[The Hedge]

He scowls at the rocky spire.

The spire is a rock.

His scowl deepens.

The spire continues to be an inanimate object.

He leans forward, really giving it the stink-eye.

The spire continues its insentient ignoring of the young man's ire.

With a huff he turns and starts off down the path, shoving some briers out of the way with his bat. As soon as he back is turned, the massive granite troll blows a raspberry at him before vanishing under the churning foam of the river. What a cheeky giant that one is. The low rumble of its migration to a new position is quite well covered up by the roar of the river.

Now doing his best to stop thinking about the rock that he was trying to use as a navigational aid, the young man strikes a path toward what he thinks is the direction of his home.

And runs face-first into a low-hanging spider web strung between two trees.

The result is more or less what one might expect.

Lots of flailing and sputtering.

And of course, "Oi! Watch where you're goin' you big lunk!" hollers an indignant little spider grig.

The young man does his best to ignore the grumbling of tiny arthropod people. "What do you mean, pop up in the wrong place?" he asks. "This place looks like a weird reflection of the area around my home. I couldn't get that far away, could I?"

He's already dreading the answer.