The hunting shelter was exactly what it sounded like—a three-walled lean-to made of logs and pine boughs, just large enough for two people to sleep under. A fire ring sat in front, cold and long-unused.
Kael deposited Cadarn on a relatively flat section of ground, then set about gathering firewood with efficient purpose.
"Don't run," she said without looking at him. "You'll make it maybe twenty feet before collapsing. Then I'll have to carry you back, which annoys me. So just... sit there and try not to die while I work."
Cadarn wasn't going anywhere. His entire body felt like it had been beaten with hammers, then dropped from a height, then beaten again for good measure.
He leaned against the shelter wall and watched Kael work.
She moved like someone comfortable in the wilderness—every action purposeful, nothing wasted. Within ten minutes, she had a fire going. Within twenty, she'd strung a rope between two trees and hung their wet clothes to dry.
From her pack, she produced dried meat, hard bread, and a waterskin.
"Eat," she ordered, tossing him some of the food. "You're no good to anyone if you pass out from hunger."
The bread was like chewing leather, but Cadarn forced it down. His stomach, empty for too long, cramped painfully before accepting the food.
Kael settled across the fire from him, eating her own rations with mechanical efficiency.
"Can I ask you something?" Cadarn said after a while.
"You can ask. I might not answer."
"Who hired you? To find me."
Kael chewed thoughtfully. "Does it matter?"
"It might. Are you working for Duke Theodric? Prince Edric? The Crown Loyalists?"
"I'm working for coin. Who's paying is their business."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer you're getting." She took a long drink from the waterskin. "I'm a tracker, Doctor. Not a politician. People pay me to find things—people, mostly. Sometimes criminals. Sometimes deserters. Once a duke's favorite hunting dog." She gestured at him with a piece of dried meat. "I don't ask questions about why. I just deliver results."
"Even if the results mean someone gets tortured? Killed?"
"Even then." Her expression didn't change. "You know what the difference is between me and the soldiers with poisoned arrows? I'm honest about what I do. I don't pretend it's noble or righteous or for the greater good. It's a job. I'm good at it. That's all."
"That's a convenient way to avoid responsibility."
"And what do you know about responsibility, Doctor?" Kael's voice sharpened. "You ran away from your old life, spent twenty years drunk in ditches, and now suddenly you're the tragic hero with a conscience? Please."
The words stung because they were true.
"You're right," Cadarn admitted. "I am a hypocrite. And a coward. And a drunk who wasted two decades running from my mistakes. But I'm trying to fix them now. Even if it gets me killed."
"Why?"
"Because people are dying. Hundreds of thousands of them, potentially. Because of something I did twenty years ago. A lie I helped create." He met her eyes across the fire. "I can't fix the past. But maybe I can prevent the future from getting worse. That has to count for something."
Kael studied him for a long moment. "What did you do? What's this lie everyone's killing each other over?"
Cadarn hesitated.
Then, because he was exhausted and feverish and this woman was probably going to deliver him to his death anyway, he told her.
He told her about the duchess's stillborn son. About the peasant baby. About the switch. About how Duke Theodric—the man currently mobilizing armies and claiming divine right to the throne—was actually the son of a farmer, not royalty.
When he finished, Kael was staring at him.
"You're serious," she said.
"Completely."
"You can prove this?"
"I kept records. Detailed ones. They're..." He paused. "They were with Captain Garrett Hale. Northern Coalition intelligence. Who's probably dead or broken by now."
Kael swore softly. "Do you have any idea how much this information is worth?"
"Yes. That's why everyone wants me dead or controlled."
She stood abruptly, pacing around the fire. "This isn't just leverage. This is... this could end the entire succession war before it really starts. Or make it ten times worse, depending on who gets their hands on you."
"I'm aware."
"And you were just planning to... what? Walk to Northern Coalition territory and testify? Alone? Wounded?"
"That was the plan, yes."
"That's the stupidest plan I've ever heard."
"It was working until you showed up."
Kael stopped pacing. "Who knows about this? About the truth?"
