If Victin had thought that the briars were bad before, he was now believing that they were Hellgates incarnate in the form of clingy and thorn-ridden plants— not only because they'd scratched his legs raw and tried to slap up underneath his kilt, but because they'd almost gotten him stuck in front of an armed hare general.
Far away from the path and underneath a slumping maple tree, a gasping Victin Stubfang lay across the ground with his bag thrown out beside him, trying to catch his breath. His legs were covered in hundreds of new cuts, his kilt was beginning to run in a corner, and his fang extensions had been loosened by a face-first crash into a whippy ash tree, because nature apparently hated him. But Fate hated him more, he thought, struggling upright and shakily taking inventory of his bone jewelry props, because it had led him straight to Long Patrol officer.
Victin tried to keep his erratic breathing down as he thought of crashing into the hare again, clutching his chest and licking his lips with unease. His eyes darted to the left and right out of nervousness, the stoat half expecting the general to come crashing out of the trees with a rapier raised and a roared 'EULUIA!' on his lips. At least, he would've by now, Victin thought, if he hadn't unintentionally caught the damn rapier and then thrown it over his shoulders when he made a run for it.
The vermin curled up in a ball to massage his bleeding and stubbed foot, giving a groan and dropping his forehead onto his knee when he went over what had happened. One second he was strutting out for the nearest path, and then the other he was stomping on the biggest briar coil in all of Mossflower and nearly colliding face-to-face with a hare general while dressed up as a Juska— before accidentally throwing a stage prop sword in his face.
Victin had been planning to lift his head to survey the damage done to the kilt and his overstuffed satchel, but at that thought, he gave another groan that was close to a sob and kept his head down. Of all the things to do, out of every path he could've taken to get himself out of the situation, the first thing he'd done was flounder like a novice actor thrown on the stage or a young malebeast unbuttoning a female's dress for the first time, and promptly chucked a sword at one of the most dangerous enemies to vermin in all of Mossflower. A wooden sword.
If Vulpez didn't have him scribbled down on the priority list for Hellgates, Victin bet he was doing so now.
He should congratulate himself on getting put in the 'destined for rapid death' group so quickly, Victin thought, slapping his paw up on the part of his face not buried in his knee. The stoat shuddered when he thought of how swiftly the hare had dodged the sword and stood back up like it was nothing. Salamandastron knew how to churn out the fighters, alright. Add in that the general had watched him calmly like he was a stupid cub after he'd taken his rapier— obviously waiting for the chance to dismantle him with his own paws— and Victin just wanted to crawl all the way back to the shifty wildcat's bar and order as many rum shots as he could take, the more questionable the alcohol content the better.
Victin finally managed to drag his paw off his face, claws raking over his fur slowly, and the stoat lifted his head to take in his surroundings. He was collapsed under slumped maple that was a tree's equivalent of a hunchback, trunk bowed down but forming a grotesque lump where it curved back up into the air. The briars other than those stuck in Victin's kilt and legs were scarce, being devoured by peppy patches of bright wildflowers that seemed just happy to be there watching an inevitably doomed stoat pick the thorns out of his fur, and they encircled a balding grassy clearing like an off-kilter halo. The sun filtered down through the leaves above in rays that varied from golden to a dusty yellow.
Everything looked so much like the setting of all the sappy romance plays Oscela ate up in her spare time (and failed to convince the troupe to perform, even under threat of frying pan assault) that Victin almost laughed. All it needed was for two stupidly shortsighted young lovers with smoldering eyes and heaving chests to come wandering in and begin breathily monologing to each other before their equally stupid parents trotted in later and slaughtered them both, preferably with more monologing, then followed by lots of 'falling upon their wretched knees and wailing to thy heavens.'
While that probably wasn't going to happen, Victin thought, jerking over his heavy satchel and halfheartedly peeping at its contents, the hill was definitely going to get its quota of dead beasts on it filled once the hare finished tracking him down. The normal officers could scrounge out an unfortunate vermin and follow their hour old footprints through a swamp. The general had probably taken out a whole stinking corsair ship by himself and smelled them out like a bloody pike, Victin thought miserably, giving a rough laugh as he poked at one of his costumes. All those metals on his jacket and broad shoulders meant something. Victin might've just as well thrown himself in front of a badgerlord and gotten his death over with.
