The Songbird and the Wolf

[ XVI ] Unlikeliest of Friends

Quinn had been a silent, distant observer of the conversation. 

Much of it unfamiliar to him, but there didn't seem to be a shadow in this place that felt remotely like the world he had known. 

He paid no more attention than was necessary to make sure things didn't escalate to violence, and when the pixie asked them to follow, the Wolf did just that with unquestioning obedience.

The silence is a thing they could drown in, the tension a thing he could cut easily with a blunt knife. But he makes no attempts at breaking it. 

The only other sound is the occasional whimper of the man strewn across his shoulders, and when the man's soft wings drag across a stone or thorn. 

As a man who has spent much of his life on the run, he recognises evasive manoeuvres when he sees them. And the path they trek through the woodlands is exactly that, passing back over their own footsteps, fording rivers and wading through shallow creeks. 

Even his own nose would struggle to track their paths, but he is unfamiliar to this world. 

He could only hope those more familiar would struggle the same. 

Eventually, they are lead up a steep outcropping. The wolf does not struggle, even with the additional weight. But the woman he saved has a harder time.

He allows his gait to slow, there to help should she need it, but she does not ask. 

The metallic smell of blood clings to her, red blossoming on the tatters of her onyx dress, bruises marking the pale of her skin. The exhaustion is a palpable thing he can almost feel in his own bones. 

Though making that out from his own is no easy task.

Eventually the ground beneath them begins tilting upward, a small hill becoming a steep incline that they zig-zag across on careful feet. The higher they go, the rockier the terrain, still shrouded by the heavy layer of trees.

The moonlight no longer penetrates the thick foliage, flooding the world in the murky dark greens from what little light could get through. 

By the time they come to a halt as the hill levels off, the sounds of laboured breathing have become all the worse from the red-head. 

Blood trickles down his face in a steady trickle, small wounds with no chance to heal as he pushes himself further and further. 

It takes a moment for his eyes to accustom to the sight. 

The slight shimmer at the edge of the world in front of him, until the thick trees disappear, to reveal a den of sorts within the jagged rocks. Even without the glamour, it would have been well hidden, not clear what it was unless someone knew what they were looking for. 

"A sentinel hideout?" The woman asks quietly. 

"Dead, the sentinels are spread thin enough that no one ever came to reclaim the position," comes the solemn answer. 

The woman stiffens, so slightly he might have otherwise missed it. Her shoulders droop then set back, she steps into the den. Scouting it out for a moment before returning to the surface, indicating for the Wolf to come in. 

He steps through the entrance, and the sight inside takes his breath away. 

A makeshift home. A bed by the far corner, pressed against the rock wall. The drip of water into a small, shimmering pool to the right hand side. 

A chest of drawers, several pulled half open, empty. Candles burned half way down, the smell of smoke so faint even his own senses struggle to pick up on it.