#baronyofthesilverwolf

And so the intrepid duo starts their trek Eastward! Perc + Alertness, or Investigation, as you prefer.

/roll 5

(Well can't botch alertness as a troll thankfully)

Heh 🙂

Gwen finds her thoughts wandering about the nature of cabbages... a cabbage dish her mom makes... isn't it about lunchtime? Her stomach grumbles a little, a mild distraction from the task at hand.

It's not her fault, big girls need their cabbage meals!

And what she can do with those big mushrooms, heaven.

/roll 6

As they wander east, Thistle spots the chimerical snail again—now nestled happily atop a wilted cabbage leaf, nibbling along one edge. But as she looks closer, she notices the leaf bears more than just snail bites: a few delicate nibbles around the rim are much too neat, too symmetrical. Not the work of a slow grazer, but something with intent.

The shed leaf lies like a trail marker, pointing due east toward a shady patch of clover where the undergrowth seems a bit disturbed.

Brow!

"Citrine, the hell?" She stomps eastward!

nom nom nom nom nom says the happy snail.

"What is going on?"

The undergrowth is thick and tangled, nettles and brambles winding among grasses, but there—just ahead—something parts the green. A narrow swath winds through the brush, nearly hidden unless one stands tall enough to see the subtle break in the pattern of foliage.

At first, Gwen takes it for a rabbit run. Even if she doesn’t choose to hunt herself, any self-respecting master of hounds knows a game trail when they see one. But as her gaze sharpens, she realizes: this wasn’t made by bounding feet.

Something was rolled—pushed, perhaps—leaving a smooth, meandering path through the brush. Glinting faintly in the shaded light, tiny yellow sparkles dust the trail, scattered like pollen.

Thistle is muttering under her breath, words, which if said any louder, would curdle milk.

"Okay, bowling with cabbage?" A brow lift.

"Something? Never brains work in mysterious ways."

They may choose press on eastward, examine further, or try something new?

Gwen decides to look closer, and looks for signs of Never Glitter.

(do you have any points in animal ken?)

(HA)

(I think she has it at 4 or something critter related)

(Ha, good enough!)

/roll 6

(Did I SAY to roll?! Feh!)

(You were gonna get a freebie. 😉 remember if you roll unrequested and it's bad, you're stuck with it...)

Gwen kneels down beside the rolled-down trail, her experienced eyes scanning the ground and nearby underbrush. Game trails have telltale signs, she knows. There, the softened earth and that cluster of loose dirt? That’s where the burrow entrance is, right beneath that tangle of roots.

And she is wise enough NOT to stick her face into the burrow, so when the small critter comes rushing out with a chatter, she isn't bonked on the nose with an irate paw.

From the hole has emerged a small creature—roughly vole-sized but clearly no ordinary rodent. Its fur glimmers with flecks of amber and moss-green, and two tiny antler-like nubs crown its head. Sharp, wary eyes fix on them. The balled up paw thumps on the ground and it chatters loudly in complaint!

It takes just a moment to realize that the squeaky squeaks are actually a squeaky VOICE...

"First that ticky-tocky winged one trampled through my home, and now you lot with your big feetses stomping about! What’s the meaning of this?"

"There was a cabbage Theft, we were head hunting," Gwen ahems.

It sniffs the air and huffs, now even more annoyed as it recalls.

"That glowing cabbage — smelled so sweet, shone like a lantern in the dark! That little spark, she wouldn’t let me have even a nibble. Worst houseguest! Uninvited! Rude!"

"I am sorry, I'm a Daireann and we don't care for rude guests. Could you tell me where the culprit might have gone, please?"

"Hey!"

It sniffs the air, and looks at Thistle, and gets a cunning gleam in it's eyes. "Only dropped chewy-chewed leaves, Quickmunch is no beggar to eat leavings! Harrumph! But if someone had.... something ELSE to eat?" It's... Quickmunch's... nose quivers, smelling something that the Nocker clearly has in her nasty little pocketses.

Because EVERYONE knows that Thistle always has stuff in her pockets, even if it might be smooshed, creased, or daubed with paint or engine grease...

"Citrine's not rude. She's.... y'know... a babe of the woods, right? She's too dumb to be malicious."

A snort and flip of it's tail.

Or perhaps it's the Boggan-raised Troll that has something in her pockets.

Or it may just be smelling remnants of breakfast, and is SOL.

Right now, it looks like it might be considering chomping those nibblish teeth down on a Nocker toe.

She huffs.

"Okay okay.. sorry, Thistle." She searches her pockets. SShe has a snack for the dogs.

The round little rodent stretches up, sniffing.

"Is every chimera a greedy gus?" She huffs. "Whatever, you get the skittles with the apple greens."

"Greedy? Ha! Those big tromping feet might’ve scared me out of a whole season’s fat—though if you ask me, I’m still plenty fat enough." A pat on a round belly with a small paw, looking both proud and indignant.

"Always room in the larder for more though." Nose wiggle wiggle, and sly, to Gwen. "And I points you the way, Quickmunch does. Clever, clever me."