Expedition

In the house, death's scent became lesser after each day. Indeed, Meryl cleaned everything she could when Oswald was away, she buried what wasn't eaten by the crows. The meat was frozen or too dehydrated to be pecked by birds, so she used the kitchen knives to get rid of it little by little.

When she had spare time, she would nostalgically play with her doll, it was the fantasy of an unborn child.

Oswald couldn't enter his distant state anymore. In the evening, despite the danger to harm someone, he wanted this sort of autopilot to happen again, but nothing happened. It was a good opportunity for him to train his knife-throwing skills again.

Eighteen meters, nine out of ten times.

Twenty four meters, eight out of ten times.

Thirty one meters, six out of ten times. 'So that's my limit.' His increase of strength allowed the knife to go farther, his improved eyes and coordination made him aim better as well, but he couldn't compete with a bow.

Alone in the forest, he wanted to experiment on his body, he was morbidly interested in his skin regeneration. He took out the sharpest of his knives and hesitantly cut the back of his left hand. Few seconds later, there was nothing left of the wound, the pain woke him up, his sore muscles were harder to locate.

He took a deep breath and threw the knife on his own hand, piercing it. 'Ouch!'

Before he had the time to pull it out, the object moved outside of his hand and fell on the dirt, the blood at the surface of his hand turned dark brown, boiled and vanished into thin air, his wound at the same time closed and the tendrils reconnected with an intense pain. The knife was clean.

Now moving his hand properly as if nothing happened, he thought. 'That's nuts!'

With one last idea germinating in his mind, he pissed on his knife and threw it as far as he could, above the trees.

He heard and felt how the air whipped around his arm and saw the leaves bending to its passage. He had to walk for a while before finding it thanks to its smell.

'That's nuts too.' He thought, seeing how far he had to go to find it.

The moon kept getting smaller, it had about one quarter left before it was completely hidden. As the previous month, he was eager to see it full anew. He wanted to know if he could recover his memory with it or lose one more night of it.

Oswald spent his day with the herd, leading them a little farther than usual. When the evening came, he heard a sound afar.

'Wolves?'

A wolf's howl resounded in the valley, it was quite far, but the boy could tell from where it came from.

Only three days later, during his second expedition in the forest, could he ask Reggy. "Why do wolves howl?"

"Heard one recently? Me too! They howl when they want to communicate their location, the prey's, or when there's a predator nearby."

Tom was here too, deep in the forest, he started imitating the howl. "Awoo! Awoo!" But he was quietened by the experimented hunter who wanted anything but an example.

Oswald whispered. "Hey funny kid, you heard Reggy? He said there are predators for wolves! Heh! What in the world could they fear?"

Tom's sudden seriousness made him choke a little. "Bears."

"Are there bears in this forest?" He said out loud.

"Of course. Though I've not seen many in my life." Replied Reggy.

Oswald was outraged. "Why the heck did you not tell me earlier? I've been hunting alone most of my evenings! I could've encountered one!"

Reggy snarled, his right eyebrow twitched. "Because bears hibernate during winter, they're asleep! There are wolves as well, plenty of them. You could've died way before seeing a bear's snoot." His tone reeked spite, he felt like an accessory carried around during the hunt because the rest of the group wanted to give a try to their hunting skills.

Grasping how dangerous was the forest had never been important to the boy until now. He was more than happy to be with the three hunters, though he doubted his ability to die. Adelmo was the group leader, he knew how to track animals, and he was the best of the village with a bow.

Within hours, they arrived at a place that bothered Oswald a lot.

The group stopped next to a rock he knew. Not just any rock, the one he woke up to when he got lost for an entire day. Remnant of his own smell were still on it. 'I was tracked by the wolf pack! I'm such an idiot! I could've died a hundred times already! It's incredible for me to still be alive!'

There were no more paw prints because of the fresh layer of snow, yet Oswald could see where the blue-glowing went, the exact same direction as him.

His grumbling stomach was too loud to ignore, Adelmo spoke. "We're too far from our homes and our little fella seems hungry. We need to rest before continuing our searches."

"There's a stream nearby, we might catch fish. I can go while you set a bonfire." Proposed Oswald.

The three hunters stared at him with wide opened eyes. "You know this place?" Asked Tom. "I can't tell where's the north and you're able to pinpoint a stream?" The kid was dead tired and thirsty.

Oswald noticed his mistake a second too late.

"I don't. I can hear the water flowing, it's pretty noisy, and this way. Don't tell me you're already half deaf! You're too young for this, you should preserve your hearing..." He hoped to confuse them, at least a little. Adelmo, the only one turning his back to the group, stood on the big rock to check if he could see or hear the stream, but he failed.

He wanted to avoid talking back to Oswald, so he whispered. "Freak."

When he was about to give new directives to the group, he saw Oswald's dark glare, but ignored it. "Go ahead, bring us some fish! I'll go for the wood while Tom and Reggy set up the fire."