Victin found himself staring at the visible sliver of a costume sleeve in the bag in the middle of all his death contemplating. He felt a small spot of hope slowly rising up in his chest. Well, the hare wouldn't be able to track and kill him if he couldn't recognize him when he found him, could he? They might be damn good at tracking vermin, but all it took was one costume and adjustment of movements, and he wasn't a vermin anymore. And costumes were the one thing he had a lot of.
He knelt down and emptied out his bag, pawing apart the folded clothes and separating them over the sunny ground to get his full inventory. Oscela would be shrieking at the top of her lungs if she saw how her precious outfits were being treated now, Victin thought as he tossed a horde captain armband aside. But since part of his situation was her fault, this would be him indulging his revenge without any worries about being chewed out later. Ripfang had better be willing to share his grog when Victin got back. He'd need it.
After spotting a few good candidates for disguise and eliminating all that looked dangerous or incriminating— any outfits, jewelry, or accessories, that hinted at horde association, madness, shiftiness, or extortion (Victin tossed aside at least two embroidered assassin and archer hoods, a northern berserker cloak made of roughed dirty cloth to resemble fur, and the multi-pocketed pants he'd worn as a thieving magician during The Merchant of Castle Riftguard)— the stoat quickly went to stripping himself down of all Juska jewelry. The bone bracelets and white curved earrings rained down into a little clattering pile.
Victin threw his empty sword sheath back into the satchel and tried to pry the fang extensions from his mouth, but when they didn't come free after much wiggling and muffled swearing, he pulled his paw out of his mouth and spat to clear the nasty taste out. How were those scumsucking extensions still clinging inside his mouth after he'd slammed his muzzle into part of a tree twice? They felt like bloody sharpened rocks clinging to his teeth, even though they were just whittled bird bone.
Most woodlanders except otters didn't exactly have fangs, Victin thought, grimacing as he pulled his kilt off and jerked the most neutral pair of pants he could find on. He'd probably have to keep his mouth shut or say he had a serious medical condition— one that spontaneously caused fangs to grow for no apparent reason. No, that didn't sound suspicious at all. But he'd have to deal with it since it was one of the better excuses he had; he wasn't pretending to be mute ever again since that incident with the grey fox in the audience front that had turned out to have a secret fear of mimes or anything distantly related to them. Victin had ached in places he didn't even know existed before Marvelo managed to kick the screaming vulpine off him. So much for hordebeasts appreciating The Outcast Crew or ever playing a mute court performer again; he'd still had shrieks of "THE MIMES!" echoing in his ears hours later.
The stoat cheered himself up by giving the discarded Juska kilt a vicious kick and vowing to 'accidentally' drop it into the troupe bonfire when he got back.
He tried to twist his head around to look at the state of the painted tattoos on his back, but all that yielded was a blurry glance of red intertwining lines and his tail. Victin frowned before he snorted and stretched his neck, popping it and his knuckles as he worked out the kinks in his body. The dye tattoos should be coverable via shirt, and there was at least one nice jacket he had that could pass as casual hare wear. He'd never be able to mimic their body quite right— he was a stoat, for crying out loud— but it was all in the movements and attitude. As long as he didn't draw any attention to his long flexible neck or waist and hunkered down just a little, it'd work.
Victin afforded himself a small grin when he saw the hat he was looking for buried underneath a messenger tunic. He pulled it out, flipping it over in his paws and brushing off the fake ears that popped from each side. The hat was a long peaked cap colored a dull brown with the texture of burlap. It had looked rather smart at one point, but all dignity to it had been absolutely destroyed for anybeast but an actor after someone had anchored two springy and long ears to the sides. Get the right cloth weave and a little bit of milkweed fluff here and there, throw it all together on some wire, and done. Hare ears.
The cap was a bit squashed after living at the bottom of Victin's bag for a season or two, and one false ear was ridiculously crooked while neither them wanted to stand up properly, but Victin would be (literally) damned if he couldn't spout off some tripe about being chewed on by a ferret or two when he was a little leveret. Working as an actor for ten seasons hadn't been for nothing.
That or the 'medical condition' excuse was looking quite handy again.
If it saved him from the hare general's rapier, he thought as he set the cap on his head and tucked his own ears in, tilting the peaked brim down over his face in a rakish yet concealing manner, he'd even make up a sob story about being an orphan and forced to housekeep for seasons for a whole family of stinking snowy owls with a single broom. Whatever it took.
