by Fel
Tarrin winced at the barrage of sudden graphic curses she threw in his direction. She was incensed, and he was suddenly glad they were separated by an uncrossable barrier. "You're going to Suld!" she shrieked. "You lied to me!" she said with a sudden vehemence that frightened him.
"I never did any such thing!" he called back.
"You said you'd stay with me, and now you're running away!" she accused. "You lied to me, Tarrin!"
"I said I would learn what you had to teach," he called back. "I never said when. You don't understand that I need to go to Suld, Jesmind. I don't have a choice. I wanted you to come with me, but you refused. This is more your fault than mine. When I'm done at Suld, then I'll be happy to go with you. But not until then."
She was totally enraged, and despite the distance between them, he was suddenly very afraid of her. "You had better run far and fast, rogue," she spat at him. "Because when I catch up to you, I'm going to kill you!" Tarrin rocked back on his heels. She meant it. "And I know where you're going, so you had best hope to every God you can remember that you get there before I do!" She snatched a small rock off the ground, and hurled it at him. Despite the distance between them, Tarrin had to duck to avoid getting his nose flattened by the rock. "I'm going to kill you, Tarrin!" she shouted at the top of her lungs, then she threw a few more tongue-shrivelling curses at him, even as she threw more rocks. He hoped she didn't know what some of those words meant, as he evaded the amazingly accurately thrown rocks.
He gave her a sober, calm look, and she stopped shouting at him. Her face was screwed up into a mask of utter outrage, and she was panting hard from her anger and exertion at throwing curses and rocks. "I'm sorry," he told her. Then he turned and started running south.
Her howling promise to gut him when she got her claws on him followed him into the trees.
It had not gone as well as he had hoped, but it had been necessary. Tarrin sighed at what could have been, then quickened his pace. Jesmind was now his enemy, and he knew that she would kill him without hesitation when she caught up to him. So he had to make sure that she didn't.
It had been a very hard two days.
Tarrin was huddling in a small hollow bole created by a massive fallen tree, avoiding a heavy rain that was soaking the surrounding forest. The only reason he stopped was that he needed rest and that it was so heavy it had reduced visibility to almost nothing. Tarrin had had almost no sleep since leaving Jesmind, pushing himself at a murderous pace that was surely so far ahead of her that his trail would be washed out by the rain. That had been his intent, for rain was a common occurance in Sulasia at that time of year. With enough of a lead and the rain washing out his scent, he could now change direction without fear of her following him.
Then again, he didn't even know if she was. He'd seen no sign of her since he'd left her fuming at the Scar. Since she knew where he was going, he saw her making one of three choices. She would try to track him down, she would get ahead of him on one of the more obvious routes to Suld and head him off, or she would go all the way to Suld and try to catch him there. Tarrin was guessing that, as mad as she was, she was chasing him. And now that the rain was so heavy, it would wash away any trace of his passage, and he could make his planned turn with no fear of her following.
Well, not too much fear.
He waited for a few moments, then climbed out into the rain, getting onto the fallen tree. Now it was important not to get on the ground, where his tracks or scent could sink into the mud. He pulled himself into the trees with a low-laying branch, then turned southeast, away from Suld.
That was his plan. Go southeast for a while, turn due south, then cross the High Road to Suld at some point. Run parallel to that road on the south side, veer away close to the city, and then enter from the south, the opposite direction of what she would think he would come in.
Two days with very little food and no sleep had taken their toll, however. Tarrin had already factored in a day of little movement into his plan. Once he was sure he'd lost her, he'd stop and get a very good sleep, then fish or hunt up a good meal, and then return to his established pattern of eating whatever he could find during a stop of only a short time. Over the last two days, his father's training in woodlore had kept him alive, letting him find roots and plants that were edible, things that he wouldn't have to hunt down or catch. He did have one meat meal, stumbling over a rabbit den, then reaching in and grabbing the animal before it could get too far away. It hadn't expected that. But raw rabbit left much to be desired, and he wouldn't do that again unless he was hungry enough not to care.
