Altar of Twilight I was angry with my foe

@Hydra

By no standard had the girl on the mountain given her home's suitor an easy task. Then taking his age into consideration, it had been even harder to complete.

But for the directionless Kavos, with nothing and no one but a steeply arduous task to live for, the weeks were spent in a goal-oriented fog that provided a well-to-do escape from his ponderous loneliness. And when the boy emerged victorious, he not only had the means to be proud, but he was now intimately aware of his own tenacity.

He looked over his collection now, making sure he had everything:

"A squirrel with fur like mine."

The black rodent had been the easiest of his tasks to complete, although finding the appropriately dark-furred critter had been the true test of his patience.

"Two birds -- one small enough to eat whole, and one bigger than you."

Hunting birds had proven more difficult than he had originally conceived thought of, but in the end he'd managed to find a baby wren that had fallen prematurely from its nest, and had a scuffle with a vulture with a wingspan that was easily longer than any wolf, nose to tail-tip.

And the leg bone of a moose!

The girl's final request had felt particularly malicious; perhaps given to him with the expectation of his failure. In no universe would he have been able to take down a moose on his own, and it was by far the task that had taken him the longest. He nosed the massive bone, complete with hoof and ankle-joint, and snorted as he remembered forcing a bull to chase him into the bog, where he became trapped and died a slow, week-long death as Kavos watched.

He and his trophies had settled near Moonspear, but with an explicit warning not to come too near without permission again, he loomed far off in the adjoining mountainous territory, waiting for the day the ravens might find him.