Steel and wood jangled as a spiritual wolf chased its prey. A wolf reborn in fury, a wolf which died long and slow, its last moments stolen by a boy greedy for the chance to be a mystic. It had died in agony and now it would have its revenge on the one who killed it. It did not matter that it had lost half its body to a parasitic plant and that there was nothing but death at the end of its path. A ghost did not care for such rationality, not matter how peaceful. And this ghostly wolf was not peaceful.

  A wandering merchant had sold that boy a binding to prevent its death forming a vengeful ghost. That binding had failed and now the ghost carried it as a prized necklace. Kae was going to find that merchant and feed him to the damned ghost assuming he survived, or even got away with his treasure. Assuming they made it back to the boundary ward which would keep the ghost out.

  Running beside him was his sister which meant that failure was not an option. He would make sure she survived unharmed, anything less wasn’t enough. One bite, one swipe of its claws, and there’d be nothing left of her—she was just so small compared to the bounding wolf.

  They had one distinct advantage. The spiritual wolf was a newborn trying to figure out all its limbs, the ghostly and the fleshly. Kae had read a lot in his short time alive, all the temple’s permitted scriptures and all the ones he’s snuck out of the abbot’s private rooms, so he wasn’t surprised that they had this small opportunity to live. The wise pacify a newborn ghost whilst its birthing pangs obscure the senses. That was either from a scripture or a manual on a ritual. As he slipped on a tree root, he cursed scriptures, manuals, and ghosts. They should all just burn together.

  “Keep going!”

  His sister, never hesitating, never pausing. Kae scrambled up, palms smacking on small, sharp stones. The ghosts wolf no longer snarled. It wailed instead, the lament of a grieving widow, a wail that wobbled and sharpened when its fangs snapped down on empty air instead of Kae’s ankle. It stumbled about, failing to change direction, and hit a tree. Half of it, the ghostly half, slid through. The rump and spine, made from fleshly plant material, smacked hard into the tree itself.

  It took the ghost a few seconds to sort out. Kae did not looked back as he sprinted through the forest. His lungs ached but he kept going, kept running. A violent crack shocked him to greater speeds. As he pushed against a tree it change direction, he saw that the ghostly wolf was free, and it had left a cloud of sawdust where there had been a tree. Kae… he chose to find new reserves of strength and keep running through the forest.

  At the end of the path was a stone pillar a little taller than he was. Those pillars formed the perimeter of the village’s protection. More accurately, the town and its attendant villages were within the barrier. Kae didn’t care. He just ran faster, feet pounding, heart racing. The ghost’s warbling wail drew nearer. He could feel the frigid, deathly wind that counted as breath. His sister stumbled at the last moment.

  Kae leapt at her and slammed into her. She yelled. He shouted an apology. They tumbled together and landed in a sprawl. Past the boundary line. In safety. A gong resounded behind them. Kae scrambled off of her, pulling his siter away where the vengeful ghost had rebounded off the barrier. It landed awkwardly, then reconfigured its body to be upright in the strangest fashion Kae had ever seen. It glared at them with its strange blue eyes. Then it leapt again.

  The spiritual wolf slammed flat against a mirror-like surface. It glowed bright yellow. The wards were older than the village. A stupid ghost wasn’t going to get through them.

  He threw his head back and laughed. Laughed till his lungs ached. Though that may have been the desperate sprint.

  Elkaera stared at him. “You’re my least favourite brother and I’m including the dead ones.”

  And people thought Kae was the morbid one. He grinned back at her and reached out, setting to rights her robes, patting away the patch of dust in her dark hair. A few leaves later and she looked… well, she looked more unkempt than she had in years, even after training, but that was besides the point.

  “But, my dear sister, look at what I’ve found. A treasure to become a mystic. Shouldn’t that at least make me worth more than the others.”

  “If you achieve something. If you earn your mortal attainments and become a legend, then maybe you’ll be useful to me. Until then, you’re proving to be dead weight that gets me dirty and takes me to the worst places. These stains will never come out. No wonder you look homeless if this is what you do all the time.”