Tarrin moved in the trees for the rest of the day. It wasn't as fast as moving on the ground, but with the heavy rain, it was almost undetectable. Especially since he was being extraordinarily careful about not leaving clawmarks on the trees. Twice he'd passed over or allowed to pass a band of Goblinoids, one a tribe of small Bruga, the other a small pack of Trolls, which were trudging about in the rain in an obvious attempt to find something.
Or someone.
They were still looking for him. He'd already known that they would. It was what made his plan risky. If he had too many fights with them, he'd be leaving bodies and obvious signs of his passage, and that was something that he was certain would doom him to be meeting Jesmind face to face in the immediate future. He had to get to Suld without getting into a single fight, if he could help it. And with the number of Goblinoids that were infesting this stretch of forest, that would not be easy. But, to his advantage, they would slow Jesmind down as well, if she did manage to follow him.
He kept moving after the sun went down, moving in the pounding rain. The darkness was much more his ally than the Goblinoids, for his sensitive eyes gathered in the murky light and allowed him to see, while they resorted to torches, ruddy beacons that told him exactly where they were. He moved on through the night, after the rain tapered off, stopping in utter silence as a sooty torch came in his direction, then moving on after it had gone by.
He moved on after daybreak, and throughout the entire day, glad of a warm, windy day with heavy overcast that would keep his shadow off the ground, while the sound of the wind through the trees would cover any sound he may accidentally make. The concentration of Goblinoids was going down, as they concentrated their search in other areas, for he only saw five bands of them as he meandered on a generally southern course.
By the end of the day, his head felt as if it were stuffed with sand, and he found his mind drifting at the most inconvenient times. He'd already been awake somewhere around two days, and he'd all but exhausted his reserves. The rain that had begun to fall was about the only thing keeping him awake, as it pattered on his head and body and dropped into his ears, which was uncomfortable. He knew that he had to stop, danger or no danger. He decided to stay in the safety of the trees, though, and he searched around for a suitable sleeping place. It took him about half an hour to find one, just as the sun was setting in the west, an old hollowed out squirrel's nest that had yet to gain a new tenant. It was just large enough for him to squeeze in through the opening, and inside it was certainly warm and dry. Tarrin removed his clothes and pushed them into the opening, then changed form and wriggled in through the entrance. The inside was indeed dry, and warm. The past tenant had littered the floor of the hollow with pine needles and shredded leaves, creating a very soft bed on which to sleep.
He laid down on the soft mat of needles and leaves, considering things in that drowsy half-conscious frame of mind before sleep. He'd yet to feel real fear at what he was doing...and he hadn't had a single dream since meeting Jesmind. In the short time that they had been together, the feisty Were-cat female had changed Tarrin, changed him very much. Because of her, he could strike out on his own, surrounded by enemies, with very little fear, and a great deal of confidence. He would have been lost out here alone, if it hadn't been for Jesmind.
He closed his eyes and slept, dropping off literally between one thought and the next.
It took him
nearly fifteen days to reach the High Road. He'd spent almost all that time moving through the trees, not leaving the Goblinoid patrols even a footprint to follow, coming down only to forage for food and to drink water, and to cross a couple of streams and small rivers. His ribs were starting to stick out some, but he'd gotten used to the constant hunger that came with meals that couldn't fill his belly.
The time out in the forest, in a way, had been good for him. His body was as tough as an old gnarled root now, already strong muscles hardened visibly by some serious physical activity. The pads on his hand-paws and feet had had been worn down, then grew back several times, until the pads that were now on his feet were about as tough as old leather. He thought he'd had endurance before, but now he could move all day and half the night at a constant speed that would have put a Goblinioid on the ground panting and heaving. It had also brought his two elemental sides into a closer symbiotic harmony, as both the human and the Cat cooperated to get him to safety. The human guiding his path and allowing him to execute his plans, the Cat by keeping him safe and telling him what moves were wise and what moves were stupid. He drew heavily on the instinctive knowledge of his animal half in those fifteen days, and that along with the woodlore instruction he'd received from his father had been what had fed him over the course of time. He noticed a change in his basic attitudes as well, for the time in the forest had all but converted him into a creature of the forest.
