Hunters by StarSpray

Hunters

As they did nearly everything else together, all assumed that they hunted together too.

They did not. That was part of what they loved about it—the necessity of solitude. Ambarussa entered the forests together, but soon parted, clasping hands and grinning at one another. Amrod took to the trees, finding a comfortable fork where he could sit in wait, listening to the whispers of the trees and the songs of the birds. His quarry wandered underneath him, unsuspecting and unwary—until he loosed his bow, and it was too late.

Amras loved the hunt, the tracking and deciphering of signs, constant movement. The beat of his heart as he sped along a trail, spear ready in his hand. Here a few tracks in damp earth; there a tuft of hair caught on a twig. Everywhere the awareness of the earth around him, teeming with life, green grass and red blood and everything between.

Ambarussa emerged together from the hunt, successful more often than not. The meat went to the supper table; the bones they made into handles for the knives their brother forged, and leather into boots and sandals and other useful things.

Then they returned to the forest.