[maikafanawen]

When all had gathered, packed and ready for their odyssey, Ceros called them to him. He had no more words, elves were a race of little dialogue, and they started off. He didn’t call for the trackers to the front so Ihwesta walked beside him as she would her own brother. She wished Orodhîn had come but knew he could not have.

“You think of your brother now Ihwesta?” asked Ceros in his deep soothing voice. Ihwesta relaxed.

“Yes, but the nostalgia will wear. It will build character yes?” Ceros smiled and they walked on, mostly in silence.

By the time a sliver of pale sunlight broke through the canopy of the forest, they had been walking eight hours. It was finally dawn and the elves continued until they reached a place where one of the disappearances had occurred. Ihwesta and Arië were immediately sent ahead with words of caution. They stayed in the shadows where they moved like wraiths, completely silent.

Their ears pricked up at every slight movement and rustle in trees ahead and behind. Then, the sound of a great beast moving quickly along the forest floor reached their ears. They made eye contact the minute they were sure it wasn’t their anxious imagination.

“Let’s go back,” mouthed Ihwesta. Her idea came just in time, for not a minute after the two elves had returned to their party did a large monster thought to be no more than legend, entered the clearing where they had just stood.

They told Ceros and the group of what they had heard. They came to suppose that it was no more than an old wolf, alienated from its pack, and probably wounded. They headed onwards, unknowingly veering further west from the path of a dangerous creature.