
The Dead Pass stretched behind him in a wound of gray stone, black sand, broken ridges, and old battlefields where nothing grew straight.
The air tasted of rust.
The ash storms cut skin.
Twice since dawn, the road had vanished beneath shifting slopes.
Three times, something without eyes had followed him through the fog.
He had killed everything that reached him.
That did not mean he was winning.
Kaneas leaned one hand against the mountain wall and forced himself around the next bend.
His legs shook.
His ribs burned where something had struck him two nights ago.
A cut along his left forearm had reopened so many times it had stopped pretending to close.
Toren was still ahead.
That thought moved him when muscle no longer wanted to.
Toren had roads.
Toren had wagons.
Toren had food, horses, men, and time.
Kaneas had the Dead Pass.
And then, impossibly, he smelled stew.
He stopped.
Not because he wanted to.
Because the smell was so out of place that his body decided danger had become confusing enough to require stillness.
Meat.
Root vegetables.
Pepper.
Something rich and sweet beneath it, thick enough to make his empty stomach twist painfully.
Kaneas pushed away from the wall and rounded the bend.
A man sat beside a fire.
No.
Not a man.
A kitsune.
Orange fox ears rose from long orange hair that fell past his shoulders, with two long bangs wrapped loosely along the sides of his face.
Red markings curved beneath his eyes and along his cheekbones, bright against sun-warmed skin.
His clothes were travel-worn but fine in their own careless way, layered beneath a cloak that looked as if it had crossed half the continent and found the experience mildly amusing.
A pot simmered over the fire.
Beside it lay bandages, potion vials, ointment tins, clean water skins, dried fruit, spare gloves, a folded blanket, and enough supplies to make Kaneas immediately distrust every single one of them.
His hand moved toward his sword.
Before his fingers reached the hilt, the kitsune spoke.
“Well now, that one took you quite a while, didn’t it?”
Kaneas froze.
The kitsune stirred the pot.
“Makes what…
one hundred and twelve of them now since you entered?
Quite impressive.”
The fire popped softly.
Kaneas measured the distance between them.
Then the angle.
Then the man’s posture.
Loose.
Open.
Careless.
Wrong.
No one sat carelessly in the Dead Pass.
No one cooked beside an open fire in a place where smoke attracted things that remembered hunger better than life.
No one counted another man’s kills through ash storms and mountain turns unless he had been watching for a very long time.
Kaneas did not draw.
He knew with the kind of certainty that kept people alive that drawing would not help.
The kitsune smiled as if he had heard the decision.
Kaneas ignored him, crossed to the supplies, uncorked the nearest potion, smelled it once, then drank.
It burned down his throat.
His vision sharpened.
Pain returned more clearly, which was not an improvement, but at least it returned honestly.
“Too tired to argue,” the kitsune said cheerfully, “too wounded to resist temptation.
Help yourself to whatever you need, my young friend.”
Kaneas opened an ointment tin and began spreading the salve across the worst cut on his arm.
“Well,” the kitsune added, tilting his head, “actually, I suppose giving permission came too late.”
He laughed.
It was a bright sound.
Entirely wrong for the place.
“Just spare me at least a bite to eat too.
I am also quite famished.
The food sources out here are abysmal.
Truly dreadful.
I found something that looked like a root yesterday, but it hissed at me, which is generally a poor sign in cuisine.
Though not always.
There are islands south of Aetheris where hissing vegetables are considered a delicacy, but I suspect that has more to do with local pride than flavor.”
Kaneas wrapped his forearm in clean cloth.
The kitsune continued, “The meat, thankfully, came from a ridge goat.
Or something pretending to be a ridge goat.
It had too many horns, but I have found that horn count rarely affects stew quality.
The vegetables were obtained through honest trade from a terrified caravan master three valleys back.
Terrified of me, not the vegetables.
I felt that distinction mattered.”
Kaneas tightened the bandage with his teeth.
The kitsune tasted the stew.
“Too much pepper.
No, wait.
Just enough.”
Kaneas finally looked at him.
“Who are you?”
The kitsune’s ears perked up.
His smile turned brilliant.
“Ah!
The question has been asked.”
He placed one hand proudly against his chest.
“Why, I am Hark.
Traveling adventurer, lesser-known cook, and all-around friendly beastkin.”
He scooped a piece of meat from the stew and ate it.
Then he pointed the spoon at Kaneas.
“But of course, you are not asking that.
You want to know why I am here, in this dreadful place.”
Hark closed his eyes, rubbed his chin, and nodded solemnly.
“Perhaps it is fate.”
Kaneas stared.
“Or perhaps,” Hark continued, opening one eye, “I am simply a bored and extremely old man who likes interfering with the plans of evil villains.
You may pick the answer you like best.”
“The first sounds true,” Kaneas said.
“But unlikely as an excuse to be here.
The second sounds false, but likely as an excuse to be here.
I dislike both answers.”
Hark’s smile widened.
“Very astute of you.
So true.
I am actually not a known cook at all, not even lesser.
I am also not bored, so you are correct there too.
Congratulations.”
Kaneas stared at him for another breath.
Then reached for another potion.
Hark watched approvingly.
“Practical.
