Overture Downs and the desolate moorland below

His presence and advisement did not deter the child, and it was with increasing dismay he watched her draw closer. Interested in him, little surprise there; he wondered if he had done nothing at all if she would have simply continued her search in another section, leaving him to pass on undetected. It was a calculation not thought of until then, but also a risk any way he looked at it. His frame stiffened momentarily before some slack found its way in, though his hackles prickled in response.

”Turn back, child,” he said, ”there's nothing for you to find beyond here.” A gentler command than a warning growl, but another warning all the same. But perhaps to call her a child wasn't entirely true either—her approach revealed that maybe all that was child about her was her age and the way she carried herself. Beyond her, his eyes made a cursory scan of the horizon, but they were still alone.