Finding the nice coat Victin suspected himself of possessing somewhere in his piles of satchel contents was easy, but when he slipped it on and tried to button it, it didn't take long to remind him why he always forgot about it. The stoat groaned in exasperation as he stared down at the stretched and sagging front too large for his chest. A butterfly nearby took the opportunity to alight on his clothes before mockingly fluttering off into the bright flower patches nearby, opening and folding its yellow wings with insect smugness.
Correction, Victin thought, staring down at the stretched material in his paws, it wasn't a nice coat. It had been a nice coat. At least, until a distracted Marvelo had grabbed the nearest thing in the blacked out costume caravan one night and tried to fit his hulking wharf rat form into a coat specifically tailored for the slender ribs and waist of a mustelid. The coat, being one of the only decent clothes Victin ever recalled wearing off stage, had shown its good cloth quality in stretching irreparably instead of tearing irreparably. The stoat was pretty sure he'd been drunk somewhere at the time the accident had happened, so he constantly kept forgetting his good costume coat didn't exist. At least that had been some great rum, Victin thought.
Fortunately, the problem was resolved when Victin's eye was caught by the wadded-up red scarf that had sparked the idea of disguising himself to start with. He buttoned the coat and stuffed it down through the collar down to the floppy belly section, rearranging it the best he could to look natural. The slightly bulgy and offset result made it look he was a hare with a tumor or unbalanced ale gut, Victin thought, staring down at his now much (lumpier) rounder belly, but since he wasn't dressing up as a high-class beast and hares weren't that handsome to start with, who cared?
Another rustling through a pile of costumes and thinking of the expression on Oscela's face when he found what he wanted and shoved the other outfits aside, and Victin had found the false hare and rabbit tail. It was built up from stringy cotton, milkweed, and carefully plucked and fluffed cloth of some other kind just like the ears that went with it, looking like a grotesque and ridiculous flower while it was unattached to anything.
Victin poked at it in dark amusement before he tied his own long tail around his waist with a basic securing wrap, something that all of the troupe members except the one weasel with the chopped-off tail used to make it easier to slip into cross-species roles. A few more seconds gave him the time to tie on the false hare tail, and the stoat easily pulled the jacket over the wrap and string. His transformation into an awkward, homely hare— but a hare nevertheless— was complete the instant he cleared his throat and set off to pick up his strewn about costumes with a strut worthy of any pompous Salamandastron resident.
He'd like to see that bloody hare general find him now, Victin thought gleefully, stuffing the last bit of Juska jewelry into the bag as he left the bent maple tree and sun-dappled clearing for the darker woods. The stoat stepped over the big patches of surrounding weeds and wildflowers to leave them swaying in their deep green and color-spotted groups. They could remain here. He, on the other paw, was getting the Hell out, and no hare or Juska kilt was going to stop him.
Sorry, general, Victin told himself, practicing a hare accent in his head as he picked his way through the forest again, there's been no Juska warrior around here, wot! Or any vermin at all, wot! So you can just bally leave, wot wot!
Feeling much smugger than he should have, Victin set a course for the path again, dodging a bent tree limb and sniffing the air when a stray leaf got underneath his cap and tickled his sore nose. He'd heard running water nearby before the whole general disaster, the sound being one of the things that had kept drawing him towards the path. The troupe always preferred to follow streams or rivers for their traveling paths since it brought in extra revenue from thirsty travelers and water rat crews. This time should be no different.
An hour of forest and briar traveling later, and he was still feeling hopeful as no hare generals popped forth from the trees and his destination neared. Victin's strut wasn't so false anymore as the stoat pushed aside a clingy fern, studying the various vines and bushes that were scattered throughout Mossflower's trees. It was dark underneath the shade of the thousands leaves, their undersides glowing a rainbow of different greens and highlighting the veins through them as they blocked the merciless high sun.
Underneath the kingdom of the leaves and birds hanging above, the ground around the trees was kinder on paws, lacking the harsh layer of thorns that Victin had been sampling before. The gurgle and splashing of running water was growing louder even in his tucked away ears (along with the annoying whistling of some off-key bird up ahead) and Victin couldn't have cared less about the latter at the moment. If the musically-impaired bird wanted to sing, why not let it?
The disguised stoat was practically floating on the fumes of hope and relief of never having to see the hare general once more. There was a spring in his step as he adjusted his jacket, happily pulled back one hanging branch that was blocking his view, and stepped out into the clearing up ahead at the exact moment Tarquin Fleetpaw did. Again.
