"Very familiar," she confirms, smiling first at the woman and then at the trees around them. "There is a lot of game here - rabbits and pheasants and deer. The fish in the water is good, too."

Not a lot of people dare to hunt this deep in the woods, but it happens. The forest, she thinks, will not mind this woman as much as it might mind a man. It is no time of starvation, that she is aware of; more people enter the forest out of desperation, then. But it is dangerous no matter the time of year, just like the mountains and the sea.

"Do you seek something in particular? Enough food for you, or for a family?"