The next morning, Kitten grew agitated that her bear had been absent for some days. She paced and wrung her hands, then insisted that something was wrong. She lifted her bag of heavy books and took off in the direction she had last seen the beast.
The traveler gathered up his shabby rucksack and caught up with her as she cut across town and forest with haste.
He was not entirely convinced that the bear needed aid. It was, after all, a beast of the wilds that possessed its own means of defense. Still, she remained distressed and swiftly doubled back across the countryside and he followed closely.
Along their march, Kitten noticed a particularly vivid looking mushroom. She paused only briefly before she sighed wistfully, then remarked that she wished she had time to draw it but she could not spare the time from her search. The traveler looked at her oddly and did not understand why she would not wish to draw something pretty, such as a flower.
Eventually a rushing stream broke their stride, and Kitten, not wishing to soak them yet again on their journey, suggested they follow the bank.
They hiked northward to find a place to ford the stream, and the traveler noticed an abandoned cart off the to side of a small hill. Ever an opportunist, he strode over to inspect what might have been left behind. There was a single bulky canvas bag, lumpy and tied tightly with twine. He withdrew one of his sharper knives and cut the cord, then his hand slipped inside to withdraw... clothing. Halfling laundry, apparently.
He turned the sack over and out fell trousers and tunics, all clean. Kitten sifted through the pile and pulled out the pieces that looked as if they had belonged to a particularly corpulent hobbit. The traveler spotted a bit of finer red fabric within the lot of courser farmers' clothing, and using his grimy fingers to pry it out from under the weight, held it up to inspect. Kitten smirked when it was found to be a lady hobbit's fancy undergarment.
They found a stone bridge in good repair a short while later and finally crossed the water to continue on the search.
Despite keeping a brisk pace, and perhaps to keep her mind from over-worry, they spoke of other things: the past, the present. The traveler asked her what her intentions with her travels in the wide world were, and he idly wondered how a thirteen year old girl developed such lofty goals.
She chuffed with annoyance and corrected him: she was nineteen.
When she was not looking, he stole a glance over her form to judge that for himself. He thought her mannerisms and naivety were far too green for one who claimed to have seen that many summers, but he supposed her figure was chronologically right.
It was almost dusk and the pair were fatigued and ravenous from the pace they had kept throughout the day. He had thought to ask if she was ready to find a place to make camp, but instead, she gasped and took off running with renewed vitality. It took nearly all his grit to force his body to muster enough of his own to catch up.
There, under a scraggly shrub, laid the bear. Kitten shrieked and ran to its side, for it was a bloodied mess with the jaws of a cruel metal trap clamped on a limb. The trap was removed, but the beast had lost much blood and was not regaining consciousness.
The traveler was anything but a mender. He simply did not have the proficiency to aid in any meaningful way, except to remove his cloak and wrap it as tightly as he could around the vicious wound. Even still, blood poured from the beast unrelieved and he knew he would not save it.
She grasped the animal as tightly as she could, her body bathed in the creature's gore. He could only stand by, helpless, and wait for the end.
But then Kitten surprised him yet again.
Her wailing stopped, and was replaced with a peculiar reverberating sound. It grew steadily louder, and then he could have sworn he saw a greenish flash appear between woman and bear for just a moment. He shook his head in incredulity, and then Kitten tumbled back off the animal and onto the soft grass.
He ran to her side, and she looked weak and exhausted. She asked in a whisper if the beast survived, and he realized that the fountain of blood had stopped, the bear resting peacefully. She looked satisfied at that, then rolled her head to the side, closing her eyes.
He laid closely next to her that night, and covered her with some of the halfling clothes they took to keep her warm. Silently he checked on her breathing several times, worried for her well-being. Any questions about what transpired would wait.