  She had a few grass stains. That was a light cost to survive a ghost attack. He smiled at how fussy she could be, shaking his head. He checked his inner pocket and found that heart-shaped fruit. It resembled a human heart, which made him assume wolf hearts were largely the same. Besides the orange sheen, he would have just assumed it was a dried heart. The Bloodsoaked Beast Fruit was aptly named. Getting it was certainly a bloody enough experience.

  “Let’s go. I want to figure out a way to distill this fruit before the day’s over.”

  He turned his back to the boundary. And froze where he stood.

  The wolf stared at him.

  Kae stared back.

  “I think you’re about to be another dead brother as well.”

  If his voice hadn’t been stolen by terror, he might have cursed out his sister. As it was, took a step back. Behind him, the ghost warbled. A new note entered this warble. Regret? Grief? Some animal emotion no human could understand?

  Kae didn’t want to know. He just wanted to know why Istrava had placed all these challenges before him.

  ***

  Two wolves.

  There had been two wolves all along.

  It explained how the first wolf had lived so long. A mate, a sibling, a packmate. Bringing food, digging holes for water.

  And now this wolf was mutated as well.

  Its eyes were red all the way through, a uniform shade that struck him to the heart with fear. It stood taller than Kae and its white fur looked razor sharp at the tip. Where it walked, it left behind smoking pawprints as though the world rejected it. Which it should.

  But Kae wasn’t going to tell it that as it padded past him, walking towards the barrier. The two wolves were of the same needlessly big size but of entirely different natures now.

  The living wolf bumped its snout against the ward, not caring at all that it sizzled, smoke rising. It was focused on its equal.

  “Demon,” Elkaera hissed.

  How?! Demons couldn’t make it past the barrier. That wasn’t… there had never been a demon within the wards in the village’s history. He knew that. Everyone knew that. And yet, what was known was clearly a damned lie.

  The demon-tainted wolf pulled back. Kae saw the burned flesh on it heal over as it padded back and forth. He took a step back. Its head snapped to him, lips curling to reveal teeth that were a bit too long, a maw that emitted a reddish smoke. He was not moving again.

  The spiritual wolf made itself small. He didn’t understand it. It lost its mass whilst the leafy tendrils emerging from its rump folded over it, enveloping it till it was a plant-shaped wolf instead of a ghost shaped wolf.

  The spirit beast walked through the ward as though it was not there.

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  So they had demons inside the wards and ghosts could evolve new ways to subvert the wards. Lovely. At least this was proof Kae was destined to be a mystic. Adventures like this were a mystic’s bread and butter. Now he just had to figure out how to kill it before it tore out his heart and ate his liver.

  The two wolves circled each other. They must have both been regular wolves that hunted a spirit beast and gorged on it, growing strong, sharing it and growing great together. Just smart enough not to attack humans. Intelligent. He saw it in their eyes, demonic red, ghostly blue, one unmade in death, the other ruined in life.

  And as Kae worried they would find kinship again, they proved him wrong. They tore at each other with reckless abandon, snarling, biting, clawing, killing.

  Whatever had bound them, kinship, love, a shared pack, it had fallen to the wayside now. They hated each other. Saw only a vicious rival for territory.

  Whatever they saw, they didn’t care at all when the siblings ran.

  ***

  They were running through a pear rows of pair trees when the battle was concluded only five short minutes later. One mournful howl pierced the world. Kae felt a deep fear infect him. He didn’t know which had won but he didn’t trust that things would end peacefully.

  Nowhere close to the village and even if they did get there, they’d be at Malva’s grinding house. The old lady was stern, but he didn’t think a demon-tainted wolf would care.

  “She could be a good distraction,” his sister argued, understanding his thoughts before him.

