the bread cracks and a traveller appears robed in the cloth of nightfall eyes burning amber and breath of brimstone asking for directions to a ruined keep of kings long before the children and wife gone awfully quiet in the stranger’s presence I raise a hand in the direction to go my eyes never leaving his as he turns just slightly but pauses and speaks in a low catlike whisper only for my ears: you have fought the likes of death care to join me?