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((This is a camp Emerwyn and Julian are setting up near the river.))

Emerwyn moved along blindly, keeping the smell fresh in her nostrils, refreshing the direction every so often.

Julian was a very good guide. Emerwyn never stumbled.

Finally, they arrived at the water. "Yes, we're here. Now, I'll gather some dry branches and brush... You rest here."

Emerwyn started walking away, but turned for a moment, smiled, and said, "don't worry."

She walked a short distance only at first, gathering up what dried underbrush she could find. Her footsteps were still audible from Julian's campspot. But there weren't many branches lying around... or even sticks that were large enough to kindle a flame.

So, Emerwyn wandered a little farther still...

Vaguely, she wondered where Ian had been all this time.

Emerwyn was having very little luck.

All the branches still attached to trees were too high up, and she had no desire to injure a living tree.

But then, while looking up, she saw a dead branch, stuck among some others. It alone would provide plenty of kindling.

It wasn't that high up...

The pile of dead plants lay off to the side of the large tree that Emerwyn now surveyed. She walked around it once, trying to find the best place to gain a foothold. It wasn't going to be easy. The hooves alone were going to see to that. But, she was tired, and very hungry. And Emerwyn was not built for this kind of thing. She was a bookkeeper!

Either way, she steeled herself, breathed deep, and leapt up - if you could call it a leap. Her hands desparately grabbed at the rough bark, while her hardened toes scraped up and down the trunk.
Finally, one of her feet found a grip, and she was able to reach up. The branch was so close...

Just a little higher...

Emerwyn almost did fall when she heard the voice. Her heart stopped, her head spun around, and her hooves skidded down a couple of feet.

When she saw, him, she tentativley lowered herself from the tree, keeping her head partially revolved. She was too scared to turn away from him.

She kept her back flat against the large tree, her hands holding it for support.

I should never have left him alone.......

"Ch-Cheshire..." Her heart pounded in her ears. She was alone in the woods with the Cheshire Cat.

"Listen," Emerwyn could hardly speak with her heart so deeply lodged in her throat.
"I don't have time for this... and neither does Julian. Those wounds need tending to."

Emerwyn absorbed what he said. The Jabberwock?
What did he mean? All of the things Cheshire related to Alice... all of it was linked to something real. What was the Jabberwock?
The fear of this was clear on Emerwyn's face.

Emerwyn's face grew confused. Was he... offering to help?
Shocked and baffled, Emerwyn held tighter to the tree.

She glanced up at the branches. There was no way she was going to reach them. She gave a nervous look at Cheshire. That glint. She could never trust him.
But, the situation couldn't be much worse if he were in a tree, right?

So, tentatively she stepped away, never turning her back to him.

She took slow steps back, watching his ascent. Watching his human form move with such cat-like grace - it looked so alien, so demonic.
Her face contorted in sick fascination.

She remembered when she had first met Cheshire. And how she was actually interested in meeting him again, finding out more about him. Now, she'd give anything for him never to appear again.