The Hunting

Chapter 17

I sat in silence as Javier and Calum laid the buck on the ground. We had to walk about 30 minutes back into the forest to try and catch any game. For a while, we were walking around the area seeing if we could find anything, but we couldn't so we had to walk deeper into the forest. The only thing that we caught was the buck. He was in clearing all by himself, probably because he was too young to mate or if he was of age, he lost a fight to another, bigger buck. He was small in comparison to the bucks I have seen closer to the Burrow. It is probably because there is not as much vegetation out here for him to eat. For six people, however, he would make a great feast for us. If it was back at the Burrow, we would definitely leave him to grow some more. When we saw him, it took a minute of hand gestures and nods to figure out if we were going to shoot him or not. We decided to get him, because not only could we make a blanket with his hide, but meat and jerky, and most important weapons with his bones. As we were walking back, my task as we are traveling through the prairie I will be to make arrowheads and Javier will make knives. This will be very useful because a couple of my arrowheads are becoming dull. I need to see if I can still sharpen them back up though. There still should be a couple of uses left in them.

Within the next two hours, we had all of the animals skinned and butchered. We had to start a fire really quick to cook the meat. Luckily, Nate, Don, and Pietra found plenty of wood and various other supplies. Sadly, we had to leave some of the bones at the campsite. Some of them we couldn't use, like the skull or bigger bones like the sternum. We just don't have room to carry all of that. Before we left, Nate and I were handed back our weapons. Pietra handed me my sword and knife back. She leaned down in whispered in my ear so only I could hear, "If you want to earn our trust so badly here is your way to prove yourself. Don't you dare hurt any of my boys and I won't hurt yours."

I raised my eyebrows. This is the first time she has called them her boys. "You do not have to worry about your boys, they can handle themselves just fine. I will not hurt them and you know that, whether you want to admit it or not." I responded softly.

She gave me a quick nod and stepped back.

As we started walking Javier and I were in the back trying to widdle and carve the bone into something useful. Calum was holding onto the hide, he was planning on turning the deer hide into a blanket. I had a piece of the leg that I was gently carving into an arrowhead. I hope I can just make enough to fill up my quiver and for the others as well. Bone is pretty fickle when it comes to carving it. It takes a while to actually get used to. If you are too heavy-handed with carving, you will take more off than you needed, therefore wasting that bone.

There was small talk here and there. Calum retold the story to everyone on how I got the buck... "and boom, right into the heart. She is so accurate with her aim. This is the first deer we have caught in a year! Do you know how long with stuff will keep?" Calum said with excitement.

Nate smugly stated, "See, I told you letting Arden hunt was a good idea. Not only that, but it gave Pierta, Don, and I some great bonding time."

"Yeah, bonding time for you two. You idiots to talk non-stop." Mumbles Pietra.

Don chuckled lightly, "Don't even play it off. You have fun too."

She shrugged, "I would have more fun hunting personally."

Getting bored with the conversation I looked over at Javier's progress. He had the hip bone and was making a curved knife. He must have felt me watching him because he looked up at me and gave me his signature, "I am not going to answer whatever your question is" look. I nodded knowingly and continued to work on my arrowhead. I thought back to when we were hunting. When the buck hit the ground after I shot it, I felt Calum radiating with excitement. I could tell he was excited to get something big. As someone who also appreciates food, I understand where he's coming from. It must be hard to eat nothing but the same couple of things every day. Especially because rabbits and squirrels aren't the most nutritious meat in the world, even more so if you are a bigger guy like Calum. Bigger people tend to need more food than people of my stature. Even, Javier was excited and that's stretching it because he looked at me and said, "Nice."

After about thirty more minutes of walking, we reached what I was dreading most... the forest's edge. I stood at the forest's edge gawking at what was in front of me. Flat ground, half-way dead grass, and very few trees. I groaned. Perfect, just what I need. No shelter. It was the same view for as long as the eye can see. Miles upon miles of it. I could tell Nate was thinking the same thing. He spoke up, "Well this looks shitty doesn't it?"

I nodded in agreeance. This is terrible. Absolutely horrible.

I jumped as Don clapped Nate and I's back, "Now now everyone, no need to be down. In front of us, we have the wide-open world. Nothing to stop us except the crippling fear of being shot down. At least there will be no sneak attacks anymore."

Nate responded, "What do you mean by sneak attacks, there hasn't been one this whole- wait. Okay dude, I see what you did there."

Don patted him on the back some more, "Come on dude, let's get going."

We continued to walk. As we got farther and farther from the forest I couldn't help but to keep looking back. The only place I have ever known is slowly disappearing behind me.