The Huntsman’s Tale
Clearing near a butchery in Old Deuxcornes
Third Month, 1273
Age 8
The old trapper set down her axe and crouched to get a better look at him. “You got in trouble again, did you?”
The butchers' boy turned his head to regard her, but he said nothing; his mouth was swollen and bloodied, and his only relief came from the snowball he held to his cheek.
“Those parents of yours sure do have a temper.”
“Mhmm.”
The old trapper stood to her full height with a creak of her knee joints. She placed a hand to the small of her back. “They got you out here looking for more firewood?”
The butchers' boy gave her more or less the same hum in response. He didn’t have a good reason to be loitering around the near-empty patch where he was. He would have had an easier time gathering kindling in the thick grove near his house. But he had no intention of doing as his parents asked for a while.
Instead, he had set out hoping to run into the old trapper. She was one of several who traded with the butchery every week or so, but she was the only one to offer him company.
The trapper drew her wrinkled mouth in a thoughtful frown. “It’s been a while since we went on a hunting trip, you and I. Doubt your folks will mind much if you’re in the mountains for a few days.”
The butchers' boy managed a brief grin before pain shot through his mouth and he had to press a bit of snow into his gums. He spat out the blood when he stood to follow the trapper up the slope.