Chaska filled the collapsible canvas bucket from the runnel below the spring lip rather than dipping into the quiet basin itself, warmed the water over the small camp stove behind the rocks, and carried it up to the gravel bank without speaking.
For the next hour Osha worked steadily in the clear afternoon light. She used a piece of soft linen and the warmed water to sponge the chalky mineral crust from her father’s bones, laying each one in order on a clean square of oilcloth before folding the stiffened grey cloak around them with the blue-stitched right cuff resting on top. She did not flinch from the work, and she did not rush it. Seven years of cataloguing temple reliquaries had taught her hands how to handle old bone with care; today she was simply doing it for someone she loved instead of an altar inventory.
Ten feet away, well above the highest winter water line of the spring, Kiv and Chaska used the iron pry-bar they had taken from the outer spoil heap and two flat slate spades to dig a deep, four-foot trench in the dry gravel directly beside the longer mound where Amren had buried the ruined sacred beast.