But now a sign of the human world stood on the ground underneath the tree in which he was perched. His tail snaked back and forth reflexively as he stared at it, the single goal that had driven him for half a month, watching a trade caravan wend its way to the west. He needed information, and here was the perfect opportunity to get it. It was a large caravan, with some ten or fifteen wagons and nearly forty men on horseback, wearing armor and carrying assorted weaponry, guarding the goods which were stowed on the large wooden conveyances.
Tarrin dropped down to a lower branch, waiting to see if he could get one man somewhat by himself. He didn't want to hurt the man, just talk to him, but he didn't want to attract the attention of the entire caravan. He got his chance, as one of the caravan's rear guard stopped not too far from him and dismounted, then hurried off into the bushes to relieve himself. The others didn't wait for him. Tarrin moved into a position relatively close to the horse, approaching it with the horse's scent full in his face so that the horse wouldn't smell him. The man came out of the bushes and climbed back up onto his horse quickly.
"Excuse me," Tarrin called from the concealment of the lower branches.
The man gave a startled oath and drew his sword.
"Oh, please," Tarrin called. "Put that away. I just need to ask you a couple of questions."
"Who are you?" he called. "Where are you?"
"Don't worry about it," he said. "Where are we? I'm a bit lost."
"This is the High Road," he said, a bit confused.
"I know that," Tarrin retorted. "Where on the High Road? Near what city?"
"How can you not know that?"
"Are you going to answer me or not?"
"I may not," he said.
"Human, if I was a bandit, I would have attacked you when you went into the bushes," Tarrin said in disgust. "I just want to know where I am so I can get to where I'm going."
The fact that Tarrin called him "human" was not lost on the man. "Are you a Faerie?" he asked curiously. "Is that why I can't see you?"
"Don't worry about what I am, just answer the question," Tarrin grated.
"This place is about a day's ride to the west of Ultern," he answered. "Jerinhold is about a day's ride east of here."
Tarrin considered that. "I came too far east," he growled aloud. "Thank you, human. That helps me a great deal."
In an intentional rustle of leaves, Tarrin left the man standing there.
Tarrin was quickly faced with another problem, one he hadn't considered. The forest came right down to the road in that stretch that he'd found, but that was not normal. Farmlands cut into the forest on both sides of the road not even a quarter of a mile from where he'd encountered the guard, and they stretched out too far for him to keep the road in sight and still stay in the woods. Tarrin couldn't follow the road quickly if he had to detour every quarter of a mile to go around a farm, and time was a definite factor. It left him with a hard decision to make, but in the end, it wasn't much of a decision.
Tarrin holed up in a tree top for the rest of the day. When sunset drained all the light from the sky, leaving only the faint, multihued light of the Skybands as illumination, Tarrin dropped down from the trees and stepped out onto the road. There was no helping it, but at least on the road he could travel with great speed. Tarrin set out in that ground-eating lope, and spent the night travelling down the road. He passed the caravan he'd encountered that day around midnight, and left them far behind.
What he didn't expect was reaching the city of Jerinhold before dawn. It was a walled city, surrounded on all sides by farmland, and not a few small villages. Tarrin wasn't about to set foot inside the city, so he ran along a road that went along the base of the wall, watching the faint light on the eastern horizon warily. He also didn't want to be caught out in the open at daybreak. He wasn't sure why he was so concerned with not being seen, but some part of him didn't want the humans to see him, or for them not to see him like that. In a way, he was afraid of how they would react to seeing a half-human creature, and the thought of being violently rejected was more than he was willing to risk.
