JUDE
the light of dawn is coming
Jude's life has changed in so many ways that it seems almost laughable that these patterns and habits remain through it all. After he'd asked Frey to age him he'd spent most of his time wandering the Wilds and driving his father mad with worry, constantly searching and inquiring with any settlement, traveler, or merchant he could find whether they'd spotted his mother or brother. It had taken nearly a year, but he'd found Maeve at last and returned her home. Not that it had healed any of the broken parts that now made up his family; patchwork, glued together, inevitably falling apart.
But he can't find it in himself to quit. To give up. Edmund is still out there, and Jude - no matter how busy his schedule gets - will never stop searching.
With how close the Oerwoud is to Torchline it's usually his first stop on any leg of travel. He's walked through these woods so many times it would almost be laughable for anything to come of it now. And so it is that fate must laugh in his face, cruelly ironic, because he stumbles across a massacre like an unwitting fawn right into a hunter's snare. There's blood everywhere. A massive beast is looming over a fallen unicorn, and beyond it - men. Dead men.
Jude chokes on the thick scent of iron that coats everything and stumbles backwards, long legs catching on brambles and tangling himself until he falls, catching himself on bare hands that immediately scrape and bleed as he stares horrified and unblinking at the scene before him. He has so few defenses on him, and he regrets always refusing his father's offered staff now that he's staring down a bloodied beast and a field of kills. As it is he can only frantically push with his legs to try and stand back up to run, even if he doubts he can outpace a molten tiger. He has to try. Maybe it will be distracted with its kills; either way, Jude's stomach revolts against him, thick with bile at the sight of so much death and making it hard to think past the fear.
But he can't find it in himself to quit. To give up. Edmund is still out there, and Jude - no matter how busy his schedule gets - will never stop searching.
With how close the Oerwoud is to Torchline it's usually his first stop on any leg of travel. He's walked through these woods so many times it would almost be laughable for anything to come of it now. And so it is that fate must laugh in his face, cruelly ironic, because he stumbles across a massacre like an unwitting fawn right into a hunter's snare. There's blood everywhere. A massive beast is looming over a fallen unicorn, and beyond it - men. Dead men.
Jude chokes on the thick scent of iron that coats everything and stumbles backwards, long legs catching on brambles and tangling himself until he falls, catching himself on bare hands that immediately scrape and bleed as he stares horrified and unblinking at the scene before him. He has so few defenses on him, and he regrets always refusing his father's offered staff now that he's staring down a bloodied beast and a field of kills. As it is he can only frantically push with his legs to try and stand back up to run, even if he doubts he can outpace a molten tiger. He has to try. Maybe it will be distracted with its kills; either way, Jude's stomach revolts against him, thick with bile at the sight of so much death and making it hard to think past the fear.
ready to return everything the darkness stole
