[Private: Desmodus]

[Carnasch]

Entering on the Eighth Brightening in the second Cycle of the Month Imperos in the Season of Autumn, Era II of the Celestine Mandate, Era XIV Post Fractum.

Carnasch left north from Acumin, the small town in the middle of the Centripaxian Heartlands, his rucksack holding his few possesions and his axe on his hip. Carnasch thought to himself after leaving the town some leagues behind, 'Good riddance to all towns and cities and people in general, they were all bumbling, loudmouthed, fools...' He continued along this thought for a few more minutes until it had exausted itself. He longed for humanity, but could not force himself to abide their precence for more than a few hours.

Consumed by these battling opposites he idly studying the ground for signs of wild life or plants that might lead him to a water source. He would need one for his searches for the elemental spellweaver he'd heard rumored these parts. He loved nature, but it was a harsh mistress, and the ability to control it, the ability to manipulate it to protect himself, wether from an enemy or nature itself, was an invaluable comodody.

Mumbling to himself, 'I'll not stay in the town for some nights i think.' he stooped for a moment to gently brush a few fallen leaves from a track he followed. Noting that a number of animal trails seemed to join and follow eachother, and that most of the tracks were headed in the same direction, he followed it until it split again. Studying each of the paths in turn, patiently selecting the most promising, the one that had multiple animal tracks, both predator and prey, he loped down it for a distance until he heard the distant trickle of a stream.

It was small, tiny even, crossible in a step in some places, and widening out to almost three fathoms across in others. The water was clear, and sparkling, and a number of large trout could be seen floating along the far bank. Smiling, he dropped his ruck sack and pulled out a thin cord, which he fashioned into a small snare using a low branch on a tree over the stream. Skipping over to the otherside, he scouted the surounding area, checking for dangerous or territorial creatures that might be attracted by the smells of his cooking.

When he returned some candlemarks later, the snare had been set off, but empty. This wasn't unusual, in fact, he was just glad that the line had not been taken. He reset it, and striped off his jacket and shirt to lay down by the bank. Laying with his head and shoulders hanging over the bank, he slowly lowered his arms into the cold water. The fish instantly scattered to other sections of the stream, but this to was not uncommon, just annoying. Slowly the fish returned, but he ignored them, they were to small for any decent eating and he would have to wait for them to come back again if he made any sudden movements.

While he waited he kept his eyes and his keen ears trained on the surounding forest to prevent him being snuck up on. A rabbit jumped next to his snare, and he thought maybe he wouldnt have to keep his hands in the icy water, but it changed directions and missed the trap.

Carnasch looked down to find a foot long, and very fat, trout beneath him. Slowly slipping his hands under its belly, he pulled upwards hard, jerking the fish from the water before it could react. The fish squirmed, and slipped out of his hands, almost falling back into the water, but he swiped his hand across it and swatted it further inland. Diving on it, he grasped the writhing fish by the tail and slammed its head against a nearby tree. The fish went limp instantly, he did it again to make sure it was dead. He pulled his flint and steel from his sack, and gathered some kindling to start a fire. He could begin heating a flat rock he'd found some ways further back in the forest while he tried for another fish.

After a very unsuccessful try at another fish, and his snare still being empty, he went back to the rock, which still had the embers glowing beneath it. Taking his dagger, Carnasch gutted the fish and cooked it boiling some water lily as a form of tea. He ate it quickly before the warmth faded from it, and before the smell could attract unwanted guests.

Once he'd finished he through the scant remains into the stream, and trudged back to where he'd left his rucksack, built another fire, this one for warmth and protection, and constructed a lean-to shelter out of branches he cut with his axe.

[Desmodus]

[ooc: This thread needs a timestamp: at least early-mid-late Imperos or Junctior, so I know what part of autumn we are in]

It was approaching dusk by now; although Carnash could not see the horizon clearly beyond the trees that encroached on his line of sight in every direction, he could tell by the lengthening shadows and growing gloom that the suns would soon be below the hilltops to the west. The Dolwood would be dark soon, and from the feel of it, chilly as well. The sky overhead, where it peeped through the thinning, colored leaves, was a deep blue, with only the occasional whiff of cirrus cloud.