There were many times in life where hyperventilating and panic weren't acceptable. For instance, like when one went up on the stage for the first time then began freezing up and choking on the middle of their lines while the troupe was relying on them, or when the horrified shrewmaid who was usually the strong costume designer turned her back after a bad tavern performance night and begged for somebeast to 'please please get this squashed spider and strawberry tart off me oh gods.' Neither of those situations were places to panic or hyperventilate.
After crashing straight into a snarling Juska warrior, almost getting killed, barely managing to escape by leaping over briar bushes while screaming the whole time, then tripping and rolling down a hill before landing on a costume-filled bag and crawling behind a tree with a heaving chest, it was the perfect time to panic.
"You are goin' to die, Tarquin," Tarquin blubbered to himself, hare's eyes wide as he rocked back forth in a fetal position with his bag crushed against his chest, "you are goin' to die and it will be bally terrible."
Oh pikesteeth, Tarquin thought, still swaying back and forth and dangerously close to whimpering, his father had been right. Not about him being a ridiculous failure wasting his small amount of talents by hopping around on a bally stage, but about 'part of the Long Patrol followin' you wherever you go, wot.' Every hare in Salamandastron had the uncanny ability to run into the largest amount of armed vermin possible for the situation, finding battalions of corsairs lurking behind the bushes even when they just went to get a jolly cup of tea. And now, even seasons after he'd left the Long Patrol, Tarquin thought, giving a high-pitched near-sob and burying his face in his sack, he was still the bloody biggest dangerous vermin magnet in the whole of his troupe and Mossflower.
"I just wanted to go HOME," Tarquin burst out, jerking his head off the sack and wildly throwing his arms up in the air as he yelled at the forest and sky, "is that so bally hard to let me do? It's not 'recevin' just desserts' or dramatic irony when I DIDN'T BLINKIN' DO ANYTHING IN THE FIRST PLACE TO DESERVE IT!" he shrieked.
His cry drove several squawking birds out of the nearby trees as they clumsily took flight, startled by the outburst and dropping a few feathers to drift down to the ground. Tarquin yelped and shrank back as one shot past him, covering his head to shield it from the fluttering form. When he peeked from between his arms, it was gone, headed up into the fragments of blue sky visible from the layers of crossing limbs and clumps of leaves. It was also probably very offended, Tarquin thought, lowering his protective arms from his head. It'd be ranting to its flock about an insane and insensitive hare for seasons after this.
"Congratulations, bucko," he muttered to himself, calmer after the birds had fled and letting his shoulders warily relax, "you probably just made a whole generation of robins think hares are all crazy, wot. You should've just stripped your clothes off and started quotin' Woe Upon My Hedgehog. It'd have done the same thing, and least somebeast would've gotten a show before your painful, untimely death."
At the thought of the fate that awaited him when the enraged Juska finished tracking him down, Tarquin sighed and crossed his arms over his knees, letting his forehead drop against them in sudden exhaustion. How had things gone south so quickly? All he'd wanted was to bluff his way out of any trouble and go back to the troupe; was that so wrong? And yet he'd ended up harassing a fully armed Juska warrior— one of the most dangerous, skilled, and ruthless things in all of Mossflower to woodlanders or any living thing, full stop— with a broken fake rapier that he'd tried to beat it over the head with.
He had tried to bludgeon a Juska warrior with a wooden stage prop.
Tarquin had to struggle not to give a small sob.
Of course, he thought, miserably pulling his face out of his crossed arms and setting his chin on them instead, now the beast was coming after him. The hare watched a few distant butterflies flutter through the rays of light that had filtered through the tree branches, their soft yellow wings as making every motion gentle. He'd give anything to be one of them right now, and not something so bony and fleshy that the Juska could sink those terrible fangs in.
Tarquin shuddered at the memory of them, remembering how they and an entire set of canines and sharp teeth had been bared in anger when he'd ran into the nightmare. They'd been the biggest pair of fangs he'd ever seen on a vermin of any kind. Add in all the fierce, bright red tattoos Tarquin had glimpsed on the monster's back along with the not-so-hidden bone jewelry and spoils of slaughter hanging all over its limbs, and he was practically thinking of the worst thing he could've ever met on the road short of an adder or a pair of Juska. Or all three together.
"Not goin' down that line of thought," Tarquin said immediately, cutting off his thoughts and shaking his head. The last thing he needed was the omnipotent ruler of hating-nice-things to read his mind and make things worse for him, since that was what it was apparently doing in its spare time. The fates needed to a get a hobby that didn't involve him, Tarquin thought. It was getting him rather beat up.
