Robin Hood (Sequel To Hiraeth- TWD)

Chapter 1

It never snows in Georgia. Or at least, it hasn't in the past fifteen years. But it gets cold in the winter. Freezing cold. But it never stops the walkers, or even slows them down. It slows down people, makes them sick, makes it hard to find food, hard to survive on their own, especially without shelter. 

Most people would be dead if it hadn't been for finding groups and long-term shelters. This was especially the case for Rick Grimes. With his group of older people, suburban city parents, farmers, and a baby, they wouldn't have made it too far in this harsh winter without the prison they lived in. They could be considered having it easy, but there were still plenty of days when they barely ate, days they had to fight invaders, days they nearly froze to death. Unfortunately, life would have been a little easier if Cailey Pallis hadn't left so many months ago. She was an expert hunter, even good competition for Daryl Dixon.

Rick's group now had to travel farther out in the frosty forest to find even the slightest bit of meat. It was dangerous because of both the weather and their new enemy, the Governor for Woodbury settlement. But they didn't have much choice now that their canned food supply was beginning to run short.

Rick and Daryl were the only ones who ever went hunting nowadays, and usually by themselves. They'd come home with a nearly-pathetic amount of meat in their arms. But it was better than nothing. And today, Rick was beginning to think he would be coming home with nothing. 

The former sheriff's shoes crunched on the frozen grass as he stalked through the forest, stopping every few seconds to listen for movement. He was miles from the prison by now, and his heavy jacket was barely doing much to keep him warm. His pistol hung from his right hand, shining in the sunlight as he searched for anything  to eat. He couldn't let his boy Carl go a day without eating, or baby Judith, even if it meant starving himself. 

Rick was stopped by footsteps. He turned on the ball of his heels, hands clicking off the safety of his gun. He hoped for a fat squirrel, a gopher or bird, maybe even a mouse. 

The footsteps crunched on the leaves and grass again. It sounded like a deer or a coyote. It was coming from through the thick brambles. Rick lifted up his gun.

When he neared closer to the thick bushes between the trees, he saw boots. A pair of man's boots tiptoed skillfully behind the tall brambles. Rick watched as the man was beginning to step closer, around the other side of the bushes. He held his gun up as his knuckles turned even whiter, loading another bullet into the chamber. 

He saw the boots come out first from the side, then a pair of white hands holding an old-fashioned compound bow. "Now come out niiiice and slow," Rick drawled out in his thick accent.

The person side-stepped out. It was a familiar face. A girl he had seen so many months ago that had left his group. She had a determined expression on her face before dropping it, lowering her bow. "What're you doin' here, slicker?" Her voice was cracked and dry, filled with irritation. 

"Could ask you the same thing, Cailey," Rick lowered his gun, cognizant that she was no threat. 

"Yer' awful far from the prison," Cailey's position fell to a slouch. She made a quiet whistle to the bushes she had come from, and as her dog crawled out Rick finally got the chance to look her over better. Cailey's jawline had gotten sharper, her cheekbones higher- probably just sunken in from malnutrition. Her messy and greasy hair had grown to her jaw now, longer than he'd ever seen before. Instead of that ripped leather jacket she once wore, over her sweater, Cailey wore a hooded poncho made of soft green cloth, such a dark green it was nearly brown. The black bandanna she once wore around her forehead was now tied gently around her dog's neck like a collar. The dog looked better now, fatter, fluffier, and it stuck to Cailey like a puppy still. 

"You are, too," Rick nodded.

The girl sighed, twirling an arrow around her left hand. "Don't belong there. Go home, Rick."

"Come back with me," the man tried to persuade her. "We've got it rough, it's hard to find food now, we've had to come this far out to find anything again. But you can help us a lot, you're an expert hunter, and you'll be better off in the shelter with the group."

Rick never begged. But when Daryl came back to the prison to find Cailey missing, he was devastated and utterly pissed. Cailey had to come back, for Daryl's sanity and his.

"I already told Carol," the girl shook her head. "Ain't no Daryl, ain't no me. I knows y'all liked me and all, but if he just up and left like that, I can't stay."

Cailey's Southern accent was developing more. She'd sounded like a whole Northerner for the first year he'd known her, even though she used slang and spoke like a hick. But her actual Georgian accent had begun forming after that first year, and was even more prominent now. The dehydration probably had something to do with it. 

"Daryl's at the prison. He is. Merle's there, too," Rick nodded. "We been trynna plan something against that settlement that took Glenn and Maggie back then. They've already attacked us once."

Cailey snorted, pressing her arrow back against her bowline. "Bullshit. Man left, he don't change his mind."

"Well, I guess he did this time," the sheriff nodded again. "He came back a few weeks after you left."

"Yeah. Right," the girl scoffed. 

"Come back," Rick asked again, softer. "Please."

Cailey pursed her lips together. "Good seein' you 'gain, Rick."

Cailey lifted up her soft poncho, revealing a leather strap crossed against her chest lined with a few small animals. She pulled a frozen dead fish off, then threw it at Rick. The girl turned, her cape-like poncho whipping in the wind as she walked behind the bristles again, her footsteps fading out as she treaded farther through the trees. 

The man held the limp fish in his freezing hand, staring at the space where Cailey had been standing. The first interaction he'd had with her after she'd spontaneously left without a word, and he couldn't even convince her to come back after so many months. 

But he would be telling Daryl, of course. If anybody could track Cailey down again, now that they knew where she had been, it would be Daryl. If anybody would be able to convince Cailey to return to the group, it would be Daryl.