"Why don't we get you something to eat? I know Fenn, Audry, Ollan and William would love to make your acquaintance."

A feather rests on the rosemary. It is not caught or tangled but balanced, calm in its stillness, as if it chose the spot deliberately. It is not the kind of feather that falls from high above on a casual breeze for its edges are overwhelmingly neat, the white of it clean, but with an odd weight to it. Fenn watches it from the edge of the porch, his eyes steady. One ear tilts forward, alert, the other remains loose. A single mote hovers a few feet away, its light low, pulsing faintly with no rhythm to speak of.

When Fenn moves, his paws land quiet against the dirt. The feather lifts just slightly as he approaches, though the air is still. He presses his nose to it once and inhales. It does not smell of bird, or dust, or even sun. It smells like a space between other smells, like how the air vibrates just before someone speaks. The feather slides from the rosemary and rests near his paw. He touches it again and glances ahead.

Another feather waits a little further on, resting in the groove of the garden path. This one is longer, with the tip beginning to fray. It does not point anywhere, not quite, but its angle invites speculation, and so Fenn takes the invitation without question. Padding forward, body low and loose, tail curling slightly behind him, while a nearby mote follows after him and is soon joined by two more.

The path curves around the edge of the outer vegetable beds, past the place where squash vines overgrow the stones and mini cucumbers threaten to leap into the carrot patches. Focused now, Fenn passes without pause and finds another feather sitting on the rim of the tin bucket by the shed, balanced impossibly well, as if set there by hands. This feather is colored in the same kind of white, though there is a faint stain near the base, darker than the rest. Fenn noses it once, then moves on, for the trail is closer and clearer now and there are more feathers forming a soft arc leading toward the far fence into the woods beyond.

Heading over, dozens of more motes join Fenn, and as he reaches the edge of the property, they all slip beneath the lowest fence rail with ease. On the other side, the path becomes more fragmented, but the feathers continue, one rests on a tree root, half folded as if tucked there. Another is nestled in a patch of moss that seems too fresh for this season.

A third feather lies across the top of a log. This feather is darker, and the tip is curled, its edge browned like something that has been singed, though no fire has come near this part of the woods in years. Fenn does not touch this one, though. He only looks at it for a long moment, then moves on. The fourth feather is even harder to find, tucked beneath a spread of clover. Its shape is smaller too. The white is dulled, the texture roughened. Still, it is part of the trail, he is certain of that.

The ground begins to rise slightly, just enough that the undergrowth thins. The trees are older here, their trunks leaning at irregular angles, the bark thick and coarse, some of it split in deep verticals where age and weather have worked together. The moss thickens along the roots too, and in one spot it has been disturbed not recently, but not long ago either. A slight hollow in the moss is here too, as though something had lain there briefly and then been whisked away on wings. Fenn sniffs it once and keeps walking.

The feathers are more sparse now. They do not end, but they appear with greater pause between them. Some are set carefully others are only half visible, just a glimpse beneath a curled leaf or tucked against a tree's base. Fanning out behind Fenn, the motes begin to arrange themselves differently, like a net drawn carefully through still water.

Fenn does not rush ahead, though, nor does he turn back. His movements instead are patient, for each step places him further from the garden and closer to something that does not yet name itself. Until the last feather in this stretch lies against the base of a crooked tree. The tree has split low and wide, its trunk gnarled like the back of a fist. The feather at its base lies flat against it, the spine running parallel with the crack in the bark. One of the motes dips close, then backs away quickly, its light pulsing once before fading.

Fenn looks ahead, and what he sees, he knows, is wrong.

The shed is too tall and too narrow, made for human shoulders and tools longer than goblin arms. Its door sticks in the frame and has to be pulled with an angle that requires practice. Inside, the smell is thick with oil, iron, and mildew, sawdust clinging to the floor as well, like forgotten snow. Ollan steps inside first, his eyes narrowing to adjust to the low light filtering through a cracked window. The space feels like it belonged to someone who believed in very specific kinds of order. Not Eileen's, someone else's, Ollan doesn't know whose. Ropes hang in loops from the rafters, tools rest in rows along the walls, jars are labeled with numbers that mean nothing to him. He runs a claw along one of the benches, dust comes away from it.

