The wounded man's breath rattled like wind trapped in a broken flute. When Mihir leaned closer, the stranger whispered again—a sound halfway between a growl and a ghost's last word.
Mihir could not understand it. Not Mandarin. Not Sanskrit. Not Tibetan.
No name. No offering of identity. Only blood, broken steel, and a silence louder than the river behind them.
He hoisted the man carefully, arm over shoulders, spine curved into effort. The commander's weight was monstrous—bones like iron rods, flesh heavy with war. Mihir staggered for a moment beneath the burden, then adjusted his footing, his bare soles grounding against the ancient stones.
"This is absurd," he muttered to himself. "I came here for peace."
But the stars above said nothing. They had seen far more absurdities in their cold, eternal gaze.
It took hours. Down the rocky slope, across a dying grove where crows watched from trees stripped bare by fire. A hamlet waited beyond the border hills—half hidden beneath fog, crouched beside a frozen stream. Houses made of dry clay and faded red wood. A handful of lives clinging to the world's spine.
The village headman said nothing when Mihir arrived with the stranger bleeding on his back. Just pointed to an empty hut and lit a small fire.
Mihir worked in silence. Ground herbs. Boiled water. Laid the man across straw and wool. He murmured old prayers, not to gods, but to the ancient memory of healing itself. His fingers traced the commander's pulse points. Every touch precise. Calculated. Not quite medical—more than that.
Siddhi.
The technique of seeing what the eyes could not. He closed his own, letting breath slow into stillness. His palm hovered over the stranger's ribs, feeling not just the break in bone—but the story behind the wound.
Spear. From the left. Angled. Fast. The man had not dodged. He had chosen not to.
Why?
Mihir scoffed.
"A commander with a death wish. How original."
He ground crushed pine bark into paste and stitched flesh with silk thread dipped in oil. Blood steamed as the herbs did their work. Sweat slicked Mihir's brow, but his hands remained steady. If nothing else, he had practiced healing more than hope.
That night, as the fire danced in the hut and the man muttered in sleep, Mihir sat at the door, robe wrapped around his knees.
The wind had changed. Softer now. But still cold.
He stared at the mountains.
Marriage. What a joke.
He had buried his name in the scriptures. Folded his youth into pilgrim's steps. And now he was tending to strangers who bled like beasts and whispered riddles in unknown tongues.
Fate, he thought, is nothing but a blind beggar with a cracked bowl, stumbling through lives it cannot taste.
He glanced back at the man.
Still alive. Still nameless.
And yet— something in Mihir's chest had shifted.
Like a moth, waking up.