The embers in the small, stone hearth were dying, collapsing into a heap of glowing orange that threw long shadows around the small room. Outside, the wind shrieked against the heavy timber walls, as if trying to find a way into the warmth contained within. The air in the room was thick with the scent of woodsmoke, and the faint remnant of burnt stew they had shared.

Barison sat on a rickety chair that groaned under his weight, his large frame swaddled in layers of wool and fur. His hands, calloused and mapped with the fine, blue veins of age, rested on his knees, trembling slightly. He had no heart for the jaunty songs of the monasteries tonight, no breath for the parables of the Cantor. The words of the innkeeper, Miara, had awoken something that he had spent fifteen years trying to block from his mind, and now the ghosts were out, pacing the small room.

He did not fear the memories, or he told himself he did not, but he could not shake the feelings each memory brought with it. He knew he was a better man than he had been, but could being better alone absolve him of his past crimes? He breathed out, heavy, tired, and with the breath, his mind relaxed. He knew the answer, knew that the Cantor forgave all transgressions, but hearing Miara’s words in front of the child he now protected, it felt like an accusation. Like he was protecting Ester only to make up for his mistakes, and not because she was a life of her own worth guarding.

Beside him, Ester sat still, lost in her own thoughts. She had been staring into the fire for what felt like hours now, expression a blank mask that revealed nothing of the storm within. Barison looked at her sideways, seeing the flicker of the orange light dance across her dark pupils. He could not shake the feeling of accusation in her stony silence now.

“Is it true?”

The voice was not the one he expected. It was not the high, clear tone of the girl who had once walked Marchand’s palace grounds. It was a hoarse sound, low and rasping like she hadn’t had water in a year. But there was strength too, the faintest glimmer of a mind well able to dissect Barison and leave him bare, should she choose.

Barison turned to her, blinking, searching her face, not believing that she had truly spoken the words, perhaps it had been only a figment of his own imagination. But Ester was looking at him, chin lifted, eyes sharp. He could not say what emotion etched her face, but he could see that the fog that had shrouded her mind since the night of the fire had not just lifted; it had burned away, leaving something hard in its place.

He opened his mouth to offer a jovial deflection, a merchant’s lie wrapped in a preacher’s blessing, but the words died in his throat. He looked at her, really looked at her, and realized that the child he had been shepherding was gone, and maybe had never been there to begin with. He had been so caught up in what he saw in her that he had never noticed her for what she was. This was no Northern girl who had miraculously survived the snow and been brought to him by the Cantor; this was a Royal of Marchand, and while the Cantor had placed her in his care, there was another reason for her appearance in his life. He did not know yet what it was, but he had to trust there was a greater plan. With that knowledge he knew he could not lie to her now, could not keep the secrets bottled up from her if she had been placed there by the Cantor. That would be a sin greater than any he had committed in the North.

Barison let out a deep sigh. It was the sound of a man finally setting down a burden he had carried across continents. He slumped back into his chair, the wood creaking in protest.

“Some of it,” he said, his voice thick, but not wavering. “Some of it is the truth, and the rest... the rest is the story the world tells when it doesn't have the stomach for the reality.”

He reached for the small flask of wine he had procured from Miara, his fingers tracing the cold metal. He wanted to drink it, but he chose not to, instead turning it slowly in his hands, gazing down at the faint scratches and feeling the comfort of its weight.

“I was not always a man of the Cantor, sister Ester. I was not always a man who sought the light in others. I suppose it's been at least twenty years ago now. Time has a way of slipping by, and I’ve lost the exact count now. But back then I was a man of hollow heart, ruled by a greed that was as bottomless as the sea. I lived for the clink of coin and the thrill of a successful deceit.”

He paused a long moment, considering, recalling the misery he had caused and wondering that he had been so cruel.