"Garrett knew. Bram knew. The people who hired them know, but probably not all the details. Duke Theodric doesn't know—he genuinely believes he's legitimate." Cadarn leaned his head back against the shelter. "And now you know."
"Now I know," Kael repeated quietly.
She was thinking. Cadarn could see it in the way her eyes unfocused slightly, the way her fingers tapped against her thigh. Calculating. Weighing options.
"How much are they paying you?" he asked. "To bring me in."
"Five hundred gold. Plus expenses."
Cadarn whistled softly. "That's... significant."
"It's enough to retire on. Buy land. Never have to track another bounty if I don't want to." She looked at him. "What are you offering?"
"Nothing. I have nothing. Fifty silver that a dead woman gave me, a knife, and a mule that hates everyone."
"That's what I thought." She sat back down, staring into the fire. "So here's my dilemma, Doctor. I can deliver you to my employer, collect my five hundred gold, and wash my hands of whatever happens next. Easy money. Clean conscience—or as clean as it ever gets."
"Or?"
"Or I believe that you're telling the truth. That this information could actually change the course of a war. Save lives." She laughed bitterly. "And then I'm stuck choosing between a fortune and... what? Doing the right thing? Helping a stranger?"
"Yes."
"I don't do the right thing, Doctor. That's not who I am."
"Maybe not. But you jumped into a quarry to save someone you were supposed to capture. You treated my wound when you could've let me bleed. You're feeding me right now when you could just chain me to a tree." Cadarn leaned forward. "You say you're just a tracker doing a job. But I think you're lying. To me. Or to yourself. Not sure which."
Kael's jaw tightened. "Don't pretend to know me."
"I don't. But I know what guilt looks like. I've been carrying it for twenty years." He gestured at her. "And you've got it too. Buried deep, but it's there."
"Shut up."
"Whatever you did—whoever you failed to save or had to deliver to a bad end—it's eating at you. Has been for a while. That's why you're hesitating now instead of just dragging me in unconscious."
"I said shut up."
But she didn't move. Didn't leave. Just sat there, staring at the fire with an expression caught between anger and something else.
Finally, she spoke. "Three years ago, I tracked a girl. Sixteen years old, ran away from an arranged marriage. Sweet kid. Terrified. I found her in two days." Her voice was flat. Dead. "Delivered her back to her father. Collected my payment. Found out a month later she'd hung herself rather than marry the man they'd sold her to."
Cadarn said nothing.
"That's what I do, Doctor. I find people who are running and I drag them back to whatever they're running from. Sometimes it works out fine. Sometimes..." She trailed off. "Sometimes it doesn't."
"So don't drag me back."
"It's not that simple."
"It is exactly that simple. Let me go. Walk away. Tell whoever hired you that I died in the quarry fall. Take the loss and move on."
"And then what? You stumble north until you bleed out or soldiers find you? That's not mercy. That's just letting you die slower."
"Then help me," Cadarn said quietly. "Get me to Northern Coalition territory. Help me testify. Help me make this mean something."
"And give up five hundred gold."
"Yes."
"For a stranger."
"For hundreds of thousands of strangers who'll die if this war escalates. For the chance to save them." He paused. "For that girl. The one you couldn't save. This is your chance to balance the scales."
Kael's hands clenched into fists. "That's manipulative as hell."
"I know. I'm desperate. Desperate people use what they have."
Silence stretched between them, broken only by the crackling fire and the wind through the trees.
Then Kael stood abruptly. "I'm taking first watch. You sleep. We'll decide in the morning."
"Decide what?"
"Whether I'm turning you in for five hundred gold..." She walked to the edge of the firelight, bow in hand. "Or committing the stupidest act of my career by helping you instead."
Cadarn wanted to press, to argue, to convince her.
But exhaustion was dragging him down like an anchor. The fever made everything feel distant and dreamlike.
He lay down on the hard ground, using his rolled-up coat as a pillow.
The last thing he saw before sleep took him was Kael's silhouette against the night sky—a lone figure keeping watch, caught between profit and principle.
He had no idea which would win.