He scanned the room in an orderly manner, starting in the far right corner (from his perspective at least), then panning left, then repeating at incrementally closer margins. His eyes were not his strong suit, and the room was too full of chatter for his ears to really make anything intelligible out of the speech, but his nose was his hidden-asset in this enterprise.
Many people don't rightly appreciate how sensitive a bear's nose is, compared to say, a dog's. It's better. Much much better. In the wild, they have very large 'home territories', as it requires such to sustain a creature of that size, and metabolic need. This means that in order to say, find a mate, they need to be able to keep tabs on each other with many MILES of distance between them. Moreover, being opportunistic scavengers in addition to hunters, the detection of a fresh corpse, likewise. Cedar could detect the slight difference in intensity of an odor from one nostril to the other, in much the way humans can with hearing, to get distance and range of a sound's source. He could do that too, but he could also do it with his nose. He had just learned a long time ago, that it was "In-discrete" to talk about the many many things people unknowingly communicated to the world when it came to that subject; Everything from where people had been that day from the smells they had picked up in the environment, to who they had been seeing or spending time with, to what they had been doing that day, even what they had eaten for lunch or dinner. That degree of intimate knowledge was "unsettling" and 'worrying' to humans, once they learned he could do that, and he had since learned from a young age that it was "very much not a good idea" to bring it up in polite conversation.
In addition to the 'where', there was also the 'what.' People emit a wide assortment of smells that they are unaware they are emitting. Smells that indicate who is married to who, -- or is sleeping with who-- smells that indicate shock-- smells that indicate mirth-- smells that indicate fear-- confusion, doubt, anger, ... ... arousal..
His nose flared at the unwelcome reek of Caitlyn Stritzel.
He had been discretely 'scanning' the entire party's guest list from where he sat at the table, doing his best to filter out useful tidbits about the party goers despite the pungent odors of the food trying to blanket out the usefulness of that sensory apparatus, when he spotted a boy who's scent jarred a sense of familiarity. He was sure he had smelled....
His unconscious bloomed in a slow-motion spray of the now posthumous Baron von Kruber, as he became a rather fine mist of bloody particles and a deformed corpse after Jazdia's arrow had hit him. The smell of the man had been overwhelming. Why did they smell like him?
Then he remembered the tedious 'breakfast conversation' he had been forced to endure while being tortured with food he did not dare eat any of-- The fox-man Kaito had mentioned something about his having sons.. He must be one of them.
He discretely sucked more air in. There was a 2nd that smelled like the dead fat-man; a girl next to a woman, with both of them surrounded by a small group of well dressed men. He turned his head ever so slightly back and forth, scanning the three of them, noting the differences and similarities. The young girl had to be a previously undisclosed sister. He didn't understand why it was humans seemed to only ever mention sons and not daughters when discussing family affairs, as girls were every bit as important as boys-- in many ways more so, at least in his opinion-- but he chalked up the omission as just another of those absurd human foibles. The woman had to be the mother, as she smelled like both of the others.
He was sure Kaito had mentioned that there were TWO sons.. He wondered which one this was, and why the second was not here...
His attention became absorbed on them-- people that they had stolen their father from. Stolen a mate from. His heart sank, even if the fat-man had been deeply involved in the abduction and illegal incarceration of the prince. These people HAD NOT been at the keep that day, and there was a distinct chance they had nothing whatsoever to do with the goings on there. They could well just be victims, caught in the crossfire, like all the other poor people of Fanghorn that day. He wished he could stop thinking about what happened there.
He looked at the boy's face, and saw that it was dark and sullen. He knew that look; He and his brother had that look often as children when people had been mean to them. It had always been his father that had taken him up in his arms, kissed and hugged him, and told him things would be better one day. It had worked for him, even if it had not worked for his brother...
That insufferable impulse to rush to every sad and weepy child he came across gripped his chest, and he flinched for a moment before he could arrest it. Solomon would have certainly noticed, but he didn't care. He was overcome with an urge to find out the degree of involvement the family had with the goings-on at the keep that day.
There was another table loaded with drinks nearby-- From where he was, he could tell it had various fruit juices out on it-- He might be able to get in earshot discretely if he perused the selection and lingered.
He looked up, and saw the girl continuing her slow approach.
Yes, it was much better than having to deal with another deranged human who was too interested in him, rather than simply refusing to see him like he had come to expect as being 'normal.'
"uh'll leave ya tuhs it 'en. Gunna git 'nodder drink." he said nonchalantly, as he stood and began his leisurely walk to the far drink table.
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