Chapter 115 – South Pass
The air at this height was thin, the kind that stung the lungs and made every breath feel borrowed. Kairo moved with deliberate precision, conserving his energy for the final climb. The South Pass lay ahead—a narrow cleft between two jagged cliffs, where the wind screamed through like a living thing.
He had chosen this route for a reason. Here, the terrain would funnel anyone following into a single line, where numbers counted for little and skill meant everything. It was a place to end pursuits… or die trying.
Elira kept close behind him, her boots landing in the prints he left in the frost. She carried less now—just the barest food, extra ammunition, and the narrow steel case wrapped in oilskin. That case had become the invisible tether between them; it was the reason they were still alive, and the reason they were still hunted.
"You've barely spoken since we broke camp," she said finally, her breath misting in the cold.
"I'm measuring distances," he replied.
"To what?"
"To how far Feretti will fall."
She didn't push for more. She had learned that Kairo's words were like bullets—few, but chosen for their impact.
They reached a bend in the trail where the ground pitched steeply upward. Beyond it, the walls of the Pass came into view—sheer stone rising like fortress walls, shadowed in the half-light. The wind funneled between them, carrying the faint scent of smoke.
Kairo's hand lifted in a silent signal. Stop.
They crouched, scanning the narrow entrance. Nothing moved, but the feeling was wrong. The snow at the mouth of the Pass was broken in irregular patches—not animal prints, but boots. Recent.
"They're here," Elira murmured.
"Or waiting for us to be," Kairo said.
His eyes tracked upward, following the line of the cliff face. Jagged outcrops, perfect for a shooter's nest. The idea of walking blindly into that throat of stone made his pulse slow, not quicken. He had been expecting it.
He opened his pack, pulling free a coil of rope and a small bundle of canvas. Elira watched as he knelt and began tying quick, precise knots.
"You're not thinking of going around?" she asked.
"There is no around. There's only above."
The climb was brutal. The rock was slick with frost, the holds narrow. Twice, Elira's boots slipped, and each time Kairo's grip on the rope steadied her before she could drop more than a foot. By the time they reached a ledge halfway up, her arms burned and her breath came in sharp bursts.
From this vantage, they could see into the Pass. Three men stood near the center, rifles slung but ready, their breath pluming in the cold. Another shape moved in the shadows of the left cliff wall—watching the entrance, not the heights.
"They think we'll come straight in," Elira whispered.
Kairo's lips curved faintly. "Then they'll think wrong."
They moved along the ledge, the rope between them taut. When they reached a point above the nearest man, Kairo pulled the small bundle from his pack and unwrapped it—three smooth stones, each wrapped in cloth. He lobbed the first into the snow at the far end of the Pass. The muffled thud drew two of the men toward it instantly.
The third stayed behind, scanning the trail. He never saw Kairo drop from the ledge behind him.
It was fast—a single blow to the side of the head with the butt of his pistol, the man crumpling silently. Elira slid down the rope after him, landing in a crouch.
The remaining two heard nothing until it was too late. The narrow ground worked against them, giving them no room to maneuver when Kairo came at them low and fast. One rifle clattered into the snow; the other man's shot went wild, the sound cracking off the stone walls and echoing into the peaks.
When it was over, the Pass was silent again except for the wind.
Kairo wiped his blade in the snow and glanced at Elira. "We move now. That shot will carry."
They stepped over the bodies without looking back, vanishing deeper into the Pass. Somewhere behind them, Feretti's men would be scrambling to follow—but here, on this ground, the pursuit was no longer one-sided.