.
.
Not long after his ear rang, he was awake and getting out of his shelter. Immediately, he recognized it was already past the crack of dawn; It was time wasted, but at least most of the birds and other wildlife would remain mostly asleep for about another hour. The previous night of last-minute scavenging wasn't easy on him either, but he wasn't awake enough to immediately remember it.
Without so much as a thought to his immediate surroundings, he put on a leather sack on his back and quickly set forward from the massive tree hollow in search of as much food as he could safely haul. Before long, however, the severity of the weather showed itself with a harsh, unexpected breeze that blew onto his side, and surprisingly knocked him onto the ground. Though he'd been lucky enough to not receive even a scratch on his clothes, it irked him that such a thing could happen; In an instant, however, he set this grievance aside and snapped right back to his scavenge, skipping past the huge pinecones in search of something easier, if even edible, to bring home for winter. Another wind blew, though he'd set his footing correctly to stand upright, and continue his search.
The numbing bite of winter annoyed him quite thoroughly, but the truth was that weather such as this, no less on the brink of winter, was perfect for him to continue looking for food without (almost literally) drowning in snow, regardless of how unbearable the search would be; There was also the benefit of hibernation in the animals, albeit a pattern he'd learn to follow after his first few winters alone. For a moment, he absent-mindedly considered casting a flame for warmth, but quickly realized how strong of a waste it would be to not only reveal his position to all the unassuming wildlife, but to also lose any way to effectively ward off any swooping birds.
It was this capability, along with several others in regards to his 'magic', that kept him alive for this long. It was this blessing, beit without pain at times, that allowed him to hold his own against nature's predators, and sometimes when afforded, it'd be this capability that allowed him to even become a hunter, if only for a moment, and stave his hunger off. Flow, as he knew it, kept him alive, and for as long as he knew to fight, this jackal would survive. To waste it on what was comparably a luxury, he'd preserve it until the moment was right.
For some odd reason, however, even the birds seemed to be far more absent than usual — Regardless of the fact that he had been hiding from tree to tree. Excluding the distant chirps from several dozen of the massive pine trees away, the silence felt odd, but he wasn't going to stop and figure out why. All that mattered to him right now was finding more food, be it dead or alive, fruit or carcass.
...
...What separated him from vermin?
-
CRACK. It felt like mental whiplash, with his body instinctively sprinting to shelter before he could even process the sound. But it clicked, what exactly he just heard — Large steps upon a shattered pinecone, though of what creature he couldn't tell. The panic quickly started to boil in his chest as his thoughts ran with him, and before long, another set of the colossal steps fell onto the earth, one after another, continuously. For his own sake, he hadn't looked back until he finally climbed into his shelter and formed a teal spear, his back pasted fully onto the back of the rough hollow.
With a moment to catch his breath, his mind began to run amok with what to make of this situation. Passively, he realized that this creature had to be bipedal, based on the fact that the steps came in pairs of two, and its size... The fact that he nearly shook with every footstep it took started to clamp down on his mental. His thought went straight to a bear or something of such a scale, but knew they would neither walk on their hinds so casually, nor be wandering right at the advent of the winter. It had to be something else.
.
...A thought lurked in his mind, one that had been eating away at his sanity for so long now. Every single time it came up he refused to think of it, brushing it off as nothing more than folklore; There couldn't be any way that a being could be as massive as the elders drew them to be. The idea of them being armed only made the jackal stray further from believing... But now, what else was left to explain it?
.
The footsteps of the beast continued, yet he still hadn't caught a glimpse of what he was dealing with, let alone where it was. On the verge of tears, he could only hope it was going away, but in the back of his mind, he knew hiding was just buying time before the inevitable occurred — Not as if he had anywhere else to run or hide. Even in such a time, the jackal knew his breaking point was far too close, and knew to calm himself before his nerves won. Reluctantly, he shut his eyes and shakily drew out a deep breath in whilst reciting a cantation of hope, desperate to gain some composure.
.
When he opened his eyes, he was met with nothing but the unreal sight of a giant, amber eye staring directly at him, surrounded by cedar skin that enveloped the entire crevice. His breath violently stumbled into a painful screech as he haphazardly shuffled away, scraping his arms and palms against the rough wood until he lost leverage; The beast's eye widened at the sight of his desperation. Just by the size of its eye alone, he knew he stood absolutely no chance to fight back; In his desperate fight-or-flight, however, the jackal began to beligerently and aimlessly swing his spear at the beast, his grip on spear and hope firm.
