The needle moves gracefully; Atrox, any

[atrox]

hangman hooded, softly swinging; don't close the coffin yet, I'm alive

Atrox watches with little expression across his face, with no great surprise or recognition. He has never seen the stallion, after all, and he has no desire to get to know him—to dig deeper than the truth. At his first statement, there is the briefest show of humor across his face, flickering on the edges of his mouth—after all, he would share exactly whatever information he wanted and in exactly the right amount—but he doesn’t say that. He neither denies it or affirms it, just flicks his tail against his scarred haunches.

When the other attempts to provoke him with the mention of a dead woman, he shrugs. He has no great care if there is some half-dead woman waking up in a cave somewhere. He has yet to smell the stench of death which means she must not be rotting, and if she wasn’t making his home smell horrendous, then he had no great care for who lived their life in the quit crannies on the edge of his home.

“I have no idea who you are so I’ve anticipated nothing,” he says with a cold smile. “I didn’t take over leadership for her—I took it from her. We didn’t exactly speak.” There’s no great malice in it because he truly didn’t care about whoever Kensa was. He barely knew the name as the supposed leader before he took Hyaline, let alone whatever plans she had for the leaders within the place.

He shrugs again. “Feel free to check on your dead plaything. I just ask you remove the carcass if you find one. I can’t stand the smell of a wasted meal.” His teeth flash slightly, a sudden white against the black of his lips, and then nothing, his yellow eyes waiting to see if there was more that needed to be said.

ATROX | THE PANTHER KING