Solo Hunting

[Roderick]

55th of Summer, 513 AV Roderick dropped the last few crumbs of rye onto the pile and stepped away from his snare carefully; the Kelvic girl he'd met a few days ago had given him this idea and he figured not using the knowledge would be idiotic. Turning around and walking away from his snare, he set a foot against a nearby tree and started pulling himself up into the branches; after he'd made it to the first it was a case of stepping and lifting himself onto the others, until he was a few feet above the ground, hidden unless someone were to look up directly at him. Roderick rested his back against the trunk of the tree, resting his bow in his hands. The wind that often moved through the Bronze Wood had taken the day off, leaving the woods strangely silent. Without the sound of the rustling leaves he could hear any movements around him, as well as the noises of the forest's insects. He shifted himself on the branch and adjusted the grip of his legs about the bark; he had left most of his things at the base of the tree, given the difficulty involved with bringing it all up here with him. The slight rustle of some bushes off to his left brought his attention towards a figure slowly making it's way out of the undergrowth. A buck with large horns emerged from the treeline and made its way out into the center of the clearing. It spotted the pile of rye lying before it and slowly made its way towards it. As it bent to begin eating the offered food the snare snapped itself about the buck, sending it into a frenzy as it tried to free itself; Roderick drew and loosed quickly at it, scoring a hit through its shoulder. Having held an second arrow between his fingers as he loosed the first, he notched it to the string and released the arrow at the buck; this time it caught the animal in the neck, as planned. Slinging his bow over his back, Roderick began to descend from the tree; no easy task with a large piece of wood dangling about him. Clutching every handhold he could find, he finally found himself with his feet back on the ground. He turned to his prey. The buck had freed itself of the snare before collapsing into a bleeding heap beside the scattered rye; it writhed in agony, trying to bring itself back onto its legs. Roderick collected his snare and began scooping up the rye into a small pouch, leaving the buck to bleed to death beside him. By the time he had collected all of his things and retrieved his sled from where he'd stashed it at the base of a tree, the buck was nothing more than a bloody corpse. Dragging it onto the sled, Roderick took hold of the rope and began dragging the buck back towards the city, planning on returning for another hunt once he had collected his money for the kill.