A few days had passed. It was time to move on. Evendim was taxing on Stitches and he was determined to make it to Forochel. After all, it doesn't matter what happens so long as he can find his friend, he can be worthy of something. He traveled the road, ceaseless on the path alongside Bread, dragging his companion at his side by the reins instead of riding atop him. His feet would burn soon under the nonstop march, but he pressed on until the border was clear in sight, and the only thing between him and the harsh cold was a small pass, and yet another traveler on the road.
Stitches lifted his gaze under his needlessly drawn hood. There's no rain, but hiding was helping him forget that he wasn't alone on the road. Ahead of him is a strangely dressed man. He is adorned in a dirty and disgusting shade of violet surcoat, and a cap that looks as though it could've been once wide brimmed crowns his head. Of course, the brim has been torn off, so now it's just a strange cap with a bell tied atop it. As he and his pack mule (carrying all manner of bags and trinkets on it) approach Stitches, he claps excitedly and calls out to him, "Ho, fellow road dweller!" He calls to Stitches, his voice high pitched and chipper, but cracking as he tries to project it.
Stitches lets out a soft grunt, looking to his right. His darker companion is quiet, in fact, not even there at the time. He draws himself and his horse to a stop as the strangely dressed man with tight fitting leggings and tattered shoes begins to prance circles around him. The man stops in front of him and fights with Stitches's dipping head to look under the hood, and finally coos as he gets a good look at Stitches's face, "Oooooooh my my my look at THIS."
Stitches blinks a few times before giving in and lifting his head to the man, at this point his lack of sleep and food makes him only half certain the strange peddler looking man is there at all. Stitches musters up his energy as his hands shake at his side from his physical neglect of his body's needs, "What do you want?" He croaks, weary and dreading response.
The man claps his hands excitedly, "You look like you could use a mask, fella! I can't imagine many are welcomin' to that face of yours, yyyyyyo-o-o-oooou scoundrel!"
Stitches grimaces with a blink. Scoundrel? Who him? What does this man know? Surely if he knows about the bandits he cannot be real. Yet, his words are as small talk to him as he studies the man, or possible hallucination, "Mask?"
"Oh yeeessss. Ye-e-e-e-esssss. A mask. Make yourself more presentable."
Stitches blinks one or two times at the man's erratic behavior, "Who are you?"
The man stops, bending at the waist with one leg straight in front of him forward, and his other leg behind him bent as he lowers himself and opens his arms in introduction, "I am Leappo, Oddities, master. I deal in oddities and ye-e-eeeesss...and you need a mask, methinks, perhaps methinks."
Stitches steps right up to the man as he finishes his fanciful bow and reaches a hand out. He places his hand on Leappo's shoulder, and as he touches him, finding out that he is in fact tangible, he recoils his head in confusion, "Huh."
Leappo giggles ecstatically and trots up to his donkey, patting it on it's tummy before searching through one of the bags. Bread had already begun to become acquainted with the donkey, sniffing at it, even as it remains unresponsive to the curious Clydesdale.
Leappo rooted through the packs before returning to Stitches with a cloth in his hand. He grabs it at both ends and stretches it out to show Stitches what it looks like. It's a gray cloth mask, with a dull red stitched mouth design across it. Somehow, it looks more friendly in manner, like a real smile. Perhaps its the curved cheek lines at the end. Stitches face droops as he meets Leappo's gaze with a grumpy snarl, "Seriously?"
Leappo seems surprised by his reaction, "No? I thought it fit rather well."
Before Stitches can respond in an annoyed or hostile manner, he feels a chill on his right ear, and a distant voice commands him, 'Take it.'
Stitches reaches his hand out immediately to the man, "Give me that."
Even at the sudden demanding tone and notion, Leappo happily hands over the mask to Stitches and claps his hands once they are unburdened, "Freeeee of charge, dear friend, frrrrre-e-e-e-eeeee of charge!"
Stitches looks down at the mask in thought. The strange and oddly short man keeps prancing about and chatting to him in an odd manner in which he elongates his own words in a shaky frame, but Stitches hardly hears him. He is thinking about the mask, and how even this piece of cloth looks better than his own face. Leappo finishes his little salesman rant with loud and resounding words that cause Stitches to snap back to attention, "...I mean, everyone wears one, right?"
"Huh?"
"A mask, of course." Leappo giggles.
"Oh....right." Stitches muses as he looks down at the mask, "Leappo, huh?"
Leappo nods and excitedly adds, "Oddities. I'll be hee-e-e-eading off towards Bree now IF... ya'know where that is."
Stitches nods, fidgeting with the surprisingly comfortable feeling mask. The cloth feels new, as though recently made. The curious man returns to his mule and gives Stitches a rather hasty departing farewell and continues down the road, bells and trinkets jingling on his donkey, and possibly on him as well. Stitches raises his eyes to Bread, who sputters at him gently. Stitches brings the mask up to his face, fastening it over his mouth and nose snuggly. It's easy to breath through, and light. The air is touchable to his breath, and its warming, but there's more to it. He feels less. Less like who he is, less like the monster who only a few days ago killed two men in blind rage. He feels better. Stitches wraps his fingers around Bread's reins and tugs him along, "C'mon boy...almost to our first stop."
Bread couldn't believe it! Their first stop! After all this time, finally.
