02-10-2018, 01:44 AM
Yves was certain of it now: he absolutely hated this forest.
Three months on his own had given the vast, armored man something of a taste for woodland. He'd slept under pines, and under oaks, and under aspens. He'd hacked through underbrush with an axe, and passed through parklike, open spaces with little more than leaf litter in his way. He'd been through woods with deer and with boar and with bear.
"This forest," he decided out loud, "is bullshit."
He'd felt it about an hour ago, when he'd hit the fog bank. For one thing, he didn't trust any fog that started as abruptly as this fog had; one moment he was picking his way past tangled roots he could see, and the next he had nearly wound up going ass over teakettle on something obscured by the swirling mists. Again, he amended ruefully. In truth, his relationship with roots could be better. His relationship with a lot of things could be better. He stopped to run a hand back through his hair. His footsteps continued to echo for--
The bottom of his stomach dropped out. If those are echoes, he thought, why am I hearing more than one set?
Carefully as he could, he pulled up his lance from where he'd been using it as a walking stick and gripped it firmly in both hands. Paranoia set in; they obviously weren't going to any special trouble to conceal their movements; what if this was a Lycian search party, finally tracking him down?
"No, idiot. Obviously they wouldn't be just walking if they'd found you." Yves froze. Had he said that out loud?
Three months on his own had given the vast, armored man something of a taste for woodland. He'd slept under pines, and under oaks, and under aspens. He'd hacked through underbrush with an axe, and passed through parklike, open spaces with little more than leaf litter in his way. He'd been through woods with deer and with boar and with bear.
"This forest," he decided out loud, "is bullshit."
He'd felt it about an hour ago, when he'd hit the fog bank. For one thing, he didn't trust any fog that started as abruptly as this fog had; one moment he was picking his way past tangled roots he could see, and the next he had nearly wound up going ass over teakettle on something obscured by the swirling mists. Again, he amended ruefully. In truth, his relationship with roots could be better. His relationship with a lot of things could be better. He stopped to run a hand back through his hair. His footsteps continued to echo for--
The bottom of his stomach dropped out. If those are echoes, he thought, why am I hearing more than one set?
Carefully as he could, he pulled up his lance from where he'd been using it as a walking stick and gripped it firmly in both hands. Paranoia set in; they obviously weren't going to any special trouble to conceal their movements; what if this was a Lycian search party, finally tracking him down?
"No, idiot. Obviously they wouldn't be just walking if they'd found you." Yves froze. Had he said that out loud?