Owen’s brawly hands plucked another set of berries from the lush green bushes in front of him. He tossed a handful of them into the air, plopping each one into his mouth, each one popping with flavor.
They were only about a mile from camp but it was still a hike to find the bushes, especially since they were depleting the resources around them these past few weeks, forcing them to trek out further. Meat was still plenty in the area, but the fruit was what everyone lived for and Shara knew exactly where to search.
It had only been the three of them, Jade and Soran stayed back to train for the day. What was nice about this task was that Owen was surrounded by food, his favorite pastime of the day: eating.
They were right around the mountain pass of Raven's edge. A path curled up around the black slick part of one of its peaks. It took some time to follow, ensuring one of them didn't slip to their death by missing a dip that opened into a pit of darkness at the last moment. The trick was to bring a walking stick with you and tap each section of the rock before stretching forward. This took time of course, making the whole endeavor quite tedious and long. Even though they left in the morning, they still probably wouldn’t make it back until far after lunch.
At a certain point, they reached a low end of the mountain and intentionally slid down the mountain into a scattering array of wild bushes.
It would take some time to collect what they needed for the trouble but none of them were in any hurry since in order to get back to camp, they still had to scale a twenty foot wall to make it back up to the black curving path they followed along the mountain to get there.
“The point is to have them make it into the basket,” Alice scolded Owen with a bag full of them in her hand.
“A few won’t hurt,” Owen contested.
Shara and Alice both stopped, scouring for ripe raspberries in front of the bush towering over them. They stared at their overflowing selection of mixed berries within each of their bags from blueberries, raspberries, black berries, black ravens, and yellow turnings. Then they glared over at Owen’s scarce selection, barely covering the bottom of his basket.
“There should be more in your basket than in your stomach.” Alice shot with a tempered growl.
“Listen, I have to spar Jade tomorrow. I have to be prepared.” Owen tossed another raspberry into the air, sliding to the side in order to catch it.
“Owen!” they both snapped.
“I’ve never sparred with a princess before.” His voice shot up with excitement. “I need my strength.” He tucked down his vest, feeling proper. “I need to be prepared.”
Owen grew into a brown bear, scaling somewhere around 9 feet tall. Before plopping back to the ground as himself. “What do you think I should be?”\
He morphed into a water elf, his blue tinted skin shining against the silver luster of carved coral forming into a chest plate around him. The coral ended right at his waist, showing a hardened dark blue silicone wrapping around his legs with dark blue metal capping around his knees for protecting his joints from the rough current.
“Maybe a water elf.” Owen played with his pointed blue ears with a childish grin.
"You know that armor is meant for the water, right?" Alice peered around edges of the sheeted material wrapped around his ankles with extensions of curved arched sheets attached to resemble that of webbing.
If Soran was training Jade right, Jade would know to click the hook at the side of his belt to draw out the mechanics spread like a web around the silicone metal wrapping Owen's legs. It dipped around his thighs twice and curled all the way down his calves to his feet and if pressed would snap his legs together in place and drop down the artificial fins curved on the back plating of his thighs so that in water, he could swim faster, on land, most likely flopping face first into the dirt.
Now it wasn't a feature Owen had to add since he could have adapted the armor how he saw fit. Yet, Alice still saw the hook resting at his waist attached to all the metal veining in the armor. It was a little detail he had to have for prosperity purposes, but no real clue as to what its actual purpose was.
“Maybe you should quit shifting, Owen,” Shara added, plucking a berry from the bush. “It’ll only starve you quicker.”
Owen ignored them, shifting into a leer, but not as intimidating as the ones they faced in Greenwood Forest. His snarl wasn’t as grimacing while he snagged a bustle of berries in his mouth, snagging the branches in his bite, trying to re-enact their deathly demeanor. It looked more like a dog tugging his toy rope, than anything else.
“Owen!” they both howled at him as several dozen berries tumbled to the ground, now unreachable with the thorns that laid on the grass bedding.
“Sorry.” He shifted back quickly with an apologetic smile, running his hand through the golden locks of his hair. “I know it’s only been a day, but I’m excited to see what she can do now that she’s starting to levitate objects. I don’t even know what that would look like in a fight.”
“I wouldn’t hold your breath.” Shara stopped plucking and turned toward him. “You heard Soran. Until she has full control, she can’t use it in a fight.”
“I don’t see what the big deal is.”
“I’ve seen witches’ minds fragment when they practice chaotic magic, it’s too powerful to control.” Shara slouched the bag of berries against her hip for relief from the weight, causing several to tumble into the grass. “I’m not even sure what Jade is. In theory, she can draw power from Layol. I don’t know about you, but that would terrify me.”
Owen gulped before shrugging it off. Then he snatched another berry from the bush, snapping it in his mouth as he contemplated it.
“My bad,” was all he could muster, his chewing ceasing, as he watched both of them place their hands on their hips, glaring at him eating another berry.
His hand lifted slowly toward one peeking from the bush with a tempting crimson red hue, luring him to test his luck.
“Owen.” Alice slowly grouched.
“Oh, all right,” he whined, tossing his hand down at them before tending to the task at hand, ripping them off for the basket instead of his stomach.
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