Fire and lean-to meant gathering more wood, and that meant wandering about the forest a bit looking for it. Fallen leaves crunched slightly under the Vagaran's feet. In town he would probably not have noticed the noise at all, but out here, it seemed loud. could anybody or anything else out here hear it? Was there anybody or anything else out here to hear it?

Gathering the wood he needed was no problem; he might have to use his axe to cut greener branches suitable for making the lean-to, but fallen, dried branches and twigs suitable for fire were there for the taking. There did not seem to be many other people were out here harvesting wood.

At least, that's what Carnasch thought until he found the fire pit.

He was coming back to the creek with his last armload of firewood when he found it. The human had wandered a few score paces off course, and come to the creek a bit upstream from his camp. He stumbled across a spot he himself might have used for camping had he wandered just a bit further, and there was a small depression in the ground, lined with the unmistakable black residue of spent coals. It didn't look to be more than a couple brightenings old, and whoever had made it had obviously not bothered to bury it.

[Carnasch]

Seeing the possible oppertunity of needing less work to settle down for the night, Carnasch quickly scanned the surrounding area to check for any lingering residents. He put the kindling down and looked for markings on exactly what said residents might have been and what they were doing. (OOC: you can input whatever it is he finds.)

Satisfied, if a little uneasy, the Vagaran giant began chopping limbs from a nearby pine, he only cut branchs that had plenty of needles, otherwise it would have been wasteful and he would not disrespect nature in that way. Taking a pair of forked branches, he stabbed them into the ground about eight feet apart and about five feet from the fire pit, so that he wouldnt have to worry about the lean-to catching fire while he slept.

He hadnt quite finished by the time the suns had gone down, but the fire put off enough light that he could finish. The fire also warmed the lean-to as the heat radiated and was reflected backfrom the branchs. Covering himself with his coat, he lay on his back and positoned his axe with in easy reach and put his hands behind his head, relaxing and letting his mind wander he thought about the ranger Philyra Nye, and the strange way they had met, and how much she confused him. He liked her; well, as much as you could like someone that you wernt sure you could trust, who might be as corrupt as the rest of the intelligent races. Eventually, sleeps call was to strong and his eyes closed, his breathing deepend, and he slept.

(OOC: Phylira and I have started a post that takes place in the same general time period, technically he meets her before this because she timestamped for the sixth and i put this as the eighth so im going to refer to her sometimes)

[Desmodus]

The camp was indeed abandoned, albeit seemingly only recently. It was a bit larger than Carnasch's own, suggesting that perhaps two or three, rather than just one person, might have been staying here. Although there were no occupants on hand, there was something else that would save the Vagaran some work: not only was there still a little firewood near the abandoned firepit, which would save the Vagaran another trip later on should he remain at that campsite, but also he found remnants of an old lean-to, similar in design to the one he was about to build. Two pronged stakes, the ends whittled with a knife to make them easier to drive into the ground, lay there, as did some still-usable vines and longer branches for making he cross-pieces and the framework for the "roof".

There were also some other smaller sticks of random length that had been whittled into random shapes; one simply sharpened into a wedge-shaped point, another looked like it was starting to resemble a snake's head, complete with eyes and a mouthline with two litte "fangs" sticking out. Anything else of value, such as food or water or equipment, the campers had obviously taken with them.

His findings made his lean-to considerably easier to make than it might otherwise have been. Carnash's snare was still free of quarry the last time he looked at it. It looked like he would have to content himself with his one fish for now, insufficient meal though it was. His fire caught on nicely, and just in time, too, for as it grew dark, so too did it start to grow cold, and Carnasch could see the vapor from his breath lit up by the flickering firelight, whiter and cooler than the woodsmoke. Things were quiet, and the sky above him clear, as he curled up under his coat to go to sleep.

Some time later, the Vagaran's eyes opened, his mind alert and somewhat startled as though something had woken him. It was still dark, and judging by how the fire had burned down to glowing embers, he had been asleep for perhaps a couple candlemarks. It was not immediately obvious at first what had roused him, but his heart was beating fast. Finally, after a few moments he heard it: a furtive, irregular rustling sound, coming from the direction of his snare.

[Carnasch]

Rousting the last of his sleep from him, Carnasch threw on his coat and retreived his axe. Before leaving, he also stoked the fire and added some wood so that he would see it on the way back, and to help keep animals from pillaging his things. Loping off in the direction of the stream, he veered south a bit, so that he would not run head long into his quarry, which could very possibly be as big as him.