William follows a moment later, he steps inside and breathes in through his nose, squinting at a wall of rusted garden trowels like they might answer for something. Ollan is already at the back, where a wheelbarrow leans sideways under a faded tarp. They had found it yesterday. It was perfect for the task, even if it looked like someone gave up on it long ago. One wheel crooked, both handles split and splintered. The tray too, dented inward, like it once carried something too heavy.

"This one," Ollan says, not as a question but as a declaration. "It's just what we need to fix. It'll carry the stinky dirt for us."

William makes a sound in the back of his throat, something halfway between doubt and amusement. He crosses the shed in a few steps and lifts the tarp further, eyeing the thing with a craftsman's disappointment. It was not a good find yesterday, it wasn't any better of a find today. Tapping the frame with a knuckle, William then squats down to spin the wheel, which refuses to budge. Ollan crouches beside him, his hands hovering near the axle too, but he doesn't reach in yet. Eileen would definitely know what to do, therefore William did too, so he waits.

"They built this too rigid," William mutters. "Too much bolt, not enough breath."

"What do you mean?" Ollan asks, shifting slightly to look at the underside, it looked useable to him just needed a bit of care.

"Non dungeon tools don't listen. You can't make them obey," William says, reaching into a satchel he found in Eileen's closet and pulling out a squat tin. "Dungeon tools want to help. They know it's their job. This tool doesn't know anything. It's useless." He opens the tin, revealing a thick, dark paste with the texture of tar and the smell of charcoal and damp stone. He made it himself this morning, an old trick every goblin knew. Dipping two fingers in, he spreads a long streak across the axle and speaks a phrase under his breath that Ollan doesn't recognize. The paste begins to bubble faintly, then settles, still the wheel does not turn.

Ollan tilts his head. "Why'd you say those words? What do they mean?"

William wipes his fingers on a large dirty towel hanging on one of the nearby walls, but he doesn't respond to Ollan, he just shrugs instead. The silence stretches between them until Ollan gently presses one claw against the inner rim of the wheel. He tests the space between the spokes, finds a wobble that William's work didn't touch. He turns the barrow slightly and listens to the way it creaks as it shifts, William watches from the corner of his eye but says nothing.

"It's tired," Ollan says after a while, almost under his breath, in the same way Eileen would, "It's not useless. Just tired."

William doesn't laugh, though Ollan's line invites it. He rubs his jaw and looks around the shed as if trying to remember something he never learned. "What would you do with it?"

"I'd start with cleaning it," Ollan says. "Because it might want to be clean. It's what Grandma would do."

"That's not fixing it," William replies, but without conviction.

Ollan shrugs his shoulders and then grabs the nearby toolbox, setting it close and opening it up. "It might be the start of it."

William gives no answer, he just steps back and finds a nearby stool, sitting in a way that suggests he might not get up for some time. Ollan doesn't mind, he doesn't ask for help, but he doesn't send William away either. The elder liked being present with all of them, even back in the camps. There was no reason he couldn't watch. Ollan lifts the wheelbarrow and props it at an angle where he can better see the workings. Fetching a small brush from the toolbox, he begins clearing away the grime and old leaves caught in the creases. He works slowly, but not aimlessly, his movements are thoughtful, shaped by listening to how the wheel turns.

Time folds in on itself, the way it does when no one is trying to make it pass quickly. The sun shifts across the windowpane, casting longer shadows into the shed. William starts speaking again eventually, not to argue, but to offer half memories of tools he once knew, wheels he once mended, the names of forgotten metals that humed when struck. Ollan replies only when he means to, focused mostly on the way interlocking pieces of the wheel fit together, the slight tension in the bolts, the give in the wood when it flexes properly.

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When he finally lowers the barrow and tests the wheel again, it moves. Not smoothly, not perfectly, but it turns with a kind of permission it didn't have before. Ollan pushes it forward once, then again. The second time, the wheel turns cleanly. William stands beside him now, arms crossed. "That wasn't a goblin fix," he says, not unkindly more uncertainly if anything.

"No," Ollan agrees. "It wasn't."

With the wheel solved, the handles are worse than they looked at first glance. Each one bears a long, narrow crack that runs just off center, the kind that doesn't break a tool but makes it impossible to trust. Ollan brushes them both clean with a cloth, careful not to press too hard. "Not rotten," Ollan says quietly.

William leans forward slightly, reaching to tap one of the cracks with a short, blunt fingernail. "Dried out more like. Could've used oil seasons ago. Might've held then but its useless..."

