The Winter Huntsman (Social, Vodarara, Vavantine)

The cold ever-winter winds blew, the aged huntsman was closed in one of his camps, this place was formed from aged wood, bitten by the frost and hardened it remained on the outskirts of the forests, with its lesser protection from the wind the ice and snow regularly froze the wood. It at least prevented its decay slightly and with care of tending to it once you passed through and making repairs it allowed one to make some sort of a makeshift shelter to stay in over the dark hours.

It was rather useful for setting up traps and allowed one the next day to head directly into the forest to hunt, it was more of an outpost that anyway, the hunter sat round a small crackling fire that’s sound would mostly be suffocated from the wind, though he tried his best to prevent much light leaking out it was likely some did anyway.

A number of sets of gloves were before his feet and in his red raw hands was a piece of jerky, the temperature was always low in this place though it was survivable if you were careful, humans weren’t as hardy as this lands natives and had to rely on their own ability rather than natural ability.

A little wolf rabbit was curled up in a sheltered corner this was the huntsmans minion of sorts, it more of stalked him across the landscape and scavenged on his food, though at least it didn’t scavenge on his winter grain mault, though he only cultivated the beverage in certain areas it did have a bit of a ting to it with the mixture of grains and other flora giving it a rather unique taste to that of Animal Blood, Water and other beverages you could acquire but then what you made yourself always tasted better.

The huntsman would sleep soon though it was nice to once in a while savour a drink.

It appeared that a not so little creature had managed to work its way to his camp through his traps, an imuchakk clad with weaponry a swordsperson as you could say from first appearance, though of course imuchakk suited this environment well and were not heavily required like a human such as himself to be heavily clad in clothing to protect them from the cold environment that filled their homelands.

The huntsman in one of his hands held a makeshift bottle made of native materials, it held the liquid much like a barrel would but was crafted from a single piece of wood that seemed to have had its plug removed.

In the other the huntsman held a wooden dish, which he occasionally was sipping from, as he focused his aged eyes on the Imuchakk that had entered what he would see as at least his domain at this time of night.

The Huntsman spoke, “what brings one out so far during the night, did you get yourself lost kid and as a member of your people you would at least have a different response to one such as myself”

The huntsman’s figure when seated on what was basic wooden seat/bed of sorts just a flat log that one could at least lie on to avoid lying on the snow, the figure covered in pelts and a scar covering what could be seen of his face as his hood was still raised, it confused him why the Imuchakk would turn up here at this time of night.

Night was not the domain of the species that could control the day, things could easily lurk in the shadows and be in wait, things that may be seen as weak in day can become far stronger than the daywalkers during the night.

The huntsman listened to the valiant words of the youngster, they still had much to learn of this world of course the brutality that it held and the shadows that lurked in its darkness, the young hold a form of experience that the old don’t they can seek mystery and are more open in mind, though the huntsman had seen his fair share of surprises and had no home to speak of he was aging, he would likely die at some point not too far in the future, though his job had become more of an eternal warden of the snow and one day it would consume him.

“Well, nipper I guess one day you lot will be the ones to lead this world, many will be dead and gone by that point, the suns and tides change and the flow of destiny changes, maybe you’ll end up somewhere far when you grow up”

The huntsman pondered something before speaking again,

“Anyway Kid its night and I’m not Evil enough to throw people out into the night, so you can make your own choice on what to do but one like myself must at least rest…… also don’t pilfer my food I’ve had enough of my hunt eaten by The High Chief”

The Huntsman lay his back into the bark behind him and would slowly enter a state of sub-sleep where he was aware in some sense but most would be rested.

Though Vodarara could have been said to be appearing as if he was sleeping or rather resting, he was still rather aware of what went on around him, it was a way to survive in these lands if you weren’t an 8ft tall blue haired giant that could kill many of the small creatures with pretty much the focused poke of a finger, It seemed the young female had taken interest in the mutt the Huntsman was carrying around, Vodarara appeared to hear little bits of what they were saying in his rested state and thusly mumbled some words that may or may not have been understandable by the young imuchakk it would much depend on if they had decent ears on their head.

“Play with the mutt if you wish don’t crush it, it’s an interesting sample”

Before he became somewhat slightly more drifted off into his own dream world, though he would easily be awoken.

[EXIT]

It would be sometime before dawn the hunter would move on from this location, it was only one of his many outposts and stop points around the Icepack and he had the habit of moving between area’s regularly though he did have a few more permanent stop offs if he was stopping anywhere specifically for certain hunting seasons or passes which animals would travel along.

It was interesting to see that there were some locals whom were less aggressive to outsiders than others though he did view there aggressiveness to outsiders to be for the best, you should trust others that often all that will lead to is something going wrong, though it was also his land at least in his view or at least he was a part of that land.

At the end of the day at least in his eyes it was good to be unrelaxed around the unknown, because it could bring many things and you would have to predict its routes, though this was his own rambling……

[exit]