Judging by the way that Juska had thrown the sword earlier and almost speared him between the eyes, he was going to be a lot more than just beaten when the warrior caught up to him.
The hare rubbed his temples with one paw, trying to avoid any more gruesome thoughts of death. It contrasted in a hilariously dark way— pardon the pun, Tarquin thought, looking at the bright spots of sun that filled the woods everywhere— with how casual and happy everything else in Mossflower seemed. All the trees surrounding him were straight-trunked and perky, even their different shaped leaves tilting up towards the sun like the one overtly enthusiastic morning troupe member who was always bouncing around full of cheer on a morning filled with hangovers or injuries. Unlike before, there were no briars, but plenty of honeysuckle vines wrapped around the high branches and spreading their sweet scent from the mouth of their little trumpet flowers. They looked like natural bouquets that glowed in the sun and served as perches for fluttering butterflies.
This was a far too nice place to die, Tarquin thought, especially for what he had coming. Come on, Tarquin, he told himself, unable to keep the morbid sarcasm out of his head, the Juska probably only knows five hundred different ways to skin a hare. It'll be fine.
Tarquin was about to continue his mental panicking when a sudden inspiration hit him. He sat up straighter, staring at a butterfly that was resting directly next to a clump of yellow honeysuckles, looking just like another bunch of the flowers. But what if he wasn't a hare? Or at the very least, didn't look like one?
The young actor suddenly felt stupid as he turned to look at his sack, a bag stacked with the bare survival essentials and his share of small costume items he was assigned to carry. Everybeast in the company had to take care of the smaller tidbits and a few outfit sets to keep things running smoothly. They weren't exactly a large operation on any scale. But that didn't mean that there was any lacking when it came to costumes.
The sack had no tie keeping it closed, making it easy for Tarquin to grab it, upend it, and send all his folded costumes, crumpled map, and one remaining scone tumbling onto the ground in a disorganized heap. He pawed away a crumpled cloak and fished out the wrapped scone before it could break and smear all over the clothes. Tarquin licked his lips as he did so, feeling the pastry crust underneath the thin wrap. His nose quivered at the smell. Kenna and Yosef had been on cooking duty for the past three days, and if there was one thing the vole and shrew knew how to do together, it was make a good blackberry and raspberry scone. He hadn't eaten anything in the past several hours, Tarquin thought, paw itching towards the wrapping. A little bite wouldn't hurt— he was a growing hare, after all, and everything had been so stressful with that Juska popping out of the bushes like the worst surprise party he'd ever gotten…
When he realized what was happening and felt the drool welling up in his mouth, Tarquin blinked rapidly before slapping his other paw away from the scone. It cringed back to his side like a disobedient pet. "FOCUS," he said to himself, tossing the scone away and smacking his own head with a costume scarf in paw. Perhaps he could rap a better sense of priorities through his skull. "You can eat when you've escaped certain death, wot."
Determinedly not looking at the scone (despite the fact that his nose gave a few more twitches and his ears tilted back with pining disappointment) Tarquin began to sort through his available costumes. He'd need something that could slip under the murderous tribe beast's attentions, he thought, tossing away a simple habit and Keelstrip's useless map both at once. But if the outfit and props he was thinking of were still in his bag, then that wouldn't be too much of a problem.
After pulling aside and folding the other unusable costumes— a simple tavern owner's suit, the striped and puffy pants of a jester he'd worn in Noonvale Tales, a wholly inappropriate short skirt and provocative pair of garters that Keelstrip been trying to smuggle into his own bag for reasons Tarquin didn't want to know (though he did know that he was never going to put his sack near the otter's bag again when they were so easily confusable), a huge costume scarf, and a few other outfits that generally related to harmless woodlanders or peaceful living— Tarquin finally managed to gather his desired costume and props.
"Thank you, Kenna!" he said gleefully, popping the monocle from his face and practically ripping off the military jacket with jangle of metals after he'd unbuttoned it. The stiff blue sleeves and cufflinks crumpled on the ground with the shoulder pads as Tarquin appreciatively raised a beaten, patched, and generally sketchy traveling vest up to eye level— the perfect top for a run-of-the-mill vermin who was probably more interested in finding a bird to eat or some ale to drink instead of painfully eviscerating the nearest woodlander with a fork.
