- TMK -

Katakos inhaled crisp alpine air as he gazed through the scope of his rifle. At the end of the crosshairs, the velvety fur of a white ibex peeked behind a pine. So far, only its hindquarters were visible as the female ibex fed on pink blossoms. While instinct demanded he pull the trigger, experience held him steady. There was a gully carved by snowmelt between Katakos and his quarry. Too early a shot would only wound the ibex, prompting Katakos to follow the beast into a land it knew better than he ever could. So Katakos waited.

           

And waited.

           

Then, as the ibex climbed a boulder for a taste of tender moss, Katakos exhaled and took his shot.

           

The crack echoed along the mountain passes. Bits of half-melted snow fell from the pines. The Katakos’ bullet slit the air, entering the ibex’s eye socket, exploding out the other side in a spray of pink. The ibex’s head listed for a moment while its legs twitched. Then it rolled off the boulder. Katakos slung the rifle over his back, exhaling with satisfaction. He whistled to Gondir, signaling the baliyon it could come from its hiding place.

           

“Come on now.” Katakos leaped onto Gondir’s saddle. “Over the gully.”

           

The baliyon leapt nimbly between the rocks in the ridge. Long claws dug into permafrost as the creature pulled Katakos over the other side of the ravine. There Katakos found his ibex. The bullet had made a clean exit with a hint of splatter on the fur.

           

“Getting better every day. Eh, Gond?” Katakos retrieved a rope from Gondir’s saddle and strung up the ibex.

           

Gondir responded with indifference, climbing the boulder to devour the moss the ibex died for.

           

“Save some room. Can’t eat all of this by myself.”

           

Katakos drew his long knife, making sharp gashes below the ibex’s Achilles tendons. He extended those cuts to the groin, careful not to puncture the intestines or bladder. Then he peeled the hide, hacking at stubborn ligament and fat as he went.

           

“Not too shabby,” Katakos said, stretching skin over the ibex’s thighs and severing the tail. “Probably can get three hundred cauldrons for this.”

           

Gondir lay on the boulder, watching his master with a mouth full of green. The moment Katakos began rolling the skin down, he was interrupted by Gondir’s hacking cough. The end result was a blast of half chewed moss over Katakos’ coat.

           

“Oh for–Gond!” Katakos shouted, brushing salvia-greased moss off himself. Gondir ignored him, content to rest his head against the boulder. Katakos shook his head, returning to the work at hand.

           

“How were the mountains, Kat? Oh, just fine. Spent days in the ass end of nowhere with a vomitus sphincter-horse.” Katakos began talking to himself. “What? He’s not a liability at all. Makes this frozen hellscape bearable with his thirty-pound shits.”

           

The wind answered, a sea gale creeping over snowcapped peaks. At that, Katakos finished with the hide, ripping it clean off the animal and laying it fur-side down on a leather wrap he outstretched beforehand.

           

“Fuck me.” He sat against the boulder, Gondir’s hot breath warming the back of his neck. “I’m becoming as crazy as Adela.”

           

Gondir raised his head, shaking his neck as if he had an itch.

           

“I’m not being an ass. Nutcase took her kid up here to farm elk and ice…” 

           

Gondir stirred, sliding off the boulder for the skinless ibex. Thick claws dug into pink meat as the baliyon snapped bones.

           

He sighed. “Thanks, Gond.”

           

Katakos stayed there for a while, twirling his crimson-soaked knife while Gondir fed on his work. His work was why they got along, though. Katakos was a killer. It was the only thing he was ever good at. Killing took him from the Salujan desert to the legion. Then, to rack up a body count that put plagues to shame. Of course, when it was over, he ended up doing more of the same.

           

Except he was no longer hunting people. Not that Gondir would mind. Meat was meat to the baliyon. He didn’t care whose it was, even if it was Katakos’. Yet that indifference made Katakos feel at home with the creature. Because when Katakos died, there would be no one spitting on his grave for all those lives he smothered. He would just be carrion for a friend.

           

And the world would go on without ever knowing he was there.

           

A snowflake tore him from this stupor. Streaking down the red on the blade, a bead of white fell to the earth. More followed and Katakos looked up to a grey sky dusting the gully with powder.

             

“Summer storm’s earlier than I thought,” Katakos said, turning back to Gondir. “Hurry up you overgrown meat rat. Got maybe a few hours before the blizzard hits.”

           

In preparation to quick freeze the pelt, Katakos tightly bound the skin fur-side out in the leather wrap and placed it with Gondir’s saddlebags. Then he undid the line holding the goat in place, jostling Gondir much to the baliyon’s annoyance.

             

“Shove it,” Katakos rebuffed the creature’s disdain. He hacked off a leg of ibex before sheathing his long knife. Winding the leg in rope, he loaded up the last of his equipment and hopped on Gondir’s saddle. “Have to get to the foothills before the storm hits. That, or suck on iced goat for the next few days.”