Still Air
He is a hunter.
The forest holds still. Raindrops, remnants of yesterday, coalesce on the surface of the tree leaves. But they do not fall. The leaves merely dip under the weight, and reach for the ground so far below.
A chill hangs in the air. It bites at the trees, and they shake in time to the pulses. Back and forth. Back and forth.
The grass below is damp with the rain that broke through the canopy. Flowers greedily cling to the taller stalks, and let the droplets slide into their waiting folds. Hues of pink and gold race out in every direction, fields that sways with every spare gust of wind.
Creatures, too, dart among the foliage; small and insignificant, they scurry to the safety of the grass. A few of the larger beetles in the area search for weaker food, and the smaller insects respond in a rhythmic wave of hide and seek.
But all is quiet. Even in the heat of their chase, the insects remain soundless. They do not break the stillness that engulfs the vines and the worms, that chokes back the birds and grounds the harpies further up. They primitively sense the silence and give quiet pursuit through the pink-and-gold flowers, unaware when the hues become splotched with slashes of red.
---- & ----
Ediya twisted in a frantic motion, and bolted left. The flowers swerved along her tail as she slithered, the hues a blur at her frantic pace. She had to get away.
She slithered and crawled for what felt like hours before she finally had to stop and double over in a fit of coughing. Once finished, she straightened up and took a wary look around the forest to see how far she had fled.
The trees towered over her with that comforting, indomitable solidness, and she recognized the shape of the flowers, with pedals pointed out in four directions. For a moment she thought that she had made it back home. But then she noticed the color was off; purple, not pink, with a shimmering quality in the light. Brimmstalk.
She cringed a little, and drew in on herself. If Brimmstalk was blooming here, then she had gone further than she intended. Much further. Which, she thought, as she looked over her tail, may be for the best.
Her tail, once a mass of shining green and yellow, was littered with small gashes and cuts. None of them were worryingly deep, but she'd lost a lot of blood in the last few hours, and her tail was streaked in red and burgundy. Her human body, too, was marked with gashes, though those weren't as bad; she'd had the height advantage there.
Nevertheless, she slumped her body against a tree and closed her eyes. She had to have gotten far enough away. She could just rest a little, and then figure out how to safely backtrack home. Back to her friends...
---- & ----
She didn't know how long she was asleep, or what exactly woke her. But Ediya could feel the silence in the air, that pressure that had become so frighteningly familiar. To others, it might seem that all was well. Nothing stirred in the trees, or darted through the undergrowth.
But she knew better. She could sense the directional force of that silence; feel it bearing down on her specifically. She quickly stretched herself out and slithered away from the tree, keeping low to the ground as she searched for the source. She couldn't just bolt out, as she had last time. That had cost her.
A few minutes passed without change. She warily circled the tree several times, and the anticipation was making her more and more nervous. Where was it? Where was it coming from? Or maybe her nerves had simply become too frayed. Had she imagined the whole thing?
I suppose I could have, she thought wryly. But she didn't believe it for a second. It was here, whatever it was. If only she could -
Snap.
She jerked up with a sudden flare of panic. Turning on the spot, she swiveled her head back and forth until she could lock on to where the sound had come from. Something - or someone - was with her. Her eyes found a small copse, and she warily focused on it. The shadows of the trees made it hard to clearly see, but she thought...
Snap.
The sound came again as the something, whatever it was, took a step closer. The feeling of silence, of waiting, intensified, and she slowly drew herself up, reared back and ready for whatever might happen. Ediya was a small naga; but for such nagas she was large, with a good twelve feet from the tip of her tail to the crest of her head. She had intimidated larger predators before, and even preyed on them once or twice. She could handle this.
Her eyes narrowed when she heard another step, and then the outline of what she thought was a human appeared within the copse. Blackness clothed the human's features, but judging by the firmness of his build and his posture she thought he was male. He was also dragging something behind him, but she couldn't tell what.
She slowly hissed, a warning for him to stay away. The slashes and cuts on her tail flared to life, as if invigorated by the sight of the man. But she didn't feel them at all. Her attention was focused solely on the human in the shadows.
He took another step forward, and the shadows over him lifted enough that she could see him more clearly. Her eyes grew wide, and she felt herself jerk as if she had awoken from a lucid dream. All thoughts of fighting left her body, and in a flash she twisted away and slithered back through the flowers.
She couldn't try to hide. Hiding would be useless. She could only flee, and hope she was fast enough.
She swerved around every tree, hoping to keep herself out of his sight. She needed to get back home. Back to the tree that was safe, to the tree that was familiar. Maybe she could make a stand there, if he still pursued her.
But she came to a sudden halt after dashing to the side of a large branch. There he was. She hadn't noticed the silence descend upon the forest, but once she stopped fleeing, she realized that all sound had vanished around them.
They were alone. Just she and he, and what he had dragged along.
She twisted about in a panic, and wobbled a little before she found a good path. It was to the left, and closer to her. She was a naga; she should be able to make it.
Before she could move, something heavy and quick slammed into her side. She flew through the air and crashed into another tree, her cry of surprise and pain breaking the stillness around them. She trembled as she lifted herself up off the ground, and then cringed back when she saw him coming closer. He was walking leisurely, as if he had all the time in the world. And she still couldn't see him clearly, despite the sunlight almost directly above.
The sight of him terrified her like nothing ever had. She clawed at the ground to upright herself, and pushed herself back as quickly as she could. She needed to leave! Her cuts and scrapes flared, and every instinct screamed at her to run.
She straightened up and madly dashed around the tree. She was a naga, a snake, a reptile of speed and strength. She had to be faster! She had to be.
---- & ----
Nothing in the forest makes a sound. Sparse drops of water fall from the leaves above, but even their impact with the ground is obediently silent. The insects barely chance to move along the grass, and even the wind seems defeated.
Some time later the pressure fades, and the forest life begins to breath again. The grass flows, and the trees seem to sigh with their relief. The insects come up from the ground and clatter noiselessly upon the open soil or between the stalks of grass in search of food once more.
A few manage to find their perch atop the mound of red and green and yellow. They wander up and down the contours, poke at the scales, and try to find what sustenance they can. A few braver insects crawl further up, where the feeling of oppression still lingers. They pick at the hands that lay flat on the ground, or along the arms, the shoulders, the stomach.
The wind picks up with a slight howl and blows strands of dark-brown hair along the undergrowth. A beetle slowly crawls up the side of the head in pursuit of the smaller insects. It clacks across the cheeks, the nose, the eyes that stare upward but cannot see. It dives down towards the chest, and splashes through red along the way.
Ediya lies unmoving. Some baser insects have already begun to feast, but those with more awareness do not dare to touch the body. The unnatural stillness has departed, but the forest holds its breath. Everything is quiet, and still, and waits.
Because he is a hunter.