  He frowned. There was a lot he’d do, but Malva was good people. He shook his head and took her arm in hand, cutting a path northward. He hoped he was remembering right as they clambered down the hard orange slopes of a gully. They startled a pair of rabbits. He ignored that. Where was it? Was he wrong? No, he was certain—

  There. He banked left in the path covered by shrubbery and old plants. Those hadn’t been there last he was here. They ran through the narrow path, getting thwacked in the face by dried trees, scraping their robes and skin against the winding path. Had they really done this when they were young?

  It appeared almost from nothing. There! Safety!

  It was an island in the middle of a pond. Kae had played there when he was younger. Ran here with his brothers before it all went wrong, when he hadn’t known how eagerly life would grind down his hope. Once, he’d tried drinking the water—something which had his oldest brother tackling him to the ground and forcing him to spit it out. A person could float on this pond with no issue. Salt did that, apparently.

  On the island were the same reddish rocks from earlier. Saltstone. A ring of stone nearly as tall as him. However long they had been here, they had leeched into the pond until the water was so toxic as to kill a person who drank it.

  His sister needed no explanation. She waded across the log bridging the island and the pond’s edge. She settled into the center of the salt circle and retrieved a talisman. Then, she began praying.

  Kae himself took his carving knife and began inscribing the basic protection runes every monk in the temple knew. He carved them across four of the stones. Then he turned the blade on himself. Blood welled on his thumb which he impressed upon the runes. The carved runes eagerly took his blood.

  Just in time because the demon was upon them. Kae didn’t know if that was the better outcome. Ghosts and demons were different. If he wasn’t so nervous, he might be able to recall those differences.

  Its paw entered the water. Its paw was engulfed in a sudden, violent smoke. It skittered back, hatred gleaming in its red eyes.

  Too much salt killed humans. Too much salt banished demons.

  He grinned and retrieved his rosary. The other thing that could banish a demon was prayer. He didn’t have the resources to pacify a ghost but a demon? Oh, that he could deal with.

  It approached again, this time going for the log. It found the same happened. Then, it roared at them. Red light spilled from its maw. It was a wrongness so profound it made Kae’s stomach lurch violently, evil forcing itself upon the world.

  The salt on the log began to burn.

  ***

  Ash coated his fingers as the sealing talisman burned under the gleam of the demon’s light. Kae would have minutes before it could cross the water line and paint the water red. Without the right banishment prayer, he could no more stop it than he could stop the sun rising. As he finished his prayer, his sixth prayer bead turned black as it burned away.

  “Just throw the stupid fruit away.”

  “No! If I don’t get it, I’ll never become a mystic.”

  “And if you die here, you’ll never become a mystic anyway.”

  She was right. Elkaera tended to always be right. His prayers weren’t working. The blood he’d used to strengthen the carved runes was burning away, the same as her talismans, same as the beads of his rosary. What they were doing was something like a cobbled-together ritual, a terrible, unfocused, untested, and unfocused ritual whose target was more powerful than the components of it. It was only like a ritual because if they’d tried to make a new ritual, they’d be blown up. This was a basic runic protection taking advantage of the environment and a bit of prayer.

  “Maybe it just wants some elk. Have you ever thought about that?”

  “I think you’ve already made a decision and you’re just lashing out to avoid it.”

  Damn her. Damn the demon. Damn the whole world. He could never get a win. No matter what he did, every victory was always another trap.

  The log split apart, igniting. The stones cracked all at once, broken along seams of weakness beginning where he’d marked runes upon them. Elkaera’s talisman was engulfed in flames.

  And Kae threw his grand treasure in the air.

  The culmination of years of hope thrown away just for the chance to live another day. Sounded about right.

  The demonic wolf sailed over them. He saw, in a frozen moment, that it caught the fruit between its jaws. Damn it all. Kae was never getting that back. But he might get his revenge right now as he and his sister ran where it had come.

  By the screech, it had landed in the salt water. Good. He hoped it burned in agony.

  He doubted life would be so kind to him.

  ***

  Try as he might, it caught up with the soon. A thunderous blow send him flying, tumbling across the ground like a child’s least favourite toy on a bad day. It hurt. That was his main thought as his brain was rattle about. Then, he remembered he had more important things than pain. Before he fully slowed to a stop, he was twisting to rise.

