Great Bear Wilderness the call

This isn't as good as I wanted it to be and it's so painfully long but it's late and I'm TIRED. But who cares, Henryk is finally on his way to Kingslend! Yay!

The sun was setting on him, ambient light bathing his brown fur into a muddied gold as he lay atop an outcropping, settled against the sheer face of the mounts. The man's eyes were aimed at the sky, above the blinding sunlight, and instead focused on the strands of purple hues dancing above. It's beauty was something he always loved to take in at this altitude, however... His mind found itself elsewhere far away from the view above him, deep in his own contemplation.

It had been days since he'd met that elken woman. Days since they'd spoken atop the shelf, and their meeting had ended in an offer. Though he'd continued on as usual afterward, he hadn't forgotten it. Not by any means... It lay in the back of his mind at all times, merely dormant until he sought a moment of rest for it to arise again.

He had been offered an opportunity to be apart of something, and that's what he'd ultimately wanted. Wasn't it? How could he be sure when uncertainty tied him down like the cruel mistress it was? He'd doubt everything that he could think of to convince himself away from the pull of it, himself most of all...

Suddenly, there was a change in the wind to break him from his thoughts. The earthen man felt it first on his pelt, prickling with the sudden feeling of something's eyes upon him. Nothing was below him though, his eyes scanned far and wide to be sure of it. And nothing could possibly see him from above. Still, he got to his paws and continued to scout with growing discomfort.

Then he turned his head to look behind him- a ridiculous move because it wouldn't have even been possible for anything to be behind him in the first place- but when he did nonetheless, his eyes grew wide with sudden trepidation. What he then saw beyond him was enough to stagger him into freezing where he stood, a cold chill crawling down his spine at the spectacle.

His shadow stood along the face of the mount elongated by the sun's position beneath him. At his helm... A dead tree perfectly poised a ways away from him cast the shadow of it's forked branches atop his head, giving his shadow the appearance of antlers.

Maybe it was a mere coincidence by a trick of the light, but to Henryk in that moment; it was something so out of place and shocking that he found it immediately hard to dismiss it. It wouldn't have been so hard had the image not been so pristine in it's execution, the branches aligned perfectly to where the rest of the lifeless tree's shadow was out of sight behind his own. He didn't encounter strange things often, but he could simply feel the loudness of it against the otherwise unimpressive day. 

A familiar voice came to mind.

He with a thousand horns... 

No. It couldn't be. How could it? He'd never had a thing to do with the High Elk of Déorwine. Never prayed to him, never gave him his dues, never even heard of his existence until mere days ago. But now as it seemed, he could only be led to believe that the High Elk was reaching out to him directly. He wanted something of Henryk, and if that were true... Who was he to turn away from something greater than himself? Even if it was something he did not understand.

The sun continued to fall, and Henryk watched the visage crawl up the mountainside and eventually disappear in solemn tranquility. He remained where he stood even long after it had gone completely, staring at the place where it had been with pensive wonder.

Then, feeling empowered by a sense of newfound resolve deep within him that silenced the doubt altogether, he leapt from the outcropping and sought out the path up the mountains.

This time he'd go past Casseiopea's View. To a land he didn't know the name of just yet, but eventually, he would know it proper. The Hinterlands.