"Ah, excuse me...Sadie, was it? We're trying to sleep. Why do you want to dance under the pale moonlight?"
"It's a joy, a privilege—just snap and bend your cartilage! Come out and I will show you. Come out and let me know you."
Isamu pads up next to Yeldrid. The kitsune is in his true form, ears turned towards the strange creature, buckler on one arm, and his hand resting lightly on the hilt of his rapier.
"I, for one, would rather like to keep my bones intact and my breathing unobstructed," he calls out. "What do you say to that, Sadie?"
He's not quite sure what to make of this creature, but its words certainly mark it as a danger... but a danger to whom, and why? He's glad to have the moonlight shining, and he keeps a silent prayer to Ysidar in his heart for clear sight to find the truth of the matter.
"What I say is, you should come out nearer. Sadie's voice is too soft for you to hear her."
"What was that? Maybe you should come closer so I can hear you," Isamu replied, not trusting her for a moment.
"Lies! None of those lies!" The creature lets out a spitting snarl. "I see them crawling in your eyes."
"Ah, so it's fine for you to lie but not for me?" Isamu retorts. "The fact that I heard you clearly means your voice is loud enough."
"I suffer from several years of severe hearing damage as a result of my occupation. I can still hear ya. Maybe you could explain why you're here before we get any further. We're trying to take a snooze, and your singing about eating humans is somewhat distracting, particularly since there are no humans here."
Yeldrid pulls his gun. For comfort. And boldness. And to show he means business.
There is a long, drawn-out silence. When the voice at last replies, it seems to have lost some of its singsong manner, and quite a bit of the unsettling rhythms.
"Be it fate or be it hate or be it shade or see it through—see you later, patient waiters, I'll await darker waters 'ere I come for you." The figure starts to slither away, keeping its glowing golden eyes on the group til the last. "But mark Sadie, the politician is not so patient a tactician—he is a most efficient mortician. Dear cat, we may not get the chance to enjoy our lovely dance."
The creature clambers off into the treetops.
The party encounters no further distractions that night, and morning soon comes. Unless awoken by another traveler, they sleep almost til noon. They rub their eyes, looking around the forest as if seeing it for the first time. "I had weird dreams."
And the last horse crosses the finish line as Rex snorts awake. "Hmm? What's going on?" he asks, eyes still droopy.
Isamu glances back at Rex. "Nothing, now. You just missed it. You're welcome to go back to sleep."
He looks back out into the night. "We most likely will want to move quickly in the morning. Something found us, something that knows about this 'politician' fellow--which means reinforcements might not be far behind."
Yeldrid immediately curls back into his bedroll bundle and begins purring, murmuring something about "Why don't fellas just say wha tthey mean around here..."
In the morning, Yeldrid seems pretty cheery, and begins inspecting his newly 'refurbished' firearm. He appears to have sacrificed one of his iron pots to remodel most of the gun barrel. It barely resembles the old gun. The gun also now seems to utilise a hammer device to feed in a burning wick.
Rex doesn't appear to have heard that he stares past the woods, eyes still half lidded. "Okay." He finally says. His head droops for a moment while sitting up then he remembers he has a bedroll. He is back asleep in seconds.
In the morning he awakes, cheery and oblivious. "I had a strange dream I think. I can't recall what happened but it was mildly ominous."
"What sort of dreams did you have, Trin?" Isamu asks in the morning after waking everyone.
"Um... I was floating." Trin frowns. "I was on a boat, and I was really big. And there were rocks up ahead. The boat was rocking a lot. Then the boat tipped over, and I woke up."
"Just as well that we didn't go with the boat plan then..." Yeldrid says under his breath.
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The party continues down the trail, leaving the Lost Tower behind. They make good time as they progress—Trin is lively and eager to get a move on. They eagerly pepper the party with questions as before. Whatever malaise afflicted them yesterday seems to have faded, at least for the time behind.
After a while, the partymembers with enhanced olfactory capabilities notice a very pleasant smell up ahead. It is the smell of fresh apples. The smell is coming from somewhere up ahead, just around the bend. A thick blackberry thicket blocks the party's view.
As they draw nearer, they find a large apple tree laden with old, rotten fruits. A small barrel next to the tree has been filled with them. The apples look well past their season, though this does not match the pleasant smell.
Isamu frowns at the sight, his hand straying to the hilt of his blade. "Doesn't it seem odd that this barrel is abandoned here? As if the owner was planning to come back but never did?"