  His sister was luckier. She had leapt away nimbly and caught a low-hanging branch before hauling herself higher. She wouldn’t get away. The demon was massive, nearly half again as big as its stupid-big size. The paw was the size of his torso. It could jump up easily and gobble her whole. So maybe that was why it focused on Kae who probably smelled like the Bloodsoaked Beast Fruit. Maybe he’d taken on a bit of its essence and the demon wanted to make sure it got its full value.

  “May Istrava strike you down and unmake you!”

  The demon snorted at his final words. What did it matter to invoke a god’s name when he was so close to dying. There was malice in its gaze as it approached, each step like a boulder crashing. It stank of blood and evil and something terribly cold. Sweat slicked his neck and back. Fear had pervaded him. Even he wasn’t dumb enough to think there was a way out.

  Kae reached out to smack it with all his strength.

  It screeched in agony, rearing back.

  Pasted on its snout was a talisman burning through its flesh. He thought maybe it was all adding up. The fight against the ghost wolf, the dip in the salt pond, all the prayers he’d levied. Maybe that was enough to weaken it enough to kill it.

  “Run!”

  But when he looked up, Elkaera had already vanished. Clever girl. Cynical, pragmatic, ruthless. His favourite person in the world. He could always trust her to take care of herself.

  The demon pawed at the talisman. Tore chunks of its snout off with pitch black claws. Cartilage and fat and hide were flung in a bloody heap. It could heal, Kae remembered. The talisman burrowing below flesh and into whatever counted as its spirit was probably a greater threat than losing half its face.

  Kae leapt at it, knife drawn. If he could just get a clean cut in, he could shove the other talisman somewhere vital. Truly put this demon down. Oh, he was going to purify its bones, cleanse its blood, and use its organs to make a replacement potion. It damn well owed him after stealing the treasure he’d found.

  A tail struck him across the chest with a blow that reminded him of being struck with a training staff by the biggest disciple on the field when they were particularly angry. The result was the same reverberating pain through his torso emanating from a narrow line and the same feeling of being tossed about. The demon’s damned tail was enough to send him to the ground, knife clattering across the dirt alongside his hopes of glorious victory.

  This is how he died. Not a mystic, not a legend, just a meal for a demonic wolf. A boy too arrogant and insolent by half. He was helpless. So damned helpless. He let his limbs loosen. Clenched his jaw and wheezed through his teeth.

  Slowly, he dragged himself away his arm, fear deepening as the demon padded towards him, half its snarling snout now exposed and burnt bone. He had to be quick now. Hide what he was doing.

  A paw large as his torso pressed down on his chest, sharp claws trapping him like a cage. He gasped out as the pressure intensified, forced to stare at the demon’s burning red eyes. It wanted to savour his helplessness, grinning, saliva trailing down its gleaming fangs.

  And just as its pounced on him, he raised his hidden knife and struck it in the neck. The demon snarled. Kae snarled back and was rewarded when its flesh erupted in flames as the talisman wrapped around his dagger dug deep into neck. The talisman seemed to become one with the beast’s flesh, digging deep, burning it away. It skittered away, whining, writing violently, pawing desperately at the wound.

  Kae grinned back at it.

  “Enjoy hell.”

  His grin died when a red glow engulfed the demon. A dark, ominous flame rose where the talisman had been placed. He saw in that flame that the symbols upon the talismans were being burned away one by one. When it was done, and parts of the demon were exposed bone and flesh, vines came to cover those wounds like green muscles. They pushed, and pulsated, and reformed the demon’s damaged flesh.

  His knife still trapped inside the demon’s flank popped out and landed hard on the earth. Its tongue stuck out of its mouth in something like a doggy grin. Oh, it had just been having fun. So Kae told it the only thing that mattered.

  “I’ll murder you in hell.”

  His words were punctuated by a screeching whirlwind blowing the demon away.