"A Soulkin?" Brennar thumped his mug so ale splashed over his knuckles. His cheeks were warm, his grin wide. "Where's mine, then? Why don't I get one? I want one!"
Ari set her quiver on the table, calm as stone. "It's a mule, Brennar."
"A mule?" He stared, then burst out laughing. "All this talk of mighty spirits—and the healer ends up with a pack animal! That's rich."
Lyra's look could have cut rope. Brennar's laugh trailed off.
Rowan leaned in, steady. "Think for a second. If the packs are endless, that's food, medicine, spare blades—everything—without weighing us down. That could keep us alive."
Brennar opened his mouth, closed it, then hid behind his mug.
Toren raised a hand, swaying a little. "Okay. I'm lost. You lot keep saying soul this and kin that. Talk straight. What does it mean?"
Ari turned to him. "Do you really believe a hawk and a panther would just choose to follow us through the wild? Hunt when we hunt? Guard when we sleep?" She tipped her head toward the doorway where night pressed against the glass. "They're bound spirits. Partners. Not pets."
Toren blinked, then tried for a joke. "So… pets with rules." His smile wobbled under Ari's stare. "Right. Partners. Got it."
Nyx smirked from her place by the post. "Say 'pet' again and Pan will teach you new rules."
That earned a wave of laughter around the table. Even Brennar's mouth twitched.
Rowan tapped the wood. "Name matters. We can't shout 'oi, mule' forever."
Lyra's voice softened. "Bounty."
Ari nodded once. "It fits."
Brennar tried to rally. "Fine. Blessed mule, endless bags. Can it carry me to bed?"
Lyra didn't bother to answer. The look she gave him said enough.
The tavern was warm and loud. A fiddle sang near the hearth. The smell of bread and meat sat heavy in the air. For the first time in days the noise in Rowan's chest eased. He let it be. He even smiled for no reason at all.
"Tell us what it felt like," Rowan asked Lyra, quieter now.
She rubbed her thumb along her cup. "Like something had been waiting inside me. I fed him because he was hungry. Then… warmth. Not words, exactly. A promise: You fed me. I will carry what you cannot." She looked down, then up again. "Simple as that."
For a heartbeat, the table stilled. Even Brennar looked thoughtful.
Toren broke the hush with a crooked grin. "To Bounty, then. May he carry Brennar when he can't walk."
Brennar snorted. "You'll be the one he drags by the ear, lad."
They drifted into talk that felt like breath after a run—easy, needed. Rowan tipped out a small pouch and counted. "Coin first. We have enough for a week, maybe two, if we're careful."
"Arrows," Ari said at once.
"Herbs, clean cloth," Tamsin added.
"Dried food. Salt," Lyra said.
"Spare bindings for the harpoon," Rowan put in.
"Rope," Nyx murmured. "A lot of rope."
Brennar lifted his mug. "And a small barrel."
"No," Ari and Lyra said together.
"I've haggled in markets since before you could string a bow," Brennar argued, thumping his chest.
"You're ale-heavy now," Lyra said. "You'd pay double for old cheese."
He made a face but didn't push it.
Ari stood, slinging her new quiver. "We'll go. Less talk, more buying."
"I'll help," Lyra said, already thinking in lists.
Tamsin rose with them. "I'll check the apothecary."
Nyx slid off the post and joined the three at the door. "I'll keep eyes on you."
"Pan?" Rowan asked.
"Outside," Nyx replied. "Streets are cleaner when I'm not the only shadow."
The women left in a rush of lamplight and cool air. The door swung shut. Their voices folded into the noise of the room.
Rowan, Brennar, and Toren stayed.
Brennar's mood bounced back. He pounded a rhythm with his palm. Toren tried to sing along, forgot the words, and made new ones that didn't rhyme. Rowan laughed until his sides hurt. For a small slice of time, the road and the raids felt far away.
"Listen," Toren announced, pointing at his own arm as if it were a map. "I am clearly the next chosen. Look at this." He flexed. Not much happened.
