Chapter 23: Minutes You Can Afford
Zane woke with his teeth clenched.
Not from cold—though the stone beneath him held the night like a grudge—but from the way his ribs protested the first breath that tried to be honest.
He kept it shallow.
He waited until the ache stopped climbing.
Beside him, Brann was already awake, sitting in the mouth-shadow of the overhang with his head tilted slightly, listening like the forest owed him an explanation.
No birds.
No insect buzz.
Just the distant hush of the basin and the faint grind of his own blood in his thigh.
"They're up," Brann said quietly.
Zane didn't ask who they were. Out here, it only ever meant one thing.
He shifted enough to check his wraps. The thigh bandage held, stiff with dried plant pulp and old blood. The shoulder still burned, but the burn was a dull ember now, not a flame. The salve Brann had shared hadn't worked miracles.
It had worked limits.
Zane could stand without seeing stars immediately.
He could move without the fever surging like a punishment.
That didn't mean he could work like a healthy man.
It meant he had minutes.
And minutes were a currency.
He sat up slowly and let the dizziness come and go. The forest outside looked unchanged through the slit of light—but it felt different, the way a room felt different after someone had been standing in it a long time.
Zane reached for the small pouch they'd taken—the goblin powder wrapped tight. He didn't open it fully. He didn't need to.
Just the memory of that bitter smell was enough to keep his throat tight.
Brann watched him. "Don't fancy breathin' that again."
"Me neither," Zane murmured.
He pushed the pouch deeper into their stash.
Not a trophy.
Not a solution.
A problem he wanted to keep in a pocket until he had to spend it.
Zane drew a line in the dirt with the edge of his cutter—short, simple. Then a second line.
Brann's brow furrowed. "What's that."
"Two bursts," Zane said. "Then we stop. No matter how good it's going."
Brann gave him a look like he didn't like being told "stop" by a man who still limped.
But he didn't argue.
Zane took that as progress.
He crawled out first, using stone and roots to keep his silhouette broken. The basin below lay open and green in patches, shadowed in others. He didn't see goblins.
That didn't make him relax.
It made him careful.
He moved along the rim line on a route that didn't leave obvious tracks—rock to root to firm soil—until the ground shifted under a certain bush where the leaves were disturbed in a way wind didn't disturb them.
Droppings.
Small.
Fresh.
Not a feast.
But the kind of proof that meant small life still existed here, and small life meant food could be stolen without chasing anything that ran faster than a wounded man.
Brann stopped behind him. "We huntin'?"
"Not today," Zane whispered. "Today we set a question and leave."
He pulled out the bark cord they'd already twisted over earlier days—rough, uneven, but strong enough when doubled. He kept it wrapped tight so it wouldn't snag and announce itself.
Zane tied a loop low to the ground and bent a thin branch into tension. The knot wasn't fancy. It didn't need to be. It needed to hold long enough for something dumb and hungry to step into it.
He set one snare.
Then a second a few paces away, not in a straight line—because straight lines were human, and humans got followed.
Each movement cost him. By the time the second loop was placed, his thigh had started to throb harder and the fever haze had crept closer, softening the edges of the world.
He stopped anyway.
Minutes were currency.
And he'd spent the first line in the dirt.
Zane turned a pale pebble white-side-up under a root knot—his marker. Nothing obvious. Nothing a goblin would bother reading.
Then he backed away, careful to brush down the grass where his knee had pressed.
Erase.
Always erase.
On the way back, Brann murmured, "That'll work?"
"It might," Zane said. "It's not for today. It's for tomorrow."
Brann grunted as if he understood that kind of patience.
They returned to Stonebreak the long way, and Zane forced himself to drink slowly when they reached the shadow of the overhang. He swallowed one bitter berry, let it sit, and listened to his stomach like it was an enemy.
His body didn't rebel.
Good.
He sat until the pressure behind his eyes eased, until his breathing stopped sounding rushed.
Then he tapped the second line in the dirt.
Brann's gaze flicked. "Second burst."
"Second burst," Zane confirmed.
He reached for a straight piece of deadfall he'd dragged earlier—dry, already snapped by time. No fresh sap smell. No loud breaking sound.
Brann watched the branch like he'd been waiting for this. "Finally."
Zane didn't rise to the comment. He set the branch on a flat stone and began shaving the end with the cutter.
Short strokes.
Controlled.
No dramatic scraping rhythm.
He kept the work tight, the blade close, the movements small enough that his ribs wouldn't punish him for twisting.
Shave.
Pause.
Breathe.
