He did not imagine that winter in the south could ever be harsher as what he had faced in his homelands. For in the Vales he was faced with brisk mountain winds and scarcity of food to sate hungry bellies; here he was met also with the cruelty of Men. Brunleik had been unprepared for the sudden snowfall overnight, and so he decided to make way once the sun had risen higher to warm the air.
He should have foreseen the folly in that decision; with dawn having long since passed, the men of the Norcrofts were out, and they were on the hunt - they sought a bear, a beast, and they sought it slayed. He should have been wiser than to travel through the snow-covered plains in the form of the massive bear of his lineage.
He would not make that mistake twice—for few men of the south remembered the tales of Beorn, and of those of his lineage; bears who walk among men and warriors who take no gentle creature for food. But here they would hunt gentle creatures for sport—they would hunt them out of fear.
Brunleik ambled aimlessly through the snow, large paw prints leaving tracks behind him. He thought he could track the path to Harwick on his own, but no scent was familiar, even as he raised his head to sniff something, anything, out. If he had not been so concerned about what path next to follow, perhaps he would have heard them coming. He might have been able to hear their whispers on the wind; their careful footsteps as they used the knowledge of their home to their advantage, moving nearly silent on the snow.
The first arrow did not pierce deeply through his thick fur, but it certainly got his attention; it fell as he turned around with a confused snort, leaving a barb of pain in its wake. It is then he noticed the throng of hunters who lie in wait for him. A heartbeat passed; one, then another, and then they lunged towards him, and he was left forced to defend himself.
Snapping jaws and growls of warning at first encouraged the men to keep their distance. But before long they mustered the courage to approach, and they struck at him with swords, and they stuck him with arrows, and they rushed him with the sharp ends of spears. He would twist and turn; he tried to shove them away rather than harm them in return - he wanted only the chance to flee, but they were relentless. He reared back on his hind legs to release a foul roar to chase them off; but one brave man rushed forward and pierced his side with a spear—not once, but twice, and Brunleik’s roar sputtered into a cry of pain as he fell back.
He heaved for breath; he snarled and snapped at them, and their hesitation to run him through a final time was all he needed to scramble to his paws and flee. In his wake he left a trail of warm red blood. He did not know how long they had hunted him to find him, but he feared they would not cease now that they had a taste for his blood. So he ran.
He limped, actually; he limped as fast as he could, and his frosted breath escaped panting jaws as he fled with his pursuers at his heels. The bleeding wounds in his side slowed him, not accounting for the myriad of other injuries he bore as well, disguised by his dark fur. It was all he could do to not low in pain. He thought perhaps that this would be the end of him, a stranger felled in a strange land—until it began to snow again. The snow fell quick and it fell thick, and soon he could not hear his pursuers’ footsteps behind him, so he tried to peer to his front.
If he’d been wiser, he would have made this journey differently. He could not even make sense of the terrain laid before him; it all blurred together in his eyes; how was he to find Harwick in this state?
As he stumbled alongside a rocky outcropping, he took the opportunity to shift back into the form of a young man that might’ve kept him safe all along. He stumbled, coughing; he raised a hand to rest along the rocks to hold himself up as the other gingerly touched warm blood dripping from his side. He winced, but tried to will himself to go further on. Just one more step. Two. He sat down instead— he leaned back beneath the narrow overhang of stone and tried to catch his breath. The snow fell even still as he looked out at the bleak horizon. Was this to be his fate? Death in pointless pursuit? Just as he was about to give up, and take whatever chance he was given in the cold, he heard a soft voice coming from the nearby forestline.
“It seems you find yourself in a difficult position, stranger.”
