14 Vhalar 721
Oram crouched and listened to the din of bear and thwarthides shouting at each other, trying to decide what to do next. Oram had crossed paths with thwarthides before, and had managed to interact with them without provoking violence, which was no mean feat, given their reputation. While he had skills and abilities that might enable him to do so again, he was taking no chances. Donning his acorn helmet he muttered “protect the harvester” to summon the leafy scale armor that was the item’s chief virtue. Under the current circumstances, the hunter realized as he inspected himself, this would have the added virtue of helping to camouflage him as he approached. Just how stealthy he would need to be would depend on whether the thwarthides had posted a lookout before going after the bear. Using his Ziell-given abilitySnow Falls Silently from Ezere mark to mask any sound his armor and equipment might make, Oram crept forward.
By the time he was close enough to see what was going on in the clearing, the hunter realized that he probably need not have bothered so much with his sneaking. The thwarthides had not posted any lookouts; about ten of them surrounded a birch tree in which, perhaps fifteen feet up, a large brown bear poised precariously among branches far too thin to support its weight properly. The bear was a bumble bear, no doubt, and was levitating so as not to put its weight on the gracile limbs. It glided to and fro along the branches with a ghostly grace, looking for a way to escape the ring of shouting pig-men and its spiky coppice of flint-pointed spears. That grace availed the beast nothing, though, as the hunting band scrambled to stay beneath it, moving for all their apparent indiscipline with surprising efficiency and unison. In obvious frustration, the bear roared down at the thwarthides, who answered with their own mocking chorus of harsh, screechy shouts while brandishing their weapons up at their quarry.
Oram, poised behind a bush whose leaves matched the pattern of his armor closely in both color and pattern, had a thought: if he could somehow distract the thwarthides and lure them away from the tree, the bear might make an escape. But what would draw the hunting party away from such a promising prize? The prospect of a better one, perhaps.
For the first time, Oram called on his bear familiarBear of Ralaith from Shirvain mark to appear. He did not yet have the ability to make it materialize into something more substantial than an apparition, but that apparition might do for what he was about to try. The familiar came into view festooned in a colorful skein of shimmering filaments, looking as if someone had knit a large festive sweater for a bear-shaped ghost. Oram couldn’t help feeling a bit disappointed and uneasy looking at it; it wasn’t exactly intimidating, nor even all that real looking. Nonetheless, it was what he had to work with.
Oram had, by now, heard enough brown bears that he could produce a convincing imitation of one’s roarLookuphere! Lookuphere! Capstone. He did so now, as the bear familiar reared up to attract the thwarthides’ attention.
Ten boar’s heads turned to face the source of this new disturbance. If they were amused or disgusted by the bear’s improbable appearance, they gave no indication of it. Quickly, the entire band shifted its attention to the thing, approaching cautiously as they spread out in front of it. Oram gave one more bear roar before he judged they were close enough to locate the correct source of the noise, then the familiar dropped to all fours, making a show of stalking towards the thwarthides. One of the thwarthides had hung back at the tree -an appointed lookout, perhaps- although its attention seemed divided between the two bears.
The bear glared at the approaching hunters, ears and lips pulled back warningly, crouched low; it stepped slowly back as the thwarthides approached in a semi-circle. Oram watched and waited, eyes sweeping over the squad appraisingly. One of the thwarthides was clearly larger than the rest, had a better spear, and wore a necklace of some sort that the other pig-men did not have, a chord about its neck from which hung several long, thin, finger-length bones. Bear bacula, the traveler realized.
This thwarthide stepped towards the bear first and jabbed at it, with surprising daring, with its spear. When the point seemed to strike nothing but air, even after several experiment jabs, the thwarthides started making grunts both puzzled and disappointed.
Not wanting to lose their attention, Oram chose that moment to rise and step into view, holding his spear point-down as if it were a staff in one hand, while holding the other palm-forward in greeting. The thwarthides instantly started, and ten spiky stone spear-heads pointed at the hunter’s chest. Eyeing those, Oram hoped that his armor would at least protect him in case his Ezere abilities did not.
”Greetings!” he shouted heartily, in what he imagined to be a theatrical voice. ”I am a spirit! A spirit of the Sweetwine! What you are doing to the bears is very dangerous!” The thwarthides regarded this new-come thing quizzically. At least they did not stab him immediately.
Oram pointed dramatically at his bear familiar. ”Behold!” he cried, brandishing his spear/staff. ”Behold the bear and…erm, forsooth! Yes, behold and forsooth this bear!” He did not know if what he said made any sense. Judging from the thwarthides’ responses, neither did they. But the traveler was just playing for time, and so far, they were giving it to him. Even the appointed lookout under the tree was now paying the weird leaf-covered gesticulating man more attention than the bumble bear in the tree it was supposed to be watching.
”But fear not!” Oram continued. ”For I have power over this bear. Watch! And learn!” He turned to face his familiar, which was now, he noticed, watching him every bit as curiously as the thwarthides.
”Ursus, ursus!” Oram intoned. ”Hear my verses! Go now and begone!”
There was an expectant pause. Nothing happened. Thwarthide and spirit bear looked first at Oram, then at one another, wonderingly. Out of the corner of his eye, Oram saw a movement, something large descending softly out of the birch tree behind the inattentive sentry. He just needed a few more trills.
”Ursus, ursus!” he intoned once more, a bit more loudly and firmly, as he took a step towards his familiar. ”Hear my verses! Fear my, umm -fersus! Go now and begone!” This time, unlike before, the hunter actually bid the spirit return to its realm, and its form disappeared even as the thwarthides watched. A squad of beady eyes turned from where the bear had been back to where Oram yet stood; they seemed more confused than awed. One of them tilted its head slightly, a bit like an intrigued dog.
”The demon bear is gone!” the hunter announced portentously to the pig-men. ”You are safe now, but let that be a warn-”
A crashing noise, followed by an alarmed shout from the failed lookout drew the thwarthides’ attention away from Oram. The hapless sentry pointed and shouted as the bumble bear plowed into the brush at the edge of the clearing, threatening to disappear into the depths of the woods. The apparent leader brandished his stone spear and let out an angry, frustrated shout, then gestured to the others, who quickly moved to chase the fleeing bear. After shooting Oram a brief, resentful glare, the leader ran after as well, taking the time to smack the failed lookout on the back of the head even as they set off in pursuit.
Oram found himself suddenly alone in the clearing, listening to the receding sound of the chase. In front of him was birch tree, from which the thwarthides had hung a grizzly bee hive, heavy with honey. There were no significant limbs protruding from the trunk for a good eight feet, and even up from there, the branches were mostly too thin to have supported the bear’s weight. The thwarthides had clearly waited for the bear to levitate up to the hive before ambushing it, just as they had at the other sites.
At the foot of the tree lay a small, crudely-stitched hide pouch. Oram looked inside to find several colorful stones, including one large hunk of amber. Oram could not tell if it was royal amber or not. Aside from the stones, Oram found two more bacula. They looked to be freshly-harvested bones, although they had been well-cleaned. The hunter thought briefly about the necklace of similar bones around the thwarthide leaders’ neck. Were they merely trophies, Oram wondered, or did they have some other significance?
Regardless of the answers to that, Oram did not wish to provoke the thwarthides any further by stealing their things, however they might have come by them. Nor did he have time to try to read them psychometrically. Carefully, he replaced the stones and bones in the bag, and left before the would-be bear hunters could recall their abandoned prizes and return for them