Tarquin pulled the vest on easily, already reaching for a loose and gypsy-style pair of pants with matching sash. It was a little brighter than he'd have liked it to be, but it was also the only thing that would cover his long legs short of the abbey robe, and he wasn't going within fifty feet of a Juska while dressed like a unarmed pacifist. The hare unbuckled the stiff belt on his general pants, standing up and kicking them off to join the jacket nearby. There was something incredibly liberating to see the hard-ironed and ever meticulous uniform he'd been instructed to fold nicely for all of his life slumped in a messy pile on the ground.
The gypsy pants were far more comfortable than the uniform, though Tarquin's tail felt smashed when he tightly wrapped the sash over to cover it. There were no vermin out there with short and fluffy tails, Tarquin thought while giving his haunches an experimental shake to make sure his tail stayed hidden, which was a pity. He didn't like binding his tail that much; it itched after so long. Reminding himself that the Juska was probably tracking him as he wasted time, Tarquin reached down and pulled out the next addition to the disguise from under a floppy hood— a long and bristly false tail.
Made from frayed material, softened pine needles, a spare belt, and lots of thread, paste, and Kenna's patience, it was a dark brown thing that slithered over the leaves just as easily as a normal mustelid's tail did. Double it up and lower the stage lighting, and it provided an awkward fox tail when the other props were short. Tarquin belted it low around his waist (it had to be worn there to compensate for his long legs and give the appearance of his torso being longer than it really was) hoping that it wouldn't fall off in the middle of his walking and land around his heels. That would be difficult to explain, he thought, tucking the belt underneath a fold of sash to hide it. There. Done with that layer.
Knowing what was coming next, Tarquin grimaced at the cheery setting and honeysuckles around him before taking one last whiff of their aroma. He tried not to inhale too hard as he secured a round and black snail shell to his quivering nose with a dab of pine sap. It was uncomfortable, and the inside of the thing always smelled like pine needles shoving their way up his nostrils, but it was also a perfect imitation of a generic vermin nose. As long as there wasn't any tasty food being eaten or cooked around him to torment his blocked sense of smell, he'd be fine.
A few more minutes and a coil of bandages and a floppy hood later, and Tarquin looked nothing like a hare. He patted the top of the huge archer hood and checked his ears one last time as he packed up the rest of the costumes, making sure that only a sliver of his ears were sticking up. Being a hare in show business had its drawbacks; their long ears were much harder to hide or put fake ears over than those of an otter, squirrel, shrew, or mouse.
Tarquin had gotten introduced to ear binding early in his career when he'd been cast as a loony background beast of ambitious species for his second role (the troupe hadn't liked his poetic waxing in the previous play and his first appearance that much; they felt he went a little overboard with all the gesturing and almost kicking Yosef off the stage). Throw him a coil of bandage and a hood, and Tarquin could tie his ears together and carefully fold them back to adjust the amount of them poking out of the ear slits. It was uncomfortable— vastly more so than the nose shell— but it worked.
It would certainly fool a Juska if he played his cards right, Tarquin thought, grinning as he tromped over to his sack and slung it over his shoulder. The walk of an apathetic vermin traveler wasn't difficult to copy, and soon he was slinking out of the flower and vine-filled spot in the woods and heading towards the path once more. In fact, Tarquin thought, walk becoming more confident as he passed through the quiet and tranquil trees, he might not even see the Juska again. If there was a hare general to hunt down and rip trophies from, why bother harassing a fellow vermin traveler with nothing but a lumpy sack? Tarquin's hope grew as he picked a path underneath the trees, given a new sense of purpose. He began to whistle.
Keelstrip's drawings had been beyond terrible, but if there was one thing the otter paid attention to on maps, it was bodies of water. He'd drawn a nearby stream in ludicrous detail, complete with jilted little swirls that were supposed to recommend currents and tiny black blobs that could've either been squashed bugs or his representations of fish. Tarquin had heard the soft bubbling of a stream while he'd been on the path, and as he got closer and closer to the place again while an hour of woodland traveling passed, his whistling and his happiness grew. He was terrible at carrying a tune, and even worse at doing so for a vermin shanty, but why not? The troupe had to be somewhere beyond the stream, Tarquin thought, whistling out a few more mutilated notes of Slaughter of the Crew of the Rusty Chain.
The hare was overjoyed to not see a single peep of the Juska or the secretive bushes that hid it again, skipping inwardly underneath his in-character trudge as he went forward. He butchered another music lyric with an off-key whistle, joyfully ducked under a low branch obscuring his sight, and stepped out into the clearing up ahead the exact moment Victin Stubfang did. Again.