Shave.
When his fingers started trembling, he stopped and switched angles rather than forcing power through weakness. The spear didn't need to be beautiful. It needed to be reliable.
He sharpened the tip to a hard point, then smoothed the grip area so it wouldn't tear his palms when sweat came.
Then he made stakes.
Four short lengths cut from brittle deadwood, each shaved into a crude spike. Not for fighting in his hands.
For the ground.
For the places goblins liked to step when they thought they were being clever.
Brann watched him make them without surprise, only a quiet focus that said he understood work like this.
When the last stake was finished, Zane's back was damp with sweat and his thigh felt like it had a heartbeat of its own.
He stopped anyway.
Minutes were currency.
He'd spent the second line in the dirt.
Zane wrapped the spear tip with cloth and tucked it close. Not like a warrior with a weapon.
Like a man protecting the first thing that gave him distance.
Then he looked at Brann. "We move the water."
Brann's face tightened. "Now?"
"Now," Zane said. "Before they find the old place and learn where we breathe."
Brann didn't argue this time. He only nodded once and helped bundle the trough and their small stash into something that could be carried without spilling.
They moved.
Slowly.
Quietly.
Not along the same line twice.
Halfway to the staging hollow near the basin rim, Zane saw it—just a trace on a leaf edge, green-black dust where there shouldn't have been any.
His throat tightened.
Brann noticed the way Zane froze. "Powder?"
Zane nodded.
"Bait," Brann muttered, voice turning hard.
Zane didn't step closer. He didn't kick it. He didn't react like prey.
He crouched, pinched dry soil, and let it fall beside the dust until the trace looked like nothing more than dirty leaf rot.
Erase.
Don't confirm you noticed.
They continued.
At the staging hollow—small, shadowed, easy to miss if you weren't already thinking like a thief—Zane slid the stash inside and rebuilt the cover with leaves and a fallen branch until it looked untouched.
Then he planted the first stake.
Not deep.
Not permanent.
Just enough to mean something.
A line that said: this isn't free anymore.
Brann planted the second without being asked, placing it where a careful climber would set a foot, not where a careless one would.
Zane's chest tightened—not with pain this time.
With satisfaction he didn't let himself enjoy.
Because the forest didn't reward enjoyment.
It punished it.
They were turning back when the basin answered.
A horn call—closer than it should've been, and different from the earlier patterns. Not a frantic signal. Not a hunt cry.
Three short pulses.
Like knocks.
Brann's head snapped toward the sound. "That's new."
Zane's jaw clenched. "Yeah."
Below, in the basin's open patch, a goblin stepped into view carrying a wooden frame with stretched hide.
A screen.
It planted the frame facing the rim like it was building a wall nobody had agreed to.
Another goblin followed with a clay pot.
It didn't throw it.
It set it down carefully behind the screen.
Deliberate.
Prepared.
Not a probe.
A statement.
Brann's voice went low. "They're settin' up."
Zane stared at the screen and felt the shape of the fight changing in his head. A screen meant they could work without showing bodies. It meant they could place powder without exposing a carrier. It meant they could start building a forward point while daring Zane to reveal himself stopping it.
They weren't just hunting anymore.
They were learning how to stay.
And if goblins stayed, the basin would stop being neutral ground.
It would become theirs.
Zane's fingers tightened around the wrapped spear.
The cloth shifted slightly under his grip. The tip inside was sharp enough to matter, not sharp enough to solve everything.
Not yet.
Brann leaned toward him, breath barely sound. "What do we do?"
Zane didn't answer immediately. He watched the goblins below adjust the screen angle with calm hands, like they'd done it before somewhere else.
Then he looked at the stakes he'd planted.
Small.
Hidden.
But real.
He felt his ribs ache, his thigh throb, the fever trying to pull him sideways.
And still—
He was here.
He was working.
He wasn't running.
Zane's voice came out quiet and flat. "We don't charge that."
Brann's eyes narrowed. "Then what."
Zane's gaze hardened on the screen.
"We make it cost them," he said. "Not today with blood. Today with certainty."
Brann didn't ask what that meant. He only watched Zane's face and seemed to understand that whatever came next would be slow, ugly, and deliberate.
Below, the goblins finished placing the pot and stepped back behind the screen.
They waited.
Like they expected Zane to flinch.
Zane didn't move.
He crouched, breathed shallow, and began counting again.
Not minutes this time.
Distances.
Angles.
Routes.
Because the next thing he built wouldn't be a spear or a stake.
It would be a decision the goblins couldn't take back.