-
"Get back! GET BACK!" He yelled in a carnal voice he'd long forgotten. It'd been all he could muster in a now-foreign language, but it proved effective in earning him a reaction from the goliath.
.
"W-whoa, hey! Take it easy! I-I'm not gonna hurt you." They interjected as they backed away in a rush, allowing him to see the rest of their face, their hands raised.
Despite his rushing instincts, the jackal had been left utterly speechless; Everything he thought he knew of beasts was being torn apart by the reality he was facing. First and foremost, the beast looked exactly like any other person — They'd even sounded like one, and soon it even clicked that they responded in his language. Second, and perhaps more baffling, was that it didn't immediately kill him, but instead apologized and backed off, with arms raised just to show no harm intended. Before he could process anything else, however, the giant lowered their arms and began to speak again.
.
"Hey... I'm sorry if I scared you, I just... I don't think I've ever seen a jackal so close before... If you don't mind me asking, are you lost by any chance?" They spoke with a few stutters. Their smile, though worried, had beamed with long-lost curiosity.
It'd only been a moment, but a thought crossed his torched mind as he tried to understand the giant's motives. It soon dawned on the jackal that there was nothing that could've stopped the giant from either being snatched from where he lied, or simply being crunched into paste like an herb in the mortar. The fact they were reassuring him caused even more dissonance within his thoughts; Everything he'd ever been taught of beasts of such nature was simply not lining up. Perhaps they were a kind beast... With his back to a wall and the only way out snuffed by the giant's presence, The jackal casted away his spear and hoped to be shown mercy. As he backed onto the tree innards, however, a sharp sting suddenly ran down his right arm, as he recoiled the injured limb to his sight.
-
The torn sleeve flapped down and revealed a wide abrasion and a small cut on his arm; His palms suffered similarly, though his right forearm withheld the majority. Nothing had broken and the bleeding was minimal, as far as he felt.
.
"O-oh, are you alright?" The giant exclaimed with eyes widened at the sight. He braced as they leaned in to assist, his hands instinctively ready to form another spear. The giant hadn't flinched or backed away, however — Slowly, the giant's hand turned to show an open palm, slightly unsteady but inviting nonetheless.
"Seriously... I'm not going to hurt you. Promise."
.
There hadn't been much for the jackal to leave behind; He knew this, and in that moment, he'd slung his bag over his shoulder without bothering to look back. With bated breath, he rose to his feet and cautiously walked to the open palm before him, soon exposing himself again to the winter elements — If only for a moment. Whether out of consideration or as a natural resting position, the giant's fingers were already curled to the jackal's left side, giving him not only some elemental protection to everything below his shoulders, but also leverage. Despite how much the giant remained unflinching, their hand trembled from the nipping wind (and possibly excitement), making the jackal's steps as unsteady. One harsh breeze forced the jackal to hold just one finger with his entire hand, clenching over it as though ready to mount over.
Each struggling step eventually brought him to the palm's center, his head still down to ensure proper footing on such an odd terrain. Standing upright and as still as he could manage, the jackal tilted his gaze up for a nightmarish duration, but eventually locked eyes with the giant's warm smile. That primal fear he'd felt only a few minutes ago almost came gushing from his mouth, not helped by how he could ever-barely feel their mild breath upon his own skin from such a distance. Yet, despite holding himself together for so long, the dread suddenly forced itself out with a sudden shift of movement; Just before he could fathom the worst, he'd been holding their finger and would've fallen to his fours.
The upwards momentum had ended just as abruptly as it started. What was a simple movement to stand for the giant had thoroughly shaken the tiny jackal's already crumbling world. Though his heart was set on the verge of another panic attack, this jackal's mental walls were cracking, and soon he turned again to face the giant, who seemed pleased with his gift from the world.
-
Tears formed and the teary-eyed jackal, in this misery, turned his gaze from his captor's eyes and into his hands, slowly curling onto the very fingers that hid him from the gusts. The giant's cautious smile warped into a full frown, to then look aside with guilt for how horrifying they'd unintentionally been to the poor jackal. "Sorry," had weakly escaped their mouth before they both shared a moment of their personal lowest, alone.
The jackal broke.
.
.
.
The giant's attention, before allowing them to wander, was suddenly put onto what felt like a water-drop on their neck. They looked up and before they knew it, light snowdrops began to roll through the land. The mess of a jackal in their palms had given up, leading them to gather their bearings and head to their own shelter for the moment.
[End of Chapter I]