Tybault still wasn't comfortable in forests. Every time he looked up, every time he remembered that the sky was blocked out by all those trees, his heart raced and his lungs felt tight. He felt trapped. So he didn't look up.
The creepy trees didn't help, though. Some kind of sap, he figured, but it was red like fresh blood. The trees looked like they were bleeding. Maybe he should have had some kind of deep thoughts about that, but he didn't. Ophelia or Athens would have, probably. They always spoke for hours about strange things like that, and how they could be metaphors for other things. Tybault didn't see the point, but he kind of missed listening to it. He missed them, all of them, together. He didn't miss their parents, but his siblings... they were his
family. He had to bring them back together.
Someone was watching him. Tybault felt eyes on him before he caught the stranger's scent, and the scent came to him long before he saw the man between the trees. The hair along his back rose. His first thought was that Germanicus had come after him, or maybe sent someone after him. That guy was super paranoid. But the scent was that of a lone wolf, not a pack wolf.
He turned with his head low, shoulders tense, and that was when he spotted the dark wolf. What do you want?
Tybault called out, still and watchful for now. Making the first move would give him the advantage, but he couldn't bring himself to attack before he knew the stranger was a threat. He looked pretty damn suspicious at the moment, but Tybault tried to be fair in all things.
Tybault snorted. He knew it was unfair of him to be annoyed by the stranger's ignorance, but he was anyway. Figure it out on your own, he was tempted to snap back. That's what I'm doing. Not that it was working out very well, but at least he wasn't putting the burden of his own lack of knowledge on someone else.
You're asking the wrong guy. Never seen this place before. Hope I never see it again,
He shot a glance around, his distaste evident in his expression. It was easy to direct his annoyance at their surroundings instead, and he felt a little less like an asshole that way.
It seemed his hostility did the trick, however, because the man suddenly wasn't interested in talking. Tybault was happy to go his own way, out of the forest and to the coast.