Dolly hurried towards the shepherd,  bound in place by the magic manipulated wooden rod.  His face was buried in the gravel, as he had rolled over onto his stomach to watch his cousin and his rams disappear over the crest of the hill; leaving behind a trampled field of black. He couldn't move any more, as every movement he made seemed to drive the rod further and further into the ground. It was a struggle to lift his head to catch the rare mouthful of air.    

    The elderly ram bleated in distress and rushed forward, lowering her horns and ramming into the rod. It tilted forward. It was easier for the shepherd to pull his head up. She rammed it again. It shifted. One more hit and the base of the rod pulled free from the ground, and Johnathan could roll over onto his back. He caught his breath and thanked the ram before staring into the blue sky. Rage roiled inside of him like a bottled thunder storm. 

    "Get back here, Arthur!" He called. His voice echoed back to him, along with the bleating of the distant rams and the wind sweeping down the slope. "You bastard! We're family." Johnathan struggled against the wooden bonds until his muscles ached and he could no longer struggled. He glared his hate to the sky until he had to blink. "Bastard!" He slammed his head backwards onto the ground. 

    His cousin. His own flesh and blood. His heart pounded like a hare on a log and he tried to push himself up. The binds around his knees and thighs held him fast in place, and caused him to fall to the ground. Dolly bleated for him to stop, but the energy in him pounded for escape. How long had he been planning this? Since he got here? It seemed too convenient. As if he was waiting for some excuse, *any* excuse to do what he had done to justify to himself? To his uncle? Was his uncle involved? He pushed once more against his bonds, and they didn't budge. Damn him. Damn him. He slammed his head into the gravely  sand until dizziness swept through his head, and then he stopped. There was nothing he could do right now, he told himself. The spell held fast and he wasn't strong enough to break through the bonds, so he laid there and stared up at the azure sky. Arthur had said that the spell would wear off eventually; could he trust his cousin's word, though?  A heavy white cloud rolled by and blotted out the harsh light of the sun from, and temporarily shaded the shepherd. Dolly nuzzled his head and laid on the ground next to him. Her pale eyes darting across every horizon. 

     The equinox was approaching quickly: only about six more days. From this position, he figured it would take five of those days to make it to the Rest with the flock. Without them, he would be able to move quicker and quite possibly intercept them before Arthur retreated into the safety of the Rest and locked him out; though if the bonds held until dusk, and he moved through the night it would still take him two or three days to catch up. Four; while he was escorting the elderly ram that now stood guard over him. Which would leave him barely any time to rest once he was out if he wanted to make sure he got his flock back before the Vernal. 

    Those bright blue, ethereal orbs flashed through his mind, and guilt hung like tar in his stomach. He wouldn't be able to go after Aethel if he did, however. Who knew where she had wandered to, and, how long it would take him to find her. If he just left her, there was no way that she would survive during the Days. But a shepherd was nothing without his flock. Obligation and guilt wrestled in his chest as the day inched on like a snail. 

    Violet evening began to erupt over the eastern horizon when the wooden binds that held him in place finally *snapped* like dry firewood. It was that snapping sound that stirred him from the short sleep he had apparently managed to slip into. His face burned, and a thin layer of salty sweat stung his pores and chapped his lips. 

    A large crack formed on the binds around his legs, and he could feel a rush of blood flow into his thighs, bringing a wave of needle like pin-pricks up and down his leg. And then the binds on his arms snapped and loosened as well, and his arms began to likewise tingle. The wood continued to snap until he was completely free. He took a deep breath and stretched his arms and legs out as far as they could go as he lay prone on his back, waiting for the feeling to return to his extremities. His knuckles brushed against the wool of the ram, who slept soundly just above him. 

    He groaned and pushed himself off the ground, shaking Dolly awake as he stood. Her tiny bushy tail wagged and kicked up a small storm of dust. As he stood, gray dust fell from his back as the crushed, black grass stained his once white shirt. 

    "Let's go, girl." He stepped forwards up the hill, and past the ram .

    It took until the last strands of daylight sank beyond the western horizon and the final grays of dusk to fade from the sky for the two of them to make it to the plateau at the top of the hill. The moon held full and heavy in the air like the sagging belly of a pregnant ram, and every star lent their light to him as he came to the stop, to the point where it was much, much easier to see now than it had been during the last few minutes of the climb. It was easy enough to see where Arthur had led Johnathan's herd from the torn up path that trampled over a couple of the mist spinner corpses at the top of the hill. He didn't even stop to make sure that the elderly ram who had given up the ghost got a proper rest. Johnathan would have to do that himself. From his position at the top of the hill he was able to make out the stretching path extending from the blackened, life drained hill, through the green. The wide trampled, path continued onwards, stretching northward and vanishing from sight. It would be easy enough to follow. 

    Guilt wrenched inside of him and he shook his head. No. He wouldn't be able to live with himself if he just let Aethel wander around, lost and alone and in danger. He slowly walked the circumference of the hill, looking down it's slope, and weaving through the bodies — the mana that held together their bodies already being broken down, as their once hard carapaces were now brittle as glass, for any sign of where she might have went. Nothing. He couldn't see a single thing. No green hoods wandering the base of the hill for the flock. No path cut through the dead grass. Nothing. Maybe she went north as well, and the herd trampled over her path? He went back to the north slope. 

    "Aethel!" He called, "Where are you?" Nothing answered but his echo, rolling back to him off the distance stony slopes of the Boreals. 

    He sighed. Perhaps it *was* best to follow the herd. He'd circle the hill once more to see if he could find anything, and then he'd set out, he decided. He circled the hill east to west, checking down the slope the entire way. Near the northwest portion of the hill, when he was almost done with his final look, he moved around the corpse of a spider that had a section of carapace from one of its legs removed, near the edge of the hill.

    The ground sank beneath him, and his leg fell through a small hole until he got stuck on his hip. Even then he could feel emptiness stretching further beyond the tip of his toe, and the gravely ground giving way around his knee. He pulled himself free — gravel falling from the wrinkles in his path, and black dust wafting from his sudden movement, and got down on his belly to peer down into the hole. Without any source of light stronger than the pale light of night, he couldn't see very far into it, save the occasional white shimmer deep inside. He reached his arm down into the inky black up to his shoulder. It was cool inside, as if all the heat had fled from the gravel. As he pulled his arm free his heart sank as the moon light reflected off tiny strands of web clinging to his sleeve.