days of traveling had been mahler's lot — it was a testament to the skill of the cherub who had tended him that the man suffered very little now. a pulse of pain from still-mending muscles was the only echo of the wild creature's teeth. the musiker had since decided to take some grim pleasure in it; he was not permanently damaged, and he had turned a threat away from grimnismal's gate.
it was the first time since departing the grotto that mahler had recalled its name, for it had become a mere growling sound, syllables strung along a stiff thread. it was the name of a place that had ceased holding potential of home when wylla had left it. suspecting it was not the inferior chaos of love that drove him, mahler traveled inland all the same, searching for threads of her scent when he knew he would not find it. 
imprinting, perhaps, he teased himself dryly — a duckling with a dog. but even that answer held no truth for the musiker. onward he moved, deeper into the summer-rich reaches of places undiscovered, until the stalk of a pelican brought him into a crouch. a fen here, rich with the scent of rotting green things, abuzz with the humming of flying insects. exhaustion stole over him then; mahler, his hunger forgotten, stretched out upon the earth, eyelids falling to half-mast as the creature began to realize the breadth of his own tiredness.