Kip and I had been keeping to the woods for a better part of a ten-day now. Over this time I had learned to better communicate with her, calling her by name and responding to my own new one. Our dreams were tumultuous, hers made her start and occasionally cry out in the night, mine filled with the memories and experience of my family and the echos of love from my queen. My mind ached with an emptiness every day upon waking. A gaping hole where queen and family would have made me whole. Where each decision was to fulfill and support the will of the queen mother. Our want's and desires would have been hers. Instead, I am forced into the burden of making my own way, a burden so alien and unknown to my kind that it seemed a wonder I could live at all.

     But something drove me on. I needed to survive. So here I was, an orphaned one with a four limb. It would have to do. On the thirteenth day Kip and I accidentally ran into a bear while we attempted to forage blue berries from bushes we happened upon. I myself was not a defenseless creature, but I knew from seeing her that a young four limb without any natural weapons or crafted ones was as good as dead. So I had been forced to scoop her up yet again and flee. Thankfully I do not think the bear was interested in us so mush as the berries in piles we had left behind. But the encounter woke me up the the fact that it was very unsafe for kip to remain in these woods. We needed to get her back to her hive, her pack, so that they could protect her better than I could. 

     "Where are your kin?" I asked when we had paused to rest by a stream, the cool waters soothed us both after our flight. She seemed a little startled at the question. "Well if'n ya mean my Da then I can't be goin back to 'im. He gave me away to that caravan and look where that got me." Her face darkened at the mention of this but she continued. "I know that the caravan was headed to a town called Gevin's Hedge. Said they had some stuff to sell there, and if'n I wanted a place to sleep and food to eat I damn well better help with the work." She sighed and plopped down next to where I was resting on a patch of grass. One of my feelers drummed her arm playfully and she let out that little warbling noise I've come to recognize as a four limb sign of happiness.

     'Why'n ya askin, eh Opal?" I turned my head more towards her and said "It is not safe for you to stay our here. I doubt my ability to keep us both from harm in these woods, so we must find a place where you will be protected in greater numbers." She slumped a bit and her face creased, she said "I know yer right. Hell yer the only thing that's acted like ya cared if I lived er died, and yer a giant bug!" Her head swiveled to look directly at me "I didn't mean that in'a bad way Opal. I'm sorry." She just stated what she knew and I didn't understand the apology, so I chose to skip over it. "Your kin do not care for you?" I asked. "Not really I guess, more focused on their own things. Not all humans care for each other, nor really see each other as any kin at all ya know." She replied resting one of her hands on the carapace of my back. "But you're right. We can't be stayin out here. Let's try to find that hedge town eh?"

     It took us two more days to find the caravan trail we had abandoned in our flight. Thankfully we must've come out onto a different part because we could not see bodies or the burnt remains of the four limb wagons. So we followed it. Another few days passed, forage was thin along the trail, but we could ill afford the time to strike off to find food only to have to find the trail all over again. I let Kip eat most of whatever we found. I suspected she could not last as long as I could without sustenance. After plodding along for four days we finally caught sight of a human hive. A wall fashioned of felled timbers surrounded their constructs, and a break in the wall held large heavy wooden doors. I single four limb leaned against it's frame, and as we approached it sprung up and fumbled with the long tipped stick it was holding. 

     "What'n the nine hells are you doin with a wood haunt child!?" He exclaimed pointing the stick in my general way. Well this was going to be interesting.