Mist lay low in the green hollows, and Sir Palamedes moved through it like a thought half-remembered. His twin blades rode easy in his hands, narrow and curved, foreign steel that caught what little light filtered through the trees. Ahead, somewhere beyond the hush of birds, the Questing Beast cried a strange, hollow sound, as if many hounds bayed inside a single chest.

Behind Palamedes was you, his squire, carefully placing each foot where the knight had stepped before.

You paused at the edge of a stream. The water shivered, rings spreading as something large had crossed not long before. Palamedes crouched, studying the mark, when the cry came again, farther now, with it another sound, unwelcome and sharp made it's way into your master's head: the sudden memory of a pair’s laughter, long gone, rising unbidden in his mind.

The knight's grip faltered. One blade dipped, kissing the water. Palamedes closed his eyes. Grief came to him not as tears but as weight, pressing down through his chest, through his limbs, until even breathing felt like a labor. For a heartbeat, the forest faded, replaced by sunlit stone and the faces of people he'd never see again.

Once the knight opened his eyes again it was too late. The moment had passed; the trail of the questing beast already felt colder, it had gotten away.