As he neared the area, the streams water sparkling in the moon light, he kept low and behind trees or bushes as mush as possible. As he gained sight of the area he ducked down behind a bush for a moment. He listened to the sounds again, they seemed quieted, like whatever had been caught didnt want to be heard. This suggested intelligence made the human even more cautous as he peered around the leaves.

[Desmodus]

Carnash's night vision suffered temporarily as his fire brightened in response to his stoking. For a moment, his camp was a bright-lit island in a sea of black. Then, as he looked away from its light and off into the forest, his eyes slowly readjusted, and the stems of trees and shapes of rocks slowly emerged from the murky background. His eyes readjusted, the Vagaran set off towards the snare, and the source of the sound.

He did not get all the way to the site of his snare, nor indeed very far from his campsite at all, when he saw it. Apparently, it had already seen him, and had stopped making any noise. It was a long, low form, doubtless a fairly large beast on all fours, although the human could not quite make out exactly what kind of beast, nor how large. What he could make out clearly were its eyes, glowing in what was probably the faint light from the fire about twenty paces behind him. They were big, round, and greenish, and they looked rather like those of a cat. A *big* cat.

The creature gazed at the Vagaran, and did not move.

[Carnasch]

Carnasch realized he probably didn't want to go any closer the instant he saw the thing. In fact, his best options where either to climb the nearest, and by that the biggest, tree he could find, or to run as far and as fast as he could, hoping the monster of a cat didn't break free before he was miles away. Niether of these options were very good, considering the cat could probably climb trees better than he could, and run faster than him, and track him by scent if it was so inclined.

Fighting it was so far out of the question the human laughed when he thought of it, the biggest thing he had ever killed was a badger, and while very ferosous, was still pitifly small compared to the giant before him. It still hadn't moved, and he watched it carefully from across the stream.

The Vagaran considered throwing rocks at it, to maybe injure it or knock it out, this seemed unlikely, but that was his only snare and he needed it back in one piece at that. He'd been lucky earlier, when something had escaped it, that it hadn't been broken or lost. Now that seemed almost certain. He could always make another, but it took time, and materials, the latter of which he didn't have.

And with winter coming on, the fur coat it could provide would be more than welcome and practically invaluable, but then again, there was the down side of still having to kill it though. He thought maybe he could catch another of the cats limbs to imobilize it futher, but he had no more rope, and the town was to far away, and on the other side of the cat none the less. He wished his old friend were here, he'd know what to do. All these thoughts went through his head in an instant, so fast if they were visible, theyd have been nothing but a blur.

Readying himself, Carnasch stalked up closer to it, hoping that maybe he could get close enough to kill it while it was ensnared, and thus avoid a more dangerous conflict by running or hidding up a tree, both of which he could always do later.

[Desmodus]

There was bad news and good news for the Vagaran. The bad news was that he had misjudged rather badly the status of the animal in front of him. It was not caught in the snare at all, though it stood quite close to it. In fact, the black beast was quite free to react to Carnasch's approach however it wished.

Which brought one to the good news, or at least, the not-so-bad news. The animal did not pounce or attack Carnasch, though it hunched down menacingly and made a low, growling sound. Not wanting for some reason to run away, it sidestepped around, the eyes disappearing temporarily behind a tall black shape (presumably a tree trunk) before reappearing on the other side, still sidestepping, still looking at Carnasch.

From near the spot where the beast had been when the human had first seen it, something else was stirring. Although he could not tell for certain what it was, he could tell that some small creature was caught in his snare, and was thrashing about, trying unsuccessfully to escape both man and cat alike.

The cat stopped after sidestepping a few paces, and seemed to tense up, as if it had no intention of retreating any further from where it was. In the darkness, Carnasch could not tell what it was going to do, just as it was still trying to determine what the apething that had so rudely interrupted its pracenda would do. The trapped critter, whatever it was, squirmed frantically, not being particularly interested in what either of them would do. Man, cat, and what-ever-the-little-critter-was stood now in a sort of three-way standoff, arranged in a roughly equilateral triangle a few meters on a side.

