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You stop to examine a leafless buckthorn shrub covered in eggplant-colored berries. Some of its lower branches have been bent and broken, but these branches appear to have been dead for a long time, so there's no telling when the event occurred. This is poor evidence of an animal's trail, but it's better than nothing.

You win one point this turn.

Total points: 12

Mist began rising from the damp forest floor not too long ago; now it's all around you, muting the autumn colors behind a ghostly bluish veil. You can still see well enough to stick to the path you've chosen, but as you walk or ride on you begin to catch glimpses of something white showing through the sparse yellow leaves of a buckthorn hedge.

You investigate.

Unfortunately it is only the skeleton of a large stag, stripped of flesh but otherwise almost perfectly intact; time has bleached its bones to the stark paleness that distracted you. A single wild rose has grown up through one of its eye sockets.

You do not win or lose any points this turn.

Total points: 11

The shrill scream startled both Teari and Trini at first, before motivating them into action. In one fluid motion Teari leapt into action, long legs stretching out below the stag. Trinian easily adapted to the movement, after all, he was quite accustomed to it. The darted through the forest, over logs and around trees. Finally they slowed, hoping that their ears hadn't mislead them.

Zharkov's next stumble didn't help Kozel's rapidly deteriorating conviction, and although his tone was chiding—"No condition at all, you see?"—he put a steadying hand on his companion's arm as he stood before him, brow knit with worry. 'Do not try to imagine up a tricky forest to blame for your own clumsiness' was what he wanted to add, but he couldn't deny the thought was growing in his mind, too. He took a quick look around their surroundings, pointedly avoiding where he had seen the blood, and it almost did seem possible that this forest could be alive, each breeze stirring the leaves a massive breath, unnaturally cold and all right Kozel was shivering again time to stop thinking like that.

"It only seems to be getting worse," he admitted quietly, returning his uneasy gaze back onto Zharkov. But with that came another idea, and Kozel drew himself up, sounding suddenly more sure. "If it is as you say, and the forest really is trying to keep us from finding the tree again, then we must be getting closer. The forest grows desperate with its tricks!" Emboldened by his clever logic, Kozel almost could have smiled. He would soon be rid of the shameful trinket after all, so long as they kept at it.

"Come along, Zharkov," he offered his arm ever-so-graciously, prepared to walk the man the rest of the undoubtedly short way. Kozel would not stumble, nor would he stray, bloody foliage be damned. But, as these things seem to happen in the Wardwood, he hardly got the chance to look forward to his new, dogless future and take a step before a new warning made itself known. A fox, though with how ignorant of animals Kozel was he probably would have called it a wolf, appeared for just a moment and then was gone.

Just a moment was all it needed, anyway, to earn a startled yelp from Kozel and send him into a panic. "A wolf!" Ah, there it was. With how quickly he stumbled back to cower behind Zharkov he nearly took a fall himself, hugging the rabbit protectively as he blubbered. "This is it, we are going to die here, killed by a wolf, a wolf."

There were, Lucterius thought, so many trees. Gareth's hand had found his elbow at some point: here they could smell the forest closing in around them, and Lucterius remembered that night so many weeks ago. It had taken him the whole day to make it to the Wardwood, and he hadn't been able to stop until he'd found himself back in his coach clutching that white-gold wooden figurine with its green whorls...he'd walked surely then, without stumbling. And he'd tracked his way over to that tree with its elegant whorls and glittering wood toys on his own, without thought for...disturbed branches and animal prints and strange mushroom circles.

Of course, it was not night time, and occasional rays of some arcane light beamed suspicion from the sky. A gentle whoosh from above told him to look. He could see hardly anything but for bare branches, dark with a hint of movement, beckoning...like fingers? Fingers. The dapples of light through branch seemed like so many winking eyes - like Signe's. Gareth's hand grew tight on his elbow. There were whispers...

And then he looked back down and there was nothing, but the spots of light had grown dimmer and thinner and his legs were stiff and tingled now, numb. What...?

Gareth tugged on his arm. "Sir," he said. "We'e a ways yet, I think."

Theron had always liked fairy wrens -- he could never bring himself to trap or hunt them. Something that small, round, and feathery just didn't belong on a spoiled noble's mantel. Admittedly, his hands were better suited to fletching arrows than to removing a thorn from a small wing, but he managed well enough. The fairy wren hadn't led him to his quarry, of course, but he felt a little better when it had flown off. Stormstruck huffed quietly, and they took up the trail again.

It appeared Frances had come full circle; the stream she saw now was the same she'd come to when she first entered the forest. The only difference was that it had gotten darker, and the waters reflected the pale orange light reaching across the sky. She bit her lip and her hand clenched tight as again the question ran through her mind: to leave or to stay?

A rustling of branches could be heard before she made her answer, and she whirled around to see a pale buck silhouetted against the trees.

"Cas..." The distance between them had only grown since the ball; she had not sensed his approach.

He came close, offering his back, but she only shook her head and stepped away. He pawed the earth, once, twice, before trying his shoulder instead. It was not without hesitance that Frances placed her hand upon it, though in truth she was grateful for his company. In silence, she let him lead her away.

Either due to luck or your own tracking skills you discover a fine hair caught low to the ground on a branch, almost invisible against the mottled loam of the forest floor. This is good evidence of an animal's trail.

You win three points this turn.

Total points: 13