“I was not a good man, and there came a point where, in the Empire, I had burned every bridge I crossed. Cheated friends, betrayed partners, and left a trail of ruined lives in my wake until Klejnot itself spat me out. Do you know, I don’t think I ever lived a moment of my life for anyone but myself. There were viler men, more violent, but I don't think there was any quite so self absorbed as myself, and I think that made me far worse than even the bloody Queen of Ara, because at least her actions were rooted in love for someone other than herself. While I did not kill directly with my actions, I did not care if anyone was hurt by what I did. How many were thrown into indentureship because I took everything from them? And even seeing the ruin I caused, I only cared for what others could do for me, what their potential value was.”

He looked into the fire, the twisted memories rising like smoke.

“As the Cantor manuscripts say: ‘The man who gathers gold while his soul withers is like a traveler who carries lead through a desert; he will find his pockets heavy and his throat dry, and he shall perish beneath the weight of his own fortune.’ I was that man. Do you know I came to the Northern Kingdoms not for adventure, but because I had run out of people to rob in Nieśmiertelny. I thought the Northmen would be simple, superstitious fools; easy prey for a man of my talents.”

“I was forty years old then. I thought I knew everything there was to know about the world. And then I met her. Her name was Freyja.”

The name felt strange on his tongue, and unreal to his ears, like it didn't belong to the world. He hadn’t spoken her name since that day all those years ago.

“I suppose she was a homely woman by the standards of the court. Her hands were rough from the loom, and her skin was weathered by the mountain sun. But do you know, in all my travels I don’t think I’ve ever seen a woman more beautiful. She was a woman of quiet strength and a kindness that I didn't know how to process. Why she looked at a man like me, a man with a serpent’s tongue and a fox’s heart, and saw something worth loving, I will never know. But she did. And for the first time in my wretched life, I felt the sharp edges of my greed begin to dull.”

Barison’s grip tightened on the flask, but still he did not drink. He did not want to dull this moment.

“We married quickly. We shared a summer that felt like a lifetime of warmth. I thought I had cheated the world one last time; I thought I had found a heaven I didn't deserve. But the North is a jealous land, Ester. It does not like to see a man happy. When the first winter came, Freyja fell ill. She was pregnant, and the sickness took root in her like a parasite. It sucked the life from her eyes and the strength from her limbs until she was little more than a ghost haunting our bed. To this day I still don’t know what exactly caused her light to fade.”

He closed his eyes, seeing the blood sigils again, the crude, red marks painted on his door by neighbors who feared the ‘Southern curse’ he had brought with him.

“The villagers... they were terrified. They saw her dying and they saw me, the stranger, and they decided I was the cause. They held up stick-wards when I walked the streets, refused to trade with us. They let us starve in our hut while the snow piled up against the windows. I spent every penny I had on importing medicines that did nothing. I sat by her side and watched the woman I loved turn into a stranger.”

“She gave birth in the middle of a blizzard,” Barison whispered, his voice cracking. “A little girl. She was so small, Ester. So fragile. Freyja held her for less than an hour before the light finally left her. She died with her hand in mine, and I... I was left in a house that smelled of death, with a world outside that wanted me dead.”

He fell silent for a long time. The only sound was the crackle of the fire and the distant, rhythmic thud of the wind against the waystation.

“I don't remember the days that followed,” he said, his gaze fixed on the dying embers, both wanting to recall the days, but also fearing what they might hold. “The grief was a grey fog that swallowed my mind. I remember burying Freyja in the frozen earth behind the hut, the ground so hard it broke my shovel. I remember the baby crying. It’s a sound I will never forget as long as I live. And I remember the fear. The absolute, paralyzing terror that the villagers were coming for me. That they would burn the house down with us inside. The thoughts kept me awake for days, and I don’t know what was real and what was fever dreams.”

He looked at Ester, his eyes wet and shining in the firelight.

“I do know that I left. I don’t know exactly when, or how, but I do know I didn't take her with me. Even now I tell myself she was better off with the villagers, that someone heard her crying and took her in, and that by leaving I saved her. But the truth... the truth is that I was a coward. I was a man of greed who had lost his prize, and I ran away from the only thing I had left of the woman I loved. I abandoned my own daughter to the snow, and now I don’t even remember her name.”

