The raindrops pelting his face were like tiny daggers of ice. His tunic had long since soaked through and now clung to his fur. Any sane fur would seek shelter in weather like this. He was beginning to question whether he still had a grip on his sanity as he trudged on.
It had been two days since he’d left the comfort of his workshop in Bree. The little girl’s tears had affected him too deeply. He’d built dozens of tinkers for dozens of families like hers. Inevitably they all went dormant or missing. That’s the way with tinkers he’d told her. She wouldn’t accept it; couldn’t accept it. Springs was her best friend. He wouldn’t leave her like that. Truth be told, he didn’t even remember building Springs. Was the tinker even one of his?
He stopped to wring his ears out and smoothed them back to tuck them under the strap of his night-goggles. The goggles were the only thing allowing him to see in the storm. A handy invention of his, a special chemical spread across the inside of the lens allowed him to see in the dark. It’d taken some research and a little luck to find the right mixture. He still had a little refining to do before he tried to sell them to others though.
Where was he? Was he still on the main road? The rain had turned the countryside to mud so it was hard to tell where the road ended. How could he hope to find the tinker if he couldn’t even tell where he was? He couldn’t very well stay here though. He had to find some kind of shelter.
That search proved more fruitful than his search for the lost tinker. A hollowed out log lay just off what he assumed was the road. He crawled in and settled in for the night. Hopefully the weather would improve in the morning. It was going to be a long andmiserable night.