"Put that away," Brennar said. "Children are present." He lifted his mug toward a table of old men who booed him for fun.
Rowan shook his head, grinning. "Save the flexing for tomorrow. We've got coin to carry and no Bounty in here."
The innkeep swept by with fresh bread. "Less shouting, more eating," she said, not unkind. "You're scaring the drinks."
Brennar broke the loaf and shoved a heel at Rowan. "Eat, then. Tomorrow we find axes for everyone."
"Tomorrow we find sense," Ari would have said if she were there. The thought made Rowan smile again.
A guard drifted past the window, helmet catching the lamplight. Nyx's earlier words—too clean—tugged at the back of Rowan's mind, then slipped away under Brennar's next story about a boar that had chased him up a stump when he was twelve. Toren acted out the boar with his hands. It looked nothing like a boar. The table behind them clapped anyway.
They ate. They talked. They were loud. It felt good.
Toren wobbled to his feet. "Right," he announced, far too loudly. "I need—" he waved a hand with grand importance— "a moment."
"Try not to fall in," Brennar said, raising his mug.
Toren gave a sloppy salute, nearly bumped a serving girl, bowed to her twice, and shouldered through the door into the night.
Nyx hadn't gone far. She leaned in the entry, eyes half-lidded, watching the street as if it were a chessboard. She murmured under her breath. Outside, a sleek shape peeled away from the dark—Pan, all silent muscle and slow breath. He slid after Toren like water moving downhill.
"Better he's not alone," Nyx said, more to the air than to Rowan and Brennar.
Rowan nodded, a small knot of worry tightening and then loosening when he thought of the panther's eyes.
Inside, Brennar tried to start the boar song again and forgot the first line. Rowan tried to help and made up a new line. A few tables joined in because it was easier than not. For a little while, Havenmoor felt like the picture it painted—safe, bright, simple.
Outside, Toren muttered to himself as he walked the narrow lane behind the tavern. "Left? Right? Someone said a yard…" He squinted at a lantern hooked over a back door, found a bucket and a short fence, and laughed at his own confusion. The night smelled of river and yeast. He braced a hand on the cool wall and breathed, trying to steady the world.
Pan's paws made no sound. He moved along the alley's edge, ears pricked, tail low, every line of him ready. A single light swung at the far end, painting the stones gold, then gray, then gold again.
The air shifted.
Toren didn't see the first hand. It came out of the dark and covered his mouth. Another tugged a rough cloth down over his face. He tried to shout; the sound died against the fabric. He swung an elbow, slow and clumsy. A hard shove knocked the breath from his chest. His boots scraped stone. The world tilted.
Pan snarled. The sound filled the narrow space, deep as thunder. He sprang—only to meet a flash of iron and the sharp snap of a line thrown low across the ground. A bolt sparked off stone near his paw. Two shapes stepped in with torches, heat and light flaring at once, forcing the panther back into the gloom.
Toren's cry was small and muffled now. Hands dragged him deeper into the lane, past the swinging lantern and out of its reach. The cloth smelled of old grain. The stones under his heels turned from smooth to rough. Voices hissed—short, close, careful.
Pan paced at the mouth of the dark, teeth bared, tail lashing. He could rush and be netted, or he could watch and wait. He watched. He waited. The torches bobbed once and were gone, swallowed by a turn in the alley that wasn't there a breath ago.
Inside the tavern, Brennar thumped the table in time with a song that wasn't really a song. Rowan's smile was still on his face, though it had softened into something tired and gentle. No one noticed the door open a finger-width and close again as Nyx checked the street and slid back into place, eyes hard.
Outside, the night settled like nothing had happened.
Pan sank into the shadow, every nerve tuned tight, and then he slipped away—silent, fast—back toward the door and the woman who would understand what his absence meant.
The noise in the tavern rolled on. The fiddle climbed. Mugs kissed wood. Bread passed hands. Laughter rose and fell.
Toren did not return.