Ester didn't move. She didn't flinch. She simply watched him, expression as unreadable as the mountain peaks. Barison had to stop then. After some time he continued, voice regaining some of his usual composure, but none of its warmth.

“I wandered for years and became a worthless ghost in the gutters of a dozen cities. I wanted to die, but didn't even have the courage for that. Eventually, I collapsed in a street in the far South, a continent away from my shame. I woke up in a Cantor monastery. The monks... they didn't ask who I was or what I had done. They simply saw a man who was broken and they set about mending him.”

“I stayed there for five years, learned their tongue, and learned their faith. I learned that the only way to fill the hole in my heart was to spend the rest of my life trying to fill the holes in others. I gave away my titles. I gave away my past. I became Barison Veril, the merchant of furs, and a true man of the Cantor.”

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees.

“When I moved to Marchand, I used the business as a cover. I took the trade routes back to the North every year, not for the furs, but to find her. I went back to that village, Ester. I went back to the hut. But there was nothing there. The village was gone, dispersed by a famine or moved by a lord, I never found out which. No one remembered the infant. No one remembered the Southern merchant. It was as if I had never existed, as if Freyja had never lived.”

“I spent fifteen years searching for a ghost. And eventually, I had to accept that my daughter was gone. But just because she was gone that didn’t mean I could rest. The world was still full of children who needed a chance, and do you know? I think this is what Freyja would have wanted. I accepted that I would never know her fate, and decided to live my life as if every soul I met was her. I shepherded the drunks, the whores, and the lost, hoping that somewhere, someone was doing the same for the girl I left behind.”

Barison looked at Ester, felt the peace settling over him as their eyes met.

“I suppose that is why I took you in, Ester. Not because you are a noble, and not because I seek a reward. But because you are a daughter of the world, and I am a man who has a debt that can never be fully paid. I see the man I was, and I see the man I am, and I find comfort in the chasm between them. The Cantor teach us that we are all fallen, but that the act of rising is what makes us holy.”

Barison reached out and gently patted Ester’s hand. Her skin was cold, but she didn't pull away.

“I may be a drunkard, a failure, and a coward,” he said softly. “But I will protect and guide you as if you were my own, and when you decide you are ready to part ways I will accept that too, and my role will be complete then. In that, I will find my salvation.”

The silence that followed was different than the one before, and Barison no longer feared it. Ester looked at him for a long time, her eyes searching his face as if for any hint of deception. Whatever she was searching for, she didn’t find it. Barison had bared his soul to her; the scars of his life, the deep regret, and the faith that held him together.

Slowly, she nodded. It was not a gesture of forgiveness, she was not the one he had sinned against, but it was a gesture of acceptance. She acknowledged the man he was, and she acknowledged the truth he had shared.

She turned back to the fire, the conversation done, her curiosity sated. Barison felt a weight lift from his chest, a pressure he hadn't even realized was there. He reached for his wine and took a long, slow sip. The warmth spread through him, not the burning heat of the spirit, but a quiet, internal glow. He looked at the girl beside him and saw his own daughter in the tilt of her head and the fire in her eyes. He would never know Freyja’s child, but he would know this one and see her safe.

As the final embers turned to grey ash, Barison finally felt his eyes grow heavy. He drifted into a sleep that was free of the North’s cold whispers, his mind filled with the image of a summer long ago and the sound of a song he finally remembered the words to. He was a man of a thousand scars, but tonight, beneath the shadow of the peaks, he was finally whole.

—-

The morning came with a brutal, white clarity. The frost on the windows had grown into intricate forests of ice, and the air inside the room had turned frigid with the dying flame. Barison woke, joints screaming in protest as he forced himself to move. He looked over at the other bed and saw Ester already awake, sitting up and staring at the door.

