Kaelen crouched at the edge of the wet trail and studied the thing blocking his path. He had crossed half the bog to reach this point. The spirit-beast waited deeper in, fading by the day, and he meant to bind it before it slipped away forever. The anchor on his belt was years of work. He would not lose it to a lesser creature. Ahead, a stack of cracked skulls rose from the mud. Horns and fangs jutted at wrong angles. The lizard had built it from things it had killed. A warning. A claim. Kaelen backed away and returned to the small clay dome he had taken as shelter. Beside it stood the thin stone watchtower he had raised himself, its crystal humming soft above the reeds. The crystal would flash if the beast moved. He had watched it for six days. He knew its patterns now. On the seventh dawn, the crystal stayed dark. Kaelen slipped past the skull pile while the lizard slept coiled in the far pool. His boots made no sound. His breath stayed even. He crossed into the deeper bog and did not look back. The trail was his now. But the watchtower stood far behind him, and the beast he hunted was close enough to feel.