Thread: The Broken Past and Uncertain Future

Richard gazed through the gloom that was a cold winters afternoon. The forest that rolled over the white dusted hills was thick and relatively quiet, the call of a bird or the rustle through the brush of some sort of game were all that stirred. None of the dangers that were sometimes found within the forest had troubled him this particular day. It was in truth a day like any others and none of the scars the world bore from what had passed before were readily on display. He wore a coat that had survived from earlier days, but over which a cloak of white wolf pelts hooded his face and covered his body. When he sank low to the ground, it was easy enough for him to become lost in the landscape. But he saw now what he had wandered into the forest for. It was a deer, or at least what now passed for one. A strange creature in a way. It was more of a size with a horse, its hair a mottled colour and its antlers twisted as though a thorn bush. Yet as he lay in the brush the creature saw him not. No bullet would be wasted on it. Rather the bow in his hands had an arrow carefully knocked. He waited and waited until the deer stood perfectly still and seemed to gnaw on a piece of bark at the bottom of an tree. Then with a hiss, the air flew through the air and its metal point stroke the creature upon the throat. A few staggering steps were seen before it fell to the ground with a sickening cry. He trudged down the ridge and stooped over the body. The deer still for a moment or so before it stilled leaving a pool of blood upon the snow. Gazing at the creature he almost sighed as it occurred to him that it was going to be far more work than he cared for dragging this back into the mountains. However, his eyes were drawn downwards as he looked down towards the forest below. A solitary figure seemed to be stumbling through the forest in something of a hurry. His dark eyes peered at the figure. A slight form, likely female and if he didnt miss his mark fleeing from something. As most of the humans beyond were scared witless of the forest, they were almost always fleeing from something. Nor did he think of it as a groundless fear, dangers enough abounded to substantiate it entirely in his view. A sigh escaped his lips as he regarded what he now thought of as the woman as he didnt care for the wolves, bears or other creatures of the forest to develop any more of a taste for human flesh than they already possessed. Nor was his without a sense of curiosity. He reached down and with a measure of exertion lifted the rather large carcass of the deer from the ground and with some strain managed to drape it across two low laying branches of a tree. Which would for the moment preserve it from any immediate scavengers until he could return. Thereafter, his large form began to lope down the ridge towards the forest below. He moved through the snow and woods with fairly practiced ease. For those whom dwelt in this environs learned swiftly or were no more. Thus much like a ghost, he moved through the forest towards the woman. His bow remained in hand, arrow knocked of course. After all whatever the womans demeanour, she was scarcely the worst thing that could be met within the woods. He remained as ever ready for that. He moved closer towards her at a rather steady pace. Soon enough he was but a dozen or more paces behind her. But he remained concealed within the forest. Simply following her for a time as he sought to divine her purpose and intentions.