The silence had returned, but the tension was gone. There was a new understanding between them; a quiet, unspoken pact forged in the firelight of the previous night.

Barison moved with practiced efficiency as he packed their few belongings back into the small travel trunks. Ester stood nearby, watching the yard below their window. The waystation was beginning to stir with the new day and he could hear the muffled shouts of a sablehand and the clinking of harness chains.

“We have a long day ahead of us,” Barison said. “The climb to the peak of the Dansen Pass is the hardest part of the journey. The air will get thin, and the wind... well, the wind will try to blow the very thoughts from your head. But once we are over the ridge, it is a straight journey down into the valley of the King’s Reach.”

He looked at her, searching for the girl he had seen last night. She turned to him, her face once again a mask of composure, but her eyes held a spark of life that hadn't been there before.

“Are you ready, Sister Ester?”

She didn't speak, but she stepped toward the door, her movements graceful and sure. She paused for a moment, her hand on the heavy iron latch, and looked back at the small, cramped room. Then, she opened the door and stepped out into the hallway.

Barison followed her, heavy boots thudding on the floorboards. As they descended the stairs, he saw Miara behind the counter, her husband still standing in the shadows with his bow. The old woman looked up, her green eyes sharp and knowing.

“Leaving so soon, Preacher?” she rasped. “Thought you’d stay long enough to drink us out of our winter stock.”

Barison laughed, the first genuine laugh since before the fall of Marchand. He reached into his pouch and pulled out several silver coins, presenting them on the counter with a flourish for Miara’s scrutinizing eyes.

“The road calls, sister Miara. And as much as I would love to sample your fine hospitality for another week, I have a daughter to get home.”

He winked at her, and received the old woman's scowl in return. The green eyes turned from Barison to Ester, then back to Barison, expression as unreadable as ever.

“Get on with you then,” she grumbled, swiping the coins into the palm of her hand. “And try not to get yourselves frozen on the ridge. I don't want to have wasted all my fine wine on a pair of frozen corpses.”

Barison bowed low, then led Ester out into the yard. The horses were already hitched, their breath rising in thick plumes. The stablemaster, a man as silent as the stone, handed Barison the reins and stepped back as Barison took them.

Together they climbed into the carriage, the wood groaning under their weight. Barison took up the stiff reins and shook them gently to break the ice that had settled on them. A moment later the horses leaned into the harness, their hooves crunching through the frozen mud of the yard as they turned onto the main road.

The waystation receded behind them, one of the last islands of warmth in the sea of ice around them. The ascent began almost immediately, the road winding upward into the clouds. The trees grew thinner here, their branches twisted into grotesque shapes by the relentless wind.

Barison didn't sing today. He sat in silence, his eyes fixed on the road ahead. He felt the weight of the expanse around him, and the ancient, indifferent power of the mountains, but he was no longer a stranger to these wastelands, and would not be afraid of the North, or its ghosts.

Beside him, Ester watched the landscape with a sharp, focused intensity. She looked at the jagged rocks and the swirling mists as they gave way to grey stone and snow. They were nearing the border now; the place where the Empire ended and the Northern Kingdoms began. Barison knew that the road ahead would be filled with new dangers, with the soldiers of King Casam and the remnants of the old wars, but he felt a quiet confidence. He had a purpose, and he would see the young women to safety.

As the carriage climbed higher, the air grew thinner and colder, until it felt as though they were breathing ice crystals. The sun struggled to pierce the endless grey of the sky, instead casting a pale, ghostly light over the world.

Barison looked over at Ester. Her shawl was wrapped tight around her, her face pale against the dark fur of her collar and the chill of the mountains. She looked at him, and for a fleeting second, she smiled. It was a wan thing, but a wonderful thing to see on her pale face.

“We’re almost there,” he said, though the wind snatched the words from his lips.

They moved on, two small figures in an unforgiving and frozen world, climbing toward the Dansen peak. The North was waiting for them, with its secrets and its silence, but for Barison Veril, he was a man of the Cantor, and he was going home.