The house doesn't have a proper fireplace, just the furnace and stove, so the tools are best kept in the kitchen. While Bodhi figures out the food situation, Kira pokes the last of the char into smaller pieces, then rakes the build-up of char and ash out onto the towel. It's more dirty work than hard, and he brushes the walls and bottom of the stove clean, centering himself with the work. When the gift isn't too strong, it's the kind of thing that keeps him occupied, calm.

It's everyone else he can't rely on, to keep their moods even or their tempers steady.

"Saw plenty on the other side," he says, wrapping the towel up around the mess to carry out back. He'll take it to the hopper tomorrow, or sift it over Ren's grave. The stones are covered in moss now that the rains are back, and he wonders what else might grow.

He's neglected that grave too, every time he's run off. Not again. "It's funny," he says when he returns, fresh wood in his arms, "they were too big. Looked like normal foxes, really, but they acted like spirits." They should have been the size of weasels, maybe, but when he remembers the animal samples in the coolers with their own, maybe it makes sense. Maybe they were something grown, another feint. He should float that by Mark when he sees him.