"I find it more odd the apples look rotten," he says squinting at them. "They smell amazing." Even the tree looked healthy but he wasn't an expert on anything natural except himself.
Yeldrid scans the tree and scrutinises the barrel, sensing something is amiss.
Yeldrid points out the tracks to Rex, "We got some footprints." He leans down and sniffs them out, getting the creature's scent.
"Want to follow? I'm not bad at following tracks but I could use some help"
Yeldrid can tell that the tracks belonged to something small—perhaps even smaller than Lily and Rex. He believes he can follow the tracks, but they seem to lead a ways off the path.
Isamu looks around warily. "I'm afraid I won't be much help follow tracks."
Rex plops down on four legs and sniffs around the tracks. Detecting something faint. Something very faint, even for his nose. But it wouldn't be impossible. "I am starting to doubt my nose but I can sure give it a shot."
Aside from the tracks, barrel, and apples, there are claw marks in the apple tree. There are signs that the barrel was rolled here, rather than carried.
Isamu notes the claw marks, and his grip on his sword hilt grows tighter. "I don't know what this is about, but it certainly seems like something a bit too dangerous to investigate with a young one about."
"Why? What is it? What did you see?" Trin peers at the claw marks. "What are those?"
"The tracks of kin, but the smaller kind. Not sure what to make of it, but I don't think they were far away. Somehow I feel like this is a trick..."
Yeldrid goes over to the barrel, pulls out a series of rods from Samson's pack, and begins screwing them together. It eventually forms a 10 foot pole, which he uses to prod the apples in the barrel. He tries knocking one of them onto the ground.
Yeldrid is able to knock one of the rotten apples onto the ground.
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"I do feel like it's a trick of some kind, but the question is, who is it meant to trick, and why?" Isamu says, keeping his hand on his sword, looking back and forth in search of danger. "As much as I'd like to solve this riddle, though, I'd rather keep moving before anyone we'd rather not see catches up to us."
For an uncomfortably and hilariously long moment, Rex becomes enraptured by the very large stick in Yeldrid's hand. He follows its every move before finally coming to his senses. "This is odd. This forest is odd. This tree is odder. But the tracks smell fresh. Maybe we can find who made them. Can you follow them?" he asks Yeldrid.
"Lily, could you look after Trin and Samson? We're going to go speak with a cat."
Trin seems reluctant to part with the three, but Lily is able to distract them with a story of her previous endeavors. The trio leave Lily, Samson and Trin behind and journey off the path.
The Writhing Wood is lush and green here, making it difficult even for the shortest member of the team to make his way through the brush. Even seeing where one is going is tricky, but Yeldrid and Rex, by combining their skills, are able to follow the trail of little cat pawprints.
After about two minutes of walking, the trail comes to a halt in front of a tall tree. Two small barrels—like the one by the apple tree, but empty—sit at the tree's base, nestled between its roots. Claw marks lead up into the branches. High above and slumped over a bough lies a spotted cat, sound asleep, wearing a large, garish red cap.
It snores loudly.
When the trail starts getting tight, Isamu takes the easier path of turning into a fox instead of trying to fight through the brush. He grins slightly at his companions as he follows them.
Rex spots the cat. A low guttural growl bubbles up from his stomach and turns into a harsh bark. He charges the tree barking the whole way. His tiny legs cannot get him very high but he continues to jump up the tree despite that.
At Rex's bark, the cat springs to its feet and stares down at the party. Its fur is on end. Seeing Rex, it lets out a shrill hiss—and a torrent of Catfolk swears and slurs.
Yeldrid is utterly appalled at the torrent of filth coming from the cat. He is going to wait to see how this goes before he reveals himself, however. He will have his gun at the ready, however.
Isamu returns to his true form.
"Rex, please calm down," he says, soothingly. "I do apologize for this," he adds, looking up at the cat, "It would appear that Rex... well, I think you can guess."
"Yes, of course I can guess!" snarls the cat. "What manners of well-thinking, upright-souled people are you to interrupt some innocent animal's rest?" Her eyes never leave the barking Rex. Her tail twitches. "Are you barrel rustlers? I'll shred your trousers to tatters!"
"I don't believe any of us have any interest in stealing barrels," Isamu replies, giving the cat a slight bow. "We are simply travelers, whose curiosity was piqued by the state of the nearby apple tree."
"Innocent my furry bottom," Rex challenged.