A plan to rescue Hunk, and a few more complications.

"Hunny," Polly nods.

"Right, she took my man with her, and I'm not about to just let them go," Hilda's face turns serious. "Any idea where they would be?"

"There's another nest near the human village a few miles away from here," Greenie pipes in.

"That's where we used to live... before the humans drove us out," Snuggles says, a tinge of sadness in her voice.

"They didn't like us taking their crops and livestock," Polly adds.

"Not that we had a choice," Snuggles adds. "They cleared away most of our old hunting grounds to make way for their fields."

A twinge of shame came over Hilda. This whole area was under her protection, so those fields were technically part of her family's land. "Can you fly me there?" Hilda asked.

"Not until our wings grow back," Polly says. "After a successful mating and molting, we have to stay close to the nest and rely on our mate to bring back food and supplies while we tend to our eggs..."

"Speaking of which..." Greenie interrupts.

Hilda's eyes go wide for a moment as she reels at the implication.

Eggs! There are going to be eggs?! Ok, don't panic. We'll just put a pin in that for now, and come back to it later...

"L-Let me go find Hunny and get the baron and then we'll get this sorted out, ok?" Hilda says nervously as she starts to climb down from the nest. "We'll talk about it later!"

"You promise?" Snuggles asks, anxiety clearly in her tone as she watches Hilda rapidly climb down from the tree.

"Y-yeah," Hilda says, a blush on her face as she touches the ground. "I promise I'll come back and then we can work out all the details."

That seems to put the harpies at ease, at least for the moment, and soon Hilda is running back into the woods and towards what she is pretty sure is the right way, based off the harpies' description.

What have I gotten myself into?