It was almost dawn by the time he'd managed to circumnavigate the walls of Jerinhold, and the High Road stretched out before him with almost no cover available. He decided to find cover for the day, but he'd get as far as he could before he had to take shelter. He ran at a very brisk pace right up until the dawning of the sun, then he veered off the road and crossed several farms, and got himself into a small strip of woods that lay between two large farms, serving as a boundary between them. He hid his clothes in a small bole of a tree, changed form, and crawled into the bole with his clothes. As the first rays of the sun washed over the floor of the woods, Tarrin fell asleep.
Tarrin was almost starving when he woke up, some time before sunset. He dressed with a hollow hole forming in his stomach, and the thought of food was the only motivating factor. Aside from a few field mice, there really wasn't much in the small strip of woods, and besides, field mouse wasn't the tastiest of meals. There were farms around, several of them, and he was absolutely positive that he could find something to eat among the buildings of one of them. Tarrin didn't really like the idea of stealing from honest folk, but there was almost nothing else to eat, and he was afraid to show himself. He was filthy and bedraggled, and a farmer or innkeeper would probably go for his pitchfork before greeting the Were-cat in a civilized manner. Aside from that, Tarrin had no money with which to buy a meal, even if he had the courage to walk into an inn.
Tarrin considered this as he slinked out of the woods furtively, keeping himself relatively well hidden among the rows of knee-high wheat growing out in the fields. The closest farm was the most logical target, and it was a very large one. Obviously losing a chicken or two wouldn't really hurt this farming family. They were evidently very prosperous. He crept among the wheat as human smells touched his nose, and he crept up on the scents with the stealth of a ghost. He lay in the field and watched as four men worked with iron rods and wooden dowels to uproot a huge treestump. The tree which had owned the stump lay on the ground beside the stump, and the stump itself had not been cut. Rather, the ancient tree which had once rested upon it had simply came down from old age. There was an older man with a brown beard and a grizzled visage that was obviously in charge, coordinating the heaving attempts of the three young men with him to rock the stump out of the ground. By their scents, Tarrin could determine that they were all related. A father and his three sons. And they all had smells of other humans all over them. Wives and children, most likely. This was a fami
ly farmstead, where whole generations lived and worked in harmony to manage the large holding and make it productive.
Tarrin just couldn't steal from them. He'd been a farmer himself, and he knew how it felt to lose livestock and crops to raiding animals. But, watching them heave and groan and sweat trying to uproot the stump, he realized that he didn't have to steal from them.
Steeling himself, Tarrin stood up. It took them a few moments to notice him, and when they did, the father gave out a startled shout and brandished his iron rod like a staff as his sons hastily yanked out their own tools to defend themselves against the intruder.
"Please, don't do that," Tarrin said from his heart, raising his paws in supplication. Tarrin's simple plea must have struck a chord with the brown-bearded patriarch, for he lowered his iron rod a bit and regarded Tarrin curiously.
"What manner of creature are ye?" he asked. "And what do ye want?"
"I'll help you uproot the stump in return for food," Tarrin offered, ignoring the questions he didn't feel like answering.
"Really now?" the patriarch asked. "And what makes ye think that we'd be wanting yer help? Or that we can trust ye?"
Tarrin hadn't considered that. Back in Aldreth, trust was a simple matter, and it was abundant through the village and outlying farms. Nobody locked their doors in Aldreth. He knew things were a bit different in the rest of the world, but watching the farmers made him look on them as he would have looked on farmers back home. And it was obvious that they were nothing like his friends back home. Tarrin caught a glimpse of his hand-paws, and an even greater reality crashed in on him. They'd trust him even less because of what he was. "I, I'm sorry I bothered you," he said quietly, turning around and starting to walk away.
"Hold," the man called. Tarrin stopped and turned around. "Yer more dirt than skin, and that shirt's hangin' off ye like there's nothin' under it. Ye offered work in exchange for food, and I have the feelin' ye could have easily stole what ye wanted. If ye could get this close to us, then getting that close to the chicken coop woulda' been just as easy. Come, stranger. Help us pull this cursed stump, and ye can eat with my family this night."
