Blackfeather Woods I just needed a little off the top.

He expected retribution for the crimes that he'd committed, even if they were a lifetime ago. He expected, maybe, to be bludgeoned to death, to flit between memories until there was only the void; but that was not going to happen. Titmouse should've remembered Tegan's spinelessness. There was no way this boy would take him out, which meant that trading his life for Maegi's was off the table.

What came next wasn't so surprising. A demand to see their captive — the girl he's already let loose, against all good judgement. Titmouse rose from his place in the dirt.

Titmouse did not know who Ceara was, but he assumed the boy meant — F'eye is nah here. It was the truth. She had been chased from the caves by Kalganov and Maegi and, hopefully, all three of them were safely removed from the forest. Little did he know.

You should leaf, Tee-gren. You ah alone. This is your chance to survive. If he didn't take this chance to flee, then surely the forest would close in on him; if not the trees, the crows. If not them, the wolves lingering in the dark.