I appreciate practical.”
Kaneas drank only half this time.
“Heard anything about suspicious movement heading east?”
“Yes, yes, of course.
You are after the caravan.”
Kaneas’s hand stilled.
Hark lifted the spoon again.
“Large one.
Too many wagons.
Too many guards.
Too much quiet beneath the noise.
Moving under trade papers with very expensive lies tucked into the margins.”
“How far?”
“From here?” Hark looked toward the eastern cut of the pass as if distance were a smell.
“Three days ahead of you.
Perhaps a touch less if you are willing to become unreasonable.”
“I am already unreasonable.”
“Not enough.”
Kaneas tied the second bandage.
Hark leaned back on one hand.
“You will need a horse.”
Kaneas said nothing.
“Actually, three.
One waiting beyond the ash gate below us.
A second near Cinderwell, if the poor beast has not eaten the reins.
A third at Blackford Cairn.
That one bites, but only people with poor character.”
Kaneas looked at him.
Hark blinked innocently.
“Do not worry.
I told it to make an exception.”
“I may have used your supplies like my own and eaten your food,” Kaneas said, “but that does not mean I trust you.”
“As you shouldn’t.” Hark nodded.
“Or really, as you should, for now.
Trust is such a situational instrument.
Very sharp when useful.
Very ugly when misplaced.”
He stirred the stew again.
“I am somewhat forbidden from moving personally in the matter at hand.”
Kaneas narrowed his eyes.
“Forbidden by whom?”
“Oh, old rules.
New promises.
A few inconvenient oaths.
The usual chains men forge for themselves and then pretend are noble because they shine.”
“That means nothing.”
“It means I cannot walk the road for you.”
“But you can leave horses.”
“Apparently.”
“And supplies.”
“Clearly.”
“And count one hundred and twelve Obscura.”
“I was bored for part of it.”
“You said you were not bored.”
“Not overall.
Briefly.”
Kaneas did not like this man.
That was not the problem.
The problem was that he was beginning to believe him.
Hark ladled stew into a bowl and held it out.
Kaneas hesitated.
His stomach made the decision before his pride could.
He took the bowl.
Hark brightened.
“There.
Much better.
Threats always sound more convincing after stew.”
Kaneas ate quickly.
Too quickly.
The warmth hit his body harder than the potion had.
For a moment, he hated how badly he had needed it.
Hark did not comment.
That was the first considerate thing he had done.
When Kaneas finished, Hark’s expression changed.
Not fully.
The smile remained, but something ancient looked through it.
“I require one thing in return for my supplies, my horses, and my aid.”
Kaneas set the bowl down.
There it was.
“What?”
Hark stood.
The air around him shifted.
Not dramatically.
No grand spell circle opened.
No firestorm answered.
No mountain trembled.
But the Dead Pass went quiet.
Even the ash stopped moving for a breath.
“Save the boy,” Hark said.
Kaneas did not move.
Hark’s red-marked face softened.
“The girl too, if you can.”
Kaneas’s fingers curled.
“You know them.”
“I know enough.”
“Who are you?”
“Hark.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the answer I am giving.”
The kitsune stepped closer.
Kaneas let him.
He could have stopped him.
No.
That was a lie.
He could have tried.
Hark placed one hand on top of Kaneas’s head.
Power surged through him.
Kaneas nearly dropped to one knee.
Water wrapped his body first, cool and clean, sliding into cuts and under bandages, washing out ash, poison, and clotted blood.
Then heat followed.
Fire, but not burning.
It moved beneath his skin, warming bruised muscle, closing torn flesh, driving cold from bone.
His arm sealed.
The split at his brow vanished.
Purple-black bruises faded through green, yellow, and then skin.
The cracked pain in his ribs lessened until breathing no longer felt like dragging wire through his chest.
Not healed completely.
The deepest wounds remained.
They were better, if only slightly, but hindering and noticeable still.
However, it gave him some hope that he would not break before the end of the journey.
His muscles still ached.
His exhaustion still sat heavy behind his eyes, but his body was mostly healed.
Strength returned, not mental strength, the one he needed most, but physical.
Not all.
Enough.
Kaneas inhaled.
For the first time in days, the breath did not hurt.
Hark removed his hand.
“This is all I can do for you, young one.”
Kaneas flexed his fingers.
He was not whole.
But he was close enough to become dangerous again.
“Why?”
Hark turned away.
“Because the fate of the world may very well depend on the outcome of your efforts.
”
Kaneas took one step toward him.
“Hark.”
The kitsune looked back.
For a moment, nine shadows moved behind him where one should have been.
“Good luck,” Hark said.
“May we meet again under better circumstances.”
Then he turned to mist.
Orange hair, fox ears, red markings, cloak, smile, and shadow all dissolved into pale vapor that scattered through the ash wind.
The fire remained.
The pot remained.
The supplies remained.
Kaneas stood alone in the Dead Pass with a half-empty bowl beside him and enough confusion to slow a lesser man for hours.
He gave it three breaths.
Then he gathered what he needed, found the first horse exactly where Hark had said it would be, and rode east.
Toren was still ahead.
But for the first time since entering the Dead Pass, Kaneas was gaining.