[Carnasch]

The Vagarans eyes never leaving the black beast to the side, Carnasch side stepped nearer to the small *thing* in the snare, he looked down at it for just an instant, marking its location. He gingerly stepped his foot down on what he thought was its head/neck area, and watched the cat as it growled louder and bunched up, probably to defend what it considered its catch. His body was a set spring, ready to jump back and away should the creature mistake his intentions

Carnasch's only thoughts were, 'Please don't eat me, please don't eat me...' He stooped slowly and with one hand, his eyes still on the cat-creature. Still tensed to dodge away, he moved in a blur as he undid his loop from the smallish being in his snare and tossed the small body at the cat, and stood back up, holding his axe ready if the animal had pounced at him or run forward.

[Desmodus]

The creature -the larger one, that is- was most displeased at the apething's move, a move to steal *it's* food. It lunged a foot or two forward menacingly, snarling and flashing its sharp teeth. It did not attack outright; first it would probe this creature's resolve. Would it stand it's ground, or would it back off?

Come to think of it, the smaller creature wasn't particularly pleased by having the apething charge towards it either. It was in pain. It was trapped. And two big creatures, one a familiar predator, the other funny-looking and -smelling, were looming over it, fighting over it. The funny one reached it first; the trapped critter kicked and lashed frantically, it did not want to die, it wanted to live live live, fight or flight, it was not picky; then it froze in helplessness as it felt the powerful tug on its leg, sensed the earth drop from beneath it, as it rose rose rose, closer, no doubt, to the odd two-legged creature's mouth.

What happened next surprised both of the non-humans. The cat did not expect the disputed quarry to come hurtling through the air at it, and the quarry did not expect to suddenly take flight. The snared creature flew a few feet in the dark, then hit the ground with a faint *plop* after which it lay for a few heartbeats-or in its own case, dozens of heartbeats- disoriented and stunned. The cat, startled, snarled again and jumped back a step, gazing angrily at this interloper.

It took a moment for the cat to realize that this was actually food, a windfall. It took a moment for the quarry to realize that it was not trapped. The rope attached to its foot no longer tied to a tree, it could run. It tried.

It was not to be. The puma was too fast for it. The cat pounced on the creature, snapping its neck easily. After taking a moment to glare jealously at the apething, it turned and dashed off into the darkening. Had the apething just offered it food? It could not tell. But it knew that it would eat. And it knew that it was not about to let apething have another shot at the delicious meat it now held between its jaws. It loped off noiselessly into the blackness, seeming to dissolve into it.

Carnasch was left alone in the shadows, the faint light from his fire back in camp just visible through the trees, but not providing enough light for him to see anything around him, a beacon but not illumination. There was once again good news and bad news for the Vagaran. On one hand, the predator was no longer harassing him. On the other, he no longer had any prey of his own to harass.

[Carnasch]

As the puma loped away, the prize clutched in its jaws, the human looked at his snare and untied it from the tree so he could examine it by the fire. He grumbled to himself about his poor luck with snares lately and wondered if he'd been cursed for something. He sat by his fire and leaned close holding up sections of his line to the light. He occationally drank from his waterskin, and chewed on some of his hard tack and jerky.

He talked to himself aloud while he inspected it, first about his poor fortune, then about his upcomming lack of sleep the next Brightening, and eventually to Philyra the beautiful woman he had met a few Brightenings previous. He thought about what they had said and done, especially what they had done, and eventually his manner lightened. He went back to sleep smiling despite any tears or cuts on his cord, and he woke feeling rested for starting a new Brightening.

[Desmodus]

Fortunately for Carnasch, there was no damage to his snare other than what he had inflicted himself. With a new bit of cord, he would have no difficulty resetting his trap, should he wish to do so. There was nothing further to trouble him before going to bed, and soon he slept.


The puma was content. It had food. It ate it quickly, before any other creature could steal it. And then it found a safe place, and rested. It woke just as the sky was starting to pale. It would be light again soon. The birds would start to become more active. And so would the ape. Some monkeys saw well at night, but most did not, especially not the large, hairless, tailless ones.

It got up and stalked through the woods, guided by both scent and memory, to the place where the apething had given it food. Its eyes caught the light, and smelled the smoke. The smoke made by wood set aflame by lighting, or by apethings. There, under cover of trees it peered between two branches at the burning wood, watching, waiting. The apething was weak. It had given up its food easily when threatened. Perhaps it would do so again.


