Willfur
Standing beneath an enormous sugar pine with one hind leg resting on its tip-toe, staring up into the tree's crosshatched branches is the almost-as-impressively sturdy, clay colored mule. He's stopped just inside the first line of trees, initially musing about how flowery narratives always describe forests as 'slowly closing in on you,' while many, like this one, do no such thing. There's no gradual transition from grassland to timber here. For whatever reason, maybe decreasing soil fertility, maybe desiccation from the Eluetherian winds, the trees had decided that this bit of earth was habitable and that one, even a few inches farther, was not.
Among primordial giants like these, who is he to second guess?
"Well! He calls up to the softwood. "You're impressive, aren't you!" Truthfully, he's grateful for the shade, having spent the better part of the morning
But you only live once, right? Why not enjoy it?
"The air must be very clean here, for you to grow so prodigiously. And if you're here-" Slowly circling the sugar pine's massive trunk, he scans the nearby underbrush, eyes and ears swiveling for a moment before exclaiming, "Ah!" Wedged between two more conifers is a tangle of bushes with plump maroon berries weighing the ends of their vines down. Some of the fruits are so dark they look almost purple, deeply ripe and unquestionably sweet.
