Red nods, and dives into the hedge, pulling Katters along behind her as she takes off at as close to breakneck speed as she can manage. "Just keep moving. Keep your eyes sharp, and if there's anything in the brush, keep your hand at the level of your eyes," she half-sings the last few words.
Katters doesn’t know if Red’s being literal — the reference is not lost on her — but just in case, she holds her free hand up to her cheek. This has the added benefit of minimising her presence, making it easier to manoeuvre through the trees and the underbrush, and keep up with Red. She tries to move quietly, but speed seems to be the greater good at the moment and she favours it.
The horn sounds again, from somewhere off behind you - where you were, on the road - and hounds bay loudly, barking and snarling and screaming in gibbering hooting laughs of "here" "food" "prey" "hunt!" "the scent-" voices and howls loud enough to carry to your ears, even across the distance. The sound of hoofbeats on the path echo like the thunder of wardrums, and the horn sounds again.
Katters stumbles — recovers. Her heart’s in her throat, her brain caught up in the white-noise panic of being pursued by something loud and fast.
Wood begins to crack and splinter. The trees are being felled as the horn sounds, and their pursuers follow them off the path.
Red is gritting her teeth with every impact to her injured leg, but refuses to slow down. On the plus side, there's no new blood in the air. On the downside, those claws digging into your arm are starting to hurt. She's trying to look around as you both run, but mostly where she's looking is in front of you both, trying to pick a way through that won't send you both plunging down with a sprained ankle.
Red’s claws barely register — Katters’ own claws are starting to leave marks on her face and she barely notices that, either. This is not hiding. But if the calls reaching them from the hunting party are any indication, they have the scent and hiding is no longer — maybe never was — an option. Still, if there’s anything Katters knows about hounds, it’s that fleeing prey excites them. She tries to keep her head, but the wind burning the back of her throat, the fear dogging her ankles, the run run run run run almost in time with her beating feet — maybe that wasn’t an option, either.
They hit a border between realms and the world gives a sickening lurch as the ground beneath them gives way... Please roll: Dex+Athletics.
Katters trips over the boundary, foot catching on the tilting world, and her hand comes down as she recovers her balance.
Red tumbles alongside her, bracing her own landing by hitting the ground on all fours, releasing Katters' arm in favor of digging her claws into the ground. "...you okay?"
“Fuckin’ winded,” Katters admits. “Can’t feel my arms. Are we clear of whatever that was?” She looks around, ears perked for any hints of baying or trumpeting.
"I... I'm not sure. Sometimes the boundaries mean you can't hear anything until they cross into the same lands-" she reaches for Katters without asking, trying to help her up as she stands. "We need to keep moving, find somewhere to hide. A Hollow, or something."
You hear no hounds, no horses, no horns... The silence is eerie, and the wind that plays along the open grassland you find yourself in is... oddly stale.
Katters does not need to be told twice. She’s walking before Red finishes her sentence, eyes out for a hiding place.
Red is following quickly alongside her, hand up, under her hood, gripping the handle of her axe, and nudges Katters, offers a slim, bone-handled knife.
Katters takes the knife and spares it an appreciative glance before going back to scanning their surroundings.
As you scan the horizon, you see something in the distance across the grassland - a house, rather dilapidated, that lies before many dry, gnarled trees. It's hard to catch any detail across the gently rolling hills of the grasslands, and they're nearly out of your range of sight... but it may be a good place to hide... Unless you want to keep hunting for another option?
Katters nudges Red and points at the house. They may as well check it out, at least — if it turns out to be a bad idea, they can look for something else.