Carnasch awoke shortly after dawn. The sky above him was light but still pale, not yet blue, and the woods were filling with the sounds of birds. The air was cool, the fire had subsided to embers, and he was feeling a bit cold and stiff. There was no sign of the puma anywhere that the human could detect. No sign at all.

[Carnasch]

Awaking both stiff and cold was never pleasant, and it happened all to often as the autumn season progressed. Soon he would either have to hole up somewhere for the winter, or find a job in a village. The first was both the most and the least desirable. It meant less contact with humans, elves, orcs, or anything else that walked on two legs. It alson meant less food, more cold, and the uncertainty of life and death. Carnasch had stayed out all winter before, quite successfully on occasion. He considered these things now as he prepared to leave.

After breakfast, he doused the fire with water from his waterskin, and walked towards the stream, dropping his axe in its loop as he went. He stooped and filled his water containers at the stream, and washed his hands and face. He looked across the stream to where the puma-cat thing had been the night previous. Curious, he stood and walked across to where its tracks were. He noted the size and the shape and followed them around, reliving the encounter in his head, he studdied the movements of the beast.

He thought of all the things that might have been going through its head, especially its perceived confusion when he threw the jack rabbit thing at it. These thoughts included that maybe it thought he had offered to feed it, which would not be good, in fact it would be down right bad. These thoughts were the deciding factor in his next decision.

The human thought to himself, 'I'll follow it... for a while at least, just to make sure that its not comming back...' So he set off following the tracks. They were not hard to follow, considering the size of the animal he was following, and when the tracks were too hard to decifer, he followed the blood from the dieing creature it had held in its jaws. He followed its tracks for a few miles, going slower than usual because he had to keep checking the tracks to make sure he had the right ones.

Eventually, he was satisfied, and he started off the tracks at a kind of north east direction, so that he should find the north - south flowing stream again. The Vagaran loped back to the stream, albiet far north of his old encampment, and then followed it north even further. Carnasch stopped for the Darkening along the stream and rebuilt himself a camp, he went through all the same steps, including reseting his snare and fishing in the stream, (he didn't catch anything and had to eat hardtack and jerky) and he sat by the fire till it was fully dark and he went to sleep.

[Desmodus]

As with so many other things he hadn't done before, trying to track the large cat turned out to be harder that it sounded. The trees were starting to shed their leaves, and these covered the ground beneath and tended to conceal tracks. The puma also hadn't left any convenient scat. Carnasch had a bit more luck with traces of fur and blood (presumably) from the quarry the beast had snagged from him. This at least told him that the creature had veered generally east-by-northeast away from the creek; however, the trail petered out after perhaps a hundred meters. Beyond that, wandering the forest in search of more clues would probably only serve to get him lost, though the creek was long enough that he would always be able to find it again simply by following the trees' morning shadows westwards until the stream intersected his path.

He hiked without incident following the stream, though he could tell from the suns shining in his eyes in the afternoon that the creek's course was starting to veer westwards (or rather: it was veered to the south from a eastsoutheastwards course; Carnasch was following it upstream). One odd thing he did notice was a lot of debris, mostly splintered wood, caught in an eddy in the creeks' bend.

As the Baijani settled into his camp for the darkening, he noticed a glint of light to the west. He hadn't noticed it before, perhaps because it was so close to where the suns were setting, but now that they were below the horizon, he was certain that it was another light. Between the trees, he could make out the flickering light of another campfire like his own.

[Carnasch]

(OOC: Baijani? Im Vagaran. Lol.)

IC:

It was just before he had been about to fall asleep, when he noticed the fire-light in the distance, so he decided that he would wait until morning to investigate it. He would be going that way anyways. For some reason it chauffed at him, it had turned his mind on, and now he couldn't shut it off. Carnasch struggled to go to sleep as he tossed and turned and his mind thought of all the possibilities of who or what it could be.

It was probably just some human lumber jacks, that would explain the wood chips and splinters in the stream, but it could be anything else including the Vysstichi. That would be bad, but they probably wouldn't have or even need fires. At last, the Vagaran succumbed to his curiousity and got up again. He banked the fire so that it would last until he returned, and started off upstream.

He ran for a while, cautious for any look outs or triplines, but slowed while he was still nearly a hundred meters out. From then on he moved only from under cover of trees and bushes, and he kept a look out for anyone behind him. When he was close enough, he climbed a tree, and from high above, he peered from inbetween the branches.