One hour: freezing cold that makes my breath visible and my fingers numb. The next: mild enough that I’m sweating beneath my layers. The ice responds to the fluctuation, cracking more violently, releasing meltwater in sudden floods that reshape the terrain around us.
We navigate a newly formed river by crossing a natural ice bridge. The structure groans beneath our combined weight. I feel it flexing, threatening to give way.
Kaster crosses first. Fast. His weight barely registers before he’s on the other side.
I follow more carefully. Each step measured. Calculated.
The bridge holds.
On the other side, old structures emerge from the retreating ice in greater numbers. A village, maybe. Or a trading post. The buildings are skeletal—frames without flesh, bones without bodies. Whatever people lived here died when the freeze came. Their ghosts remain in the architecture they left behind.
Kaster finds a sheltered alcove between two collapsed walls. Stone provides cover from the wind. A partial roof offers protection from precipitation that might come.
“We rest here.”
I don’t argue. My body appreciates the reprieve even if my mind remains restless.
He producesa whetstone from somewhere in his supplies and begins sharpening his blades.
The sound is rhythmic. Metal against stone. A meditation in violence.
I watch him work. The methodical precision of each stroke. The way his hands move with certainty born from centuries of practice. He doesn’t look at the blade—doesn’t need to. His body knows the angle, the pressure, the exact motion required to maintain an edge capable of cutting through divine-made flesh.
The sight does unexpected things to my awareness.
Not attraction. Not exactly. More like recognition. An understanding that his violence serves a purpose—one that currently includes keeping me alive.
“We need to discuss the targeting.”
The words escape without my permission. Kaster’s hands don’t pause. The whetstone continues its steady rhythm.
“What about it?”
“The pattern.” I gather my thoughts, organizing the observations I’ve been collecting since this hunt began. “The Executors at the shrine—they ignored you completely. Bypassed the larger threat to focus on me specifically.”
“I noticed.”
“The Hunters before that. The Scouts even earlier. Every wave has prioritized me over you.” I lean forward, warming my hands near the heat that radiates from his body. “You’re the more dangerous target. Tactically, eliminating you first makes sense. But they don’t.”
Kaster’s rhythm finally breaks. His hands still on the blade.
“You have a theory.”
He knows I do.
“The informant confirmed it. The gods are building these creatures for us. But I’ve been watching the patterns since the border settlements. Every escalation. Every new monster type. Every shift in their tactics.” I pull my hands back from his heat, suddenly too aware of the proximity.
The grinding of ice fills the space where words might have been.
Finally: “Then we keep moving. Southeast. Toward terrain where their advantages diminish.”
“That’s it? That’s your response to learning the gods want us dead?”
He holds my stare. No fear shows there. No surprise. Only the cold calculation of something ancient weighing its odds.
“The gods have wanted things before. They don’t always get them.” He returns his attention to the blade. “We survive. We adapt. We become the problem they’re afraid of. That’s the only strategy that matters.”
I should argue. Point out that fighting gods is suicide, that running might preserve us longer, that the smart move isseparation—removing the threat of combination by eliminating the possibility of combination.
