Author's Note:

So...I've read The Red Fox Clan...and this really unfortunate event is briefly touched on. I hope you all share my sympathy for Halt.

Halt tied the lead rope to a sturdy looking tree. Twenty pairs of curious eyes looked at him. Halt ignored them, although he couldn't help but notice that some of them seemed uneasy. He approached the nervous horses in the herd, patting them on the muzzle reassuringly and muttering comforting words. Once he was done, he glanced up at Abelard, who was watching him with a rather jealous look in his eyes.

"What?" Halt asked, raising his eyebrow.

Softie, Abelard teased. Halt ignored him and took a leather folding bucket from his saddle, along with his canteen and water bag. He moved to loosen the girth straps, then reconsidered. He was in dangerous and foreign territory, after all, and he might need to make a run for it.

"Stay here. Silent," Halt told Abelard. He moved out of the copse of trees silently, using his ears to find the stream close by. It was only a couple of metres away from the trees in which the Temujai horses were concealed. All the same, he slipped unobstrusively through the trees, making it very difficult for possible observers to keep track of him. Before he broke out of the trees next to the stream, he glanced around him, his keen eyes taking in every centimetre of his surroundings. He continued to do so as he moved closer to the stream. Then he stopped.

He had heard a faint sound to his left. The thudding of several sets of hooves became increasingly louder, and he began to hear voices, shouting. Halt dived back towards the cover of the trees as half a dozen goats burst through the greenery. Behind them, two Temujai, mounted on ponies and armed with bows, urged them towards the stream.

Halt watched this from where he was lying on the ground in the shadow of the trees, his right ear pressed against the ground. By chance, there was a gap between the ground and the left side of his cowl. He continued to observe them, his heart in his mouth every time a goat strayed away from the river. He certainly did not want to be stepped on and discovered.

To his horror, a nanny goat moved away from the river, moving towards the shade, presumably to taste some of the grass. The goat took a few steps, sniffed the grass, then seeming unsatisfied, continued forward. The nanny goat was now barely a metre from Halt's face. He held his breath, staring at the hooves in front of him, willing himself to blend with the grass. He realised that blending with the grass at this moment wasn't wise at all.

The goat shuffled forward and nudged the cowl of his cloak gently aside. He inwardly cursed. Then it decided to chew on Halt's shaggily cut, dark hair. For a moment, he gritted his teeth and resisted the urge to leap away from the goat, knowing that he would easily be discovered if he did that. He waited a second more, hoping that the goat would find that chomping on his hair was unpleasant. He felt his hair being tugged out of his scalp, saliva dripping onto it, and he knew that he would never be able to live with a bald head. He decided to leap up.

He quickly came to his feet, surprising the nanny goat and the nearest Temujai pony. The pony reared on its hind hooves, throwing its rider from the saddle. Halt left the bucket, canteen and water bag on the ground and stepped forward quickly to the other Temujai. He grabbed him by the leg and tossed him out of the saddle with a grunt. Then, as they were regaining their breath, he turned his heel on the shepherds and ran in a direction away from the concealed horse herd, whistling for Abelard as he went.

Abelard quickly caught up to him, and he gripped the pommel of the saddle, swinging himself up without stopping. He heard the twang of bows behind him, and two arrows whipped through the air, burying themselves in the trunks of the trees. He continued to ride in a direction away from the Temujai horse herd. He would circle around and get them back that night, along with his bucket, canteen and water bag. To his surprise, no more arrows followed him. He hadn't really threatened the goats after all, so he reckoned that that the Temujai shepherds were willing to let him run away.

He idly ran his hand through the left side of his hair. His hair was more or less fine, apart from the fact that his hand came away wet and sticky.

I didn't know you cared so much about your hair, Abelard said. Halt glared at him.

"What makes you say that?" he asked. Abelard seemed to consider the question for a moment or two before replying.

Your haircut. Tell me that you're going to get a better one after this.