Path of the Mother (Book Three)

Chapter 6 Forestly Visit

Duncan busied himself around the camp while Lilly went to see if there was a way into the mountain. He washed and then hung his bloody breeches up to dry on a tree limb. After that, he spent a little while looking for any edible plants that he could add to the eggs later.

Equipment maintenance was the next thing on his list. He laid all his arrows out on a log while he checked the tips and fletching on each. The Goblins didn't use a feather fletching on their shafts. These all had some kind of a thin leather that was whipped and glued on to do basically the same thing. A couple of them needed to be resecured.

A small cane tube in his kit yielded enough glue base for the job, but he made a mental note to refill it next time they were in town. It was a powder made from some kind of tree sap and mixed with some other stuff. He didn't really know what all was in it, but a little bit of saliva wet it enough to make it tacky, and he was able to fix all the arrows pretty quickly.

One of the shafts looked like it might be warped, so he picked it up to sight along its length. Right where the arrow was pointed, a small person was standing there in the camp looking at him. He hadn't even heard anybody come up.

"Whoa! Where did you come from?" Duncan asked, startled.

"I've been standing here for a while," the boyish face said.

He looked young and slim and fairly small. He was probably only about four and a half feet tall. His eyes were dark green, and his short wavy green hair was only a couple shades lighter.

"Are your parents close? Did you get lost or something?" Duncan asked. "It's kind of dangerous for kids this far from town."

The guy smirked at that and asked, "Just how old do you think I am anyway?"

"I don't know. Thirteen maybe?"

"Humans," the young-looking guy said. "I'm actually two-hundred and thirty-seven. My name is Lichen, and I'm what your kind call a Forest Nymph."

Duncan had never seen one of them before, and he'd been in the forest a bunch of times. "I'm sorry. I hope I haven't intruded into some place that I'm not supposed to be or anything."

"Oh, no ... nothing like that," Lichen said. "I was just wondering if you've seen a great big fella running around here. He might look like a Troll, only about twice as big."

"What are you looking for someone that big for?" Duncan asked. He wasn't ready to give up any information that he didn't really need to. He also didn't want to lie if he didn't have to. "You do realize that you'd only be a snack to someone that size."

"Well, Duncan, if he didn't eat you, then chances are that he's not going to eat me either," Lichen said.

"So, you already know who I am," Duncan said. "You been spying on me?"

"I'm a child of the forest," he said. "I spy on everybody that comes here. Oh, a couple of birds told me that they had to run a baby Troll off of their nest earlier. They said they knew it was a baby because it wasn't very big and couldn't run very fast. Hope they didn't hurt it very much. They did say that they bloodied it up pretty good."

"Oh, you're so funny," Duncan said, chuckling sarcastically. "Hey, I thought Nymphs always wore leaves and bark or something."

"You have to keep up with the times. In the old days there wasn't much contact with Humans, but it's like you guys are hiding behind every tree these days. We're just trying to blend in."

"So, what are you here for?"

"I see a lot of what goes on in the forest, but sometimes, other things put a fog on what I can and can't know. I was wondering what is happening now that is stirring everything up so much."