OOC: The whole post is made by individual posts, starting with mine and then Bad Omens. It goes like that throughout the entire scenario. (Also Bad Omens posts are in italics, and there's a -- between each post.)
Xanfyrst wrote:Feeling that he has accomplished what he's been told to do, the cloaked man quietly leaves the town at the end of the day.
At the border of Triel, near a small pocket of forest close to the river, he pulls off the crude cloak and disposes of it into the murky water. Nearby, hidden within a fallen branch, he takes out a different cloak and throws it around his shoulders.
He then turns around and looks back at the settlement, smirking mischievously, his emerald green eyes twinkles in the dusk that heralds the coming of the night.
Bad Omens wrote:The cloaked figure whom felt it wise to present such a spectacle was not alone when he left the town. A keen eye had been watching him quietly from the shadows and now, as this antagonist passed from the world of man into a place this silent watcher knew all too well, the hunt truly begins.......
What followed:
Travelling down the murky road towards the north east, he frequently used his magical abilities to improve his speed, and making short rests every couple of hours.
He was aware that his presence at Triel had most likely been monitored by those who opposed his employer. In his many years of working for the underworld of the Sword Coast he had come to expect such. It would be foolish not to.
Though, with the years his abilities to blend in with the shadows, crowds and other environments have improved tenfold, it had also made him more careless than he should be. Nowadays he only made a few wide zig-zags in the woods and ran through the water streams a couple of times, as it has proven to be enough to loose most people in the past.
After more than half a day, he stopped up at a small clearing with a large dead tree in the middle. He carefully studied the tree-trunk and found it hollow. Deciding that he had probably lost any pursuers by now, he climbed inside the trunk and made himself comfortable, even if he practically standing up inside it. As always, he was sleeping with a small blade in each hand in case he was disturbed in his light slumber.
--
He followed at a distance, moving silently through the wood like the breeze. This one he tracked was not unaccustomed to the ways of the hunter, though he did not think as a hunter would. He himself was born a survivor, learning the way of the wood and he was a very patient hunter.
In his early life, it had been unwitting men, in his adolescence it was the had been the suspicious and for a time in these lands it was the deadliest of his people's enemies. The one he hunted was clever he thought but not as much as he needed to be. The streams presented a minor disadvantage, more an inconvenience for an impatient beast than a hunter of men.
While the tracks would disappear into a stream, they would eventually be found again in the mud lining the other side and the hunter's companions aided in finding them before being dismissed back to the woods. This mud then clung to the prey's boots and trailed through the wood. If he had been smart, or hardened to the trails of the woods, he might have taken off his boots but alas the hunted did not, allowing for the hunter to quicken his pace.
He looked to find the less dry and fresher mud. The soft ground also allowed for the tracks to remain steady and constant. When the mud and tracks began to moisten, the hunter slowed his pace, stopped and waited. There he would stay until the took sight of his prey once more. He did not need rest. He was, as he was born to be, a tireless hunter...
--
After a few hours of light sleep, the hooded man exposed himself to the morning sun, rather gracefully jumping out of the hollow trunk. He was rubbing his eyes while still holding his blades, accustomising them to the light, even if the sun hadn't fully risen above the horizon.
He mumbled some foreign words, swiftly moved his hands backwards and back, his blades gone as if they had been turned magically. He looked around with narrowed eyes, checking the whole clearing for anything unusual, but found none. If there was somebody there, they had no placed a foot in the clearing.
The hooded man then began stretching his neck and arms, loosening the joints after hours of being locked into the same position. A loud crack or two could be heard.
As the man began preparing to leave the clearing, continueing his journey north, he began to get a nagging feeling that he was being watched. Either by someone or something. He turned around and squinted towards the forest on the other side, expecting to see something. After a while, he shrugged and mumbled some words before entering the woods. He was moving through the forest with over twice the speed of any human being was capable of, easily avoiding fallen branches and other obstacles.
--
It was not long before a movement within the field drew the hunter's keen eyesight. The glare of metal and the shape of a male figure could been seen. His prey stirred, he thought but the timing to was not right.
So, he waited and watched as the figure moved back for the woods across the clearing. The hunter had now learned some of his prey's tricks. He placed his hands into the dirt and rubbed it over his face carefully. He then gathered grass and next to a fallen log laid down, pulling the grass around him.
He would give his prey a head start and so fell into a meditative state. His divinely inspired spells and the magic from the weave which surrounded and altered his being dissipated. It would not be long, only perhaps a few hours and he would return to the hunt back at full strength.
He was gaining on the prey but it was his patience, as it always had been that led to his prey's downfall. So, the pursuit continues...
--
Though not used to traverse the wilds, he had a remarkable ease to adjust himself. He almost literally flew over the wooden landscape, the environment not too different than the city once he got used to it.
He slowed down to a walk, then stopped up to take a deserved breather. He looked forward and could see the full power of the sun shining through the branches ahead. After hours of speeding through the forest, he had finally reached the edge of the forest. Now, he was probably not more than 500 meters away from the farms that lead up to Corm Orp, the village at the roots of the Sunset Mountains.
"About bloody time.. " he mumbled. "Maybe I can get some decent meal at the Hungry Halfling and a soft bed..." referring to the village's popular tavern and inn that merchants, soldiers and mercenaries often visited when they came through.