"It still might," Ollan answers, not to argue, but to offer another possibility. Ollan begins by wrapping twine just below the worst of the splits, moving in slow, deliberate spirals. Not tight, just firm enough to hold shape without pressure. William watches his hands, then walks to a shelf without a word and he returns with a small tin bottle. The cap is stuck and takes a few seconds of murmured effort to open. The oil inside smells faintly of smoke and lavender. Uncapping it, William tips a few drops along the length of the right handle, then lets Ollan smooth it in with his fingers.

"Use a cloth. The wood won't thank your claws." William mutters, but Ollan smiles without lifting his head.

"This one needs the extra attention." They then do the second handle together, with a cloth. When they are finished, the cracks are still there, but different now darker and more sure of themselves. Not gone, but no longer threatening to split wider. Ollan steps back to inspect the work and he runs a hand over each grip slowly, as though trying to hear whether it holds.

They both look at the barrow again. It leans slightly, a creature not yet ready to run but no longer broken. Ollan nods once to himself and turns back to the tray, checking the edge for warps he might have missed. William returns to his seat without comment, folding his arms again with the ease of someone settling into patience.

Audry finishes the letter slowly, her fingers smudged with charcoal, the soft kind that breaks if pressed too hard. The paper beneath her hands is faintly wrinkled from where her wrist has rested too long in one spot. Her spelling, too, wanders in places, but the words feel steady. It is not a letter to anyone specific for she isn't even really sure why she was writing it. The letter doesn't even have a name and ends with one that isn't quite hers. A signature that curls differently than usual, like the letters leaned in too far before they were done forming. She reads it once, nods without meaning to, then folds the paper into thirds and presses it flat.

The wooden box on the shelf is small, square, and smells faintly of mint and lavender. It used to hold buttons, or string, or something else long used up. She had found it underneath one of the beds in the cottage. She opens it and places the letter inside without ceremony, like setting something down where it belongs. One mote hovers near the shelf for a moment, pulsing faintly. But as the lid closes, the mote retreats into the corner of the room, its glow dimming until it no longer asks to be looked at.

With the letter done, Audry turns to the pantry. The door sticks for a moment, with familiarity, like an old friend teasing. Inside, the shelves are uneven and the jars don't match so she begins to sort them with the kind of quiet urgency that doesn't show on the outside.

No one had told her to do this. She had simply woken up this morning from her dream and felt she needed some things to be in better places than they were now. The same instinct that drew her to write the letter to no one, was drawing her here, where the jars sit in quiet disarray. She does not sort them by size or shape or even contents, but by the way they feel in her hands. The heavy jars finding their way to the back, the ones that give comfort settled in the middle. She places the pickled things along the left and the dry goods on the right. She does not measure or label her system.

She just listens to the shelf and the way it breathes when a jar is set down. She even had to ignore how some of the jars shifted when her back is turned. Others whispering when she touches them, a soft insistence about where they belong. She listens sometimes until that is she finds a jar, small and pale with a cracked lid and filled with seeds she does not recognize. It feels sharply out of place so she sets it on the kitchen table. It does not feel like something Eileen would have let stay, perhaps Fenn would dig a grave for it she muses to herself.

When she finishes, she closes the pantry door with care. She then turns without haste and finds herself on the floor, on her hands and knees, though she does not remember choosing to kneel. There is no urgency in her movement, but there is certainty in the fact that the task felt valid. She begins to look for something she does not know how to name, and that is when she sees it. A tiny woven basket tucked beneath the stove.

It is small enough to be missed unless someone is already close to the ground or reaching for something they have dropped and this basket in particular looks forgotten. She cannot say if she has seen it before, but she cannot say she hasn't either. Its presence under the stove feels both strange and inevitable like its waiting for her.

She lifts it gently and opens it with care. The air inside the basket is cool, undisturbed. Inside are three things, a single doll sized leather glove, soft with wear and too small for anyone living in the cottage, a tiny teacup with a chipped rim, its gold paint faded and rubbed away. The last item, a square piece of shingle, smooth and heavy, no more than an inch wide, with her name carved into it. She knows it is her name, though the letters are shaped in a way she does not recognize. The style is not crude or careless but old, older than she is, older than the cottage, older perhaps than even Eileen.

