Cyd had taken point on the march out of Lockhaven, without having been told to do so.  It was his first time back in a patrol in several seasons- to a certain extent, he had gotten used to doing some independent work.  Someone had to patrol the big, empty spaces in the Territories, looking for trouble, and Cyd had been good at that sort of thing.  Plenty of farmsteads to check with, or travelers who got in a little over their heads.  Or just updating surveys.  There's a lot of things to do, and not enough mice in the guard to get them all done with patrols.  It suited Cyd, and seemed to promise his way to a patrol leader's spot soon- after all, if he can do these things alone, how much more could he do with a team?<br/><br/>And that's why he was surprised to get a letter from Lucien over the winter, rather than Gwendolyn, telling him that Lucien had selected him for his patrol, rather than telling him Gwendolen needed him to form a patrol.  For quite a while, it felt like a demotion, like he needed to be supervised.  Like something Julian would do to him.  He'd had the past few weeks to wonder about this, and figure out what to do about it.  He'd even tracked down Francine, to see if he should just turn in his cloak.  She'd pointed out- as had Hans, in his own way- that this might be his road to promotion.  He could show that he could work with a team, support its leader, and work his way to promotion that way.  In fact, independent work was something of a dead end.<br/><br/>That had made sense back in Lockhaven, but a couple days on the road, under command again, and it had chafed him a bit.  He stayed ahead of the patrol, clearing the path, and really only coming back when he needed to point something out to the patrol- a downed branch on the path, a washout by a stream, or a predator off in the distance.  Minor stuff, but he needed the time to adjust, even if it did make him seem aloof and distant to the rest of the patrol.  It wasn't really his problem.  It wasn't that he didn't respond to questions or pitch in and work hard when the time came to make camp.  He just did his own thing most of the time.<br/><br/>One of those things involved taking a small book and writing set out of his pack on longer stops.  Cyd always made a few notes in it, scratching away at the page before setting it back in his pack.  When they stopped for the day, Cyd spent more time fiddling with the book, usually after dinner.  A few days into their march, George made his way over in the early evening, as the light was fading.<br/><br/>"I couldn't help but notice, you write in that book a fair bit," George opened.  Cyd nodded for him to continue. "I suppose I was rather curious- I don't know that anyone else is keeping any sort of notes like that on the road."<br/><br/>Cyd gave a little shrug, then answered, "Well, I keep track of the weather through the day- the wind, the clouds, any precipitation, what I can tell about the temperature.  Weather's pretty important when you're out in it, like I'm sure you know.  There are some mice around who like to use these observations to help figure out if there are any patterns or something like that, to help predict the weather."  He flipped open a page, where Cyd had been trying his hand at it- making notes about the weather, then his predictions about the next day.  They were hardly perfect, but close enough several times.<br/><br/>Later, as they were preparing to leave Dorigift, Cyd said that he was going out of town a ways to look at the sky and check the wind, then paused.  "Anyone feel like coming with me?"  It was the first time he'd invited anyone to come along with him on his excursions.<br/><br/>