--
He first felt his breath and then slowly opened his eyes as he left his trance like state. The sun's rays shinning in through the leaves slightly burned, at least until they adjusted. Lying still, he listened intently. The sounds of leaves blowing in the breeze, insects crawling and birds indiscriminately flying to perch on creaking branches.
He then rose slowly and peered around. His first words being those whispered in arcane language enabling him to vanished from view. The animals all knew he was there but no sentient being might, unless of course they possessed his same gifts. He then offered a nearly imperceptible whistle and forth came a white wolf from the surrounding woods.
The wolf trotted forth to sit before the hunter. He then looked up to the blazing sun and called forth to the god of elements, the great purifier, to bless the animal while it sat patiently. When he was done, he took forth what now was a rag and placed it before the wolf's snout. The discarded cloak of the prey.
The muddy cloak still held some of the scent of it's previous owner, as the wolf sniffed it and then looked up to the hunter. "Go, find him", he said and cast one last spell to hasten the wolves travel. The hunter watched as the animal launched it's self down the path with tremendous speed.
"I will be with you soon", the hunter whispered to himself...
The wolf tears over the soft dirt, dry leaves and twigs, leaping down trees as he pursues the scent. His master had offered him this hunt. The wolf would find this creature for his master. The wolf would make it a trophy and offering of his affection for his master but now there was only one focus, the scent.
It was growing near and this drove the animal harder. It began to salivate in anticipation of finding his prey. The wolf's mouth began to draw back at the sides to reveal it's incisors, readying for the kill. Then light began to shine more through the canopy and the wolf began to slow as it came to a clearing.
There, not but twenty meters before it in the clearing was the smell. The prey, the kill, the trophy to prove his undying adoration for his master. Still, he he stopped at the edge of the Forest. This was not the way of the wolf, he knew it would play into his prey's hands to run out into the clearing alone.
The wolf lowered it's head, bared it's terrible fangs and let out a low growl to let the prey know he was there. The wolf's blue eyes were fixated upon the man as it paced slowly back and forth at the ridge line of the canopy, inviting the man to move back toward he and the woods...
--
His keen hearing instantly picked up the growl and he turned around in an instant, swiftly drawing his sword. His emerald green eyes wearyingly scouted the area behind him.
"Who's out there?! Show yourself!" he shouted, preparing himself to be attacked. He mumbled some words to ward himself. While doing so, he moved behind a tree and... disappeared. He had used an invisibility spell and was now slowly moving away from where he was, his steps surprisingly silent.
Once away from where he had been, he leaned up on a tree while keeping both his eyes and ears on high alert. He clutched the hilt of his sword, ready to thrust it into whatever was hunting him.
He waited and waited, but nothing happened. He peaked out and twitched his ear. Nothing to see, nothing to hear. His paranoid mind quickly concluded that this wasn't a normal wolf or wolf-pack. No, the wolf was either one of them annoying druids or a pet of a ranger, which meant he had been followed.
He knew that he wasn't in his element, and that he would be in a disadvantage against whoever was out there. There was no point in trying to fight.
"Blasted.." he mumbled and began, with a low voice, to chant a spell. He waggled his fingers and he instantly blended in with the environment, turning invisible. With no delay, he ran towards the clearing. He could have sneaked out, leaving no trace... but he didn't want to risk getting caught if whoever was out there was as good a tracker as he thought he/she was. No, he ran like if he was running from an angry dragon-mother, ignoring the fact he left visible traces on the ground, giving up his immediate position.
--
The wolf growled in a low guttural tone as it watched it's prey turn and to flee. It's body tensed into a coil of muscles and it's back paws began to dig into the dirt. Just as it was about to leap into chase, it felt something stroke it's bristled coat gently. The animal began to swing round and sink it's fang's into that something when it saw it's master standing beside it. Quickly stepping back, the wolf lowered it's head to whimper in shame.
The hunter bent down while placing three arrows back within his quiver and a bow upon his back, all in a single motion. The hunter's eye scanned out over the field, watching the man flee while the wolf continued to whimper. In a light moaning tone directed at the wolf which was near inaudible, he directed the animal toward him with a wave of his hand.
The wolf stepped slowly forward toward the hunter whose eyes now turned toward the town beyond and the banners of the patrols upon it's roads. "You did well my friend, you needn't be ashamed", the Hunter told the wolf in it's own tone. The hunter stroked it's mane to reassure the animal with his gloved hands. "We have done well but now we must be patient", the Hunter said as he stood and drew forth a rune.
The wolf watched as it's master spoke in a language it did not understand and suddenly the rune begin to glow. The Hunter placed this rune within a silk blue satchel and began to walk deeper into the wood. He turned one last time, jerking his cowled head toward his companion, telling the wolf to follow. It did, coming up to trot along side the hunter as if nothing had just happened.
Then as they drew to the shadows of the forest, there was a sudden flash of light and they were gone...
--
The hunter's prey got out of the clearing and ran towards the farms on the outskirts of Corm Orp before removing his invisibility from himself. He panted heavily as he looked back into the dark of the forest with his emerald green eyes and smirked, knowing he got away from whoever or whatever was chasing him.
"Nobody catches Alistair the Red. Nobody."
