The first day passed in a blur of riding and brief stops to water the horses.

Gabriel and Adan alternated between a steady canter and a brisk walk, letting the horses recover between pushes. The burning in Gabriel's chest never faded, pulling northwest with constant insistence that made it hard to think about anything except covering distance.

They didn't talk much. Adan wasn't the type to fill silence with unnecessary words, and Gabriel was grateful for it.

By evening they'd covered more than half the distance. They made camp in a clearing off the road, no fire, cold rations eaten in darkness while the horses rested nearby. Adan took first watch without being asked.

Gabriel lay on his bedroll staring up through tree branches at stars that seemed too distant to matter. The burning in his chest had become almost bearable now, as if the magic was satisfied with the progress they were making.

Almost there.

Tomorrow, maybe afternoon at latest.

Sleep came eventually, broken by dreams of basements and torture and a mage's calculating eyes.

Dawn came grey and cold. They were riding again within minutes, pushing the horses harder now that the end was in sight. The landscape changed gradually as they travelled, farmland giving way to forest, villages becoming sparse, the road degrading from packed dirt to barely maintained trail.

Around midday on the second day, they crested a hill and Bridgedon appeared in the valley below. Stone buildings clustered around a river crossing, walls maintained better than most Northern Kingdom towns, and everywhere Gabriel looked he saw Church colours.

Too many Church colours.

"That's a lot of Paladins," Adan said quietly, the first words he'd spoken in hours.

Gabriel's jaw tightened as he counted patrol groups visible from this distance. Three in the market square, two on the walls, another pair checking papers at the main gate. The city felt occupied in a way it hadn't two months ago when he'd passed through as just another traveller.

"Martial law," Gabriel said. "Or close to it."

They descended toward the city gates at a more measured pace. The burning in Gabriel's chest had intensified as soon as Bridgedon came into view, pulling harder now like a dog straining at its leash.

At the gate, guards in Church colours stopped them with raised hands. The older one, a man with sergeant stripes and scars that spoke of real combat, studied them with professional efficiency.

"State your business."

"Personal matter." Gabriel kept his voice neutral, his hood up to hide his eyes. "I have business with a mage."

The guard's expression tightened slightly at the word mage. "Mages are registered and monitored in Bridgedon. Name?"

Gabriel realised he'd never learned the mage's name. She'd saved his life, bound him with debt magic strong enough to drag him across three kingdoms, and he didn't even know what to call her.

"Old woman. Northeast quarter. Shop with blue door."

The guard exchanged a glance with his partner, something passing between them that Gabriel couldn't read. The younger guard opened his mouth to speak but the sergeant cut him off with a gesture.

"Papers," the sergeant said flatly.

"Don't have any."

"Then you're not getting in." The younger guard's hand moved toward his sword hilt, eager in the way young soldiers often were when they thought they'd found legitimate trouble.

Gabriel's hand moved toward his coin purse, preparing to offer a bribe, but the sergeant spoke first.

"Wait." The older man studied Gabriel more carefully, eyes narrowing as he took in the dual swords on his back, the way he carried himself, something in his posture that marked him as more than just another traveller. "You're that one. The one who killed the paladin. The one with the red eyes."

Shit.

Gabriel's hand shifted closer to his sword hilt. Beside him, Adan tensed almost imperceptibly, ready to move if this went bad.

"I'm not looking for trouble," Gabriel said carefully.

"I'm not offering any." The sergeant's expression remained professional, giving nothing away. "But regulations say no entry without papers." He glanced at his partner, then back to Gabriel. "However, if the mage wants to see you, that's above our authority. Let them through."

The younger guard looked like he wanted to argue, mouth opening with protest already forming, but the sergeant's tone left no room for discussion. After a moment of visible internal struggle, the young

The guard stepped aside.

Gabriel and Adan rode into Bridgedon without another word.

The city felt wrong the moment they crossed the threshold. People moved with heads down, conversations stopping abruptly when Paladins passed. Every corner seemed to have a patrol, groups of three or four moving with purpose through streets that should have been busy with normal commerce.

Fear hung over everything like smoke.

"They're not just patrolling," Adan said quietly as they navigated through the tense streets. "They're hunting."

Gabriel had noticed it too. The way guards watched doorways, the way they studied faces, checking everyone against some internal list of acceptable and unacceptable. This wasn't normal security. This was a purge in slow motion.

They headed northeast, following half-remembered streets toward the shop with the blue door. The burning in Gabriel's chest grew unbearable as they got closer, hooks dragging through flesh, pulling him forward with magic that wouldn't be denied much longer.

There.

The shop materialised between a tanner and a closed bakery. Faded blue door, no sign, nothing to indicate what was sold inside. Exactly as he remembered.

Gabriel dismounted and the second his boots touched ground, the burning vanished completely. Just gone, like it had never existed at all.

He stood there for a moment, breathing hard, his chest aching where the pull had been constant for two days.

Adan dismounted beside him and studied Gabriel with concern. "You alright?"

"Yeah." Gabriel rolled his shoulders, testing the absence of pain. "It's done pulling. We're here."

They tied the horses to a post and approached the door. Gabriel raised his hand to knock.

The door swung open before his knuckles touched wood.

An old woman stood in the doorway, grey hair pulled back, lined face that spoke of decades lived hard, and eyes that calculated everything they touched. The mage. She looked exactly as Gabriel remembered, down to the slight smile playing at the corners of her mouth.

"I was wondering when you'd arrive," she said, her voice dry and cracked like old leather that had seen too much sun. "The debt always collects itself. Come in."

She turned and disappeared into the shop's darkness without waiting for a response.

Gabriel and Adan exchanged a glance. Then they followed her inside, ducking through the low doorway into shadows that seemed thicker than they should be.

The door swung shut behind them with a sound like finality.

The shop was exactly as Gabriel remembered. Cluttered shelves packed with bottles and dried herbs and things preserved in murky liquid that might have been plant or animal or something worse. A single lamp cast shadows that moved wrong, bending and twisting in ways that had nothing to do with the flame. The air smelled like copper and old parchment and something underneath that Gabriel couldn't identify but made his skin crawl slightly.

The mage settled into a chair behind a scarred wooden desk that looked older than the building around it. She gestured to two stools across from her with one gnarled hand.

"Sit."

Gabriel remained standing. Adan moved to cover the door without being told, positioning himself where he could watch both exits and intervene if needed.

The mage's lips twitched in something that might have been amusement. "Cautious. Good. You've learned something since we last spoke, though apparently not enough to avoid owing me debts." She pulled a pipe from her desk drawer and lit it with a gesture that involved no flint or tinder. "Let's talk about what you owe me."

"What do you want?" Gabriel kept his voice flat, giving nothing away.

"Straight to business. I appreciate that." The mage drew on her pipe and exhaled smoke that was too blue, too thick, hanging in the air longer than natural smoke should. "You owe me a debt. I saved your life with an illusion that fooled many Paladins and the other church dogs. That kind of magic has a price, boy."

"I know."

"Do you?" Her eyes were sharp, cutting through the smoke and shadows to pin him where he stood. "Because you look like you're expecting me to demand your soul or your firstborn child or some other theatrical nonsense."

Gabriel didn't respond. Debt magic was binding in ways that normal contracts couldn't match, and he had no idea what price she'd set or whether he could pay it and remain himself afterwards.

"No need for dramatics," the mage continued after a moment. She tapped ash from her pipe into a dish that looked like it was made from something's skull. "I'm practical. Souls are difficult to store and children are useless to an old woman with one foot in the grave already." She met his eyes directly. "I want something much simpler. A life for a life. You kill someone for me, the debt is paid, we never speak again."

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