She takes the cup and glove in one hand and the air grows colder around her. She rises, crosses to the sink, takes a small pot from the cupboard, and sets the objects inside. She fills the pot halfway with water, places it on the stove, and lights the burner. She does not watch it boil for she steps away and walks out into the open air as if forgetting about the boiling pot of water on the stove.

What lies beyond the feathered path and the crooked tree is a clearing. It is not wide, but it is open enough that the light does not filter through branches or leaves. In the center stands a stone, its surface flattened by time but not softened. It is long enough to stretch a body across, broad enough to lie on with arms open. The stone is darkened in uneven patches, as though something once scorched it gently and then vanished. Around its base, the moss refuses to grow. The earth surrounding it is layered with ash, not scattered but settled in the shape of a ring, too even to be chance. The line is narrow, sharp at the edges, as if placed by a slow and careful hand.

Within that ring, the dirt is marked by footprints. They are small, almost delicate, pressed straight into the soft ash and soil. One set moves toward the stone, another moves away, and several more chase one another in tight, looping circles. The pattern is strange but not wild, it suggests motion with a purpose, a ritual danced more than once.

Fenn waits at the edge of the clearing, his paws just outside the reach of the ash. His body is held in stillness, ears poised and alert. Behind him, the motes begin to move in slow circles, tracing their own ring just beyond the first. Their light is low, their path steady. One dips close to the ash, brushes against its edge, and lifts quickly as if startled. The glow around it flares for an instant, then contracts inward, dimming until it is nearly nothing. The others draw in more tightly, responding as if to a signal, and form a loose, silent band around the space.

Near the base of a leaning pine, just outside the ash, rests a low flat stone. A small figure lies atop it. It is a white leather doll, its surface pale, sewn from white ebony like skin. The stitching is maroon, faded but still deep in color. One of the arms is twisted too far at the joint, as if pulled and never righted. The doll has no face, only the soft suggestion of where eyes might have been, worn shallow by time or touch. A single feather lies across its chest, the feather is dark at the root, sticky and curled along the edge. It looks burnt, but there is no scent of fire, the black is not rich but dry, the surface cracked and brittle. It is the color of something that has been damaged slowly and deliberately.

To the right of the stone, a wide tree rises with bark split in deep vertical lines. Its roots bulge from the ground as if pushing upward after long resistance. The trunk bears names stabbed into the wood. Some are fresh, others faded to near invisibility. They climb in no order at first, but as Fenn watches, a pattern begins to take shape. Some names have been poked through, not with a single hit but by many strikes, as if erased by anger or insistence.

The sight worries Fenn but pales in comparison to what Fenn finds near the center of the trunk, spaced with careful intention. It is a name that Fenn knows. It belongs to one of the goblins Eileen has been sheltering, but it is not written in her hand. Instead it is her middle name, carved in a style older than anything Audry has ever touched. The letters are shaped with certainty, their lines clean and heavy. Two names sit above it, both are stabbed out. The name below remains untouched, but the space between them is deliberate, and the meaning behind that space feels like a decision already made. Whoever etched this into the bark was keeping a list, and the pattern is not random.

Fenn lowers his head, ears slightly back. Not flat, not fearful, only measured. He does not feel afraid for what moves through him now is older than fear, something patient and shaped by experiences he didn't know he had. It is not the instinct of a creature avoiding harm, but the practiced quiet of one who knows how to walk without disturbing a place that has chosen to be still.

His paws then begin to shift against the dirt. He does not step forward, though the air in the clearing invites him to. He does not cross the ash ring either for the markings in the ground are too recent, and the center feels too kept, too aware of itself.

From above, a single feather begins to fall. It does not drift or spin. It comes straight down in a line that never wavers. It lands gently beside the altar stone, just inside the ring of ash. The sound it makes is lighter than the sound of dreams forming, quieter than the memory of wind. Behind him, the motes pulse in unison at the site, their glows brightening once, not in alarm, but in response. The clearing recognizes the moment and the motes have found a task for themselves even as their presence grows sharper as if bracing for something.

Fenn senses all of this and so he turns his body slowly, each step placing him further from the center of the clearing. He does not look back at the altar, at the tree, or at the doll with its scorched feather. He knows what has been left there is not meant for him. What waits now is not in the woods and it was clear Fenn was needed elsewhere. He needed to keep Audry away from this, she needed him, he would find her, he would help.

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