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She does not arrive by chance.
(“Sylva,” They had whispered. “Sylva,” They had whimpered. “Sylva,” They had crooned.)
So she follows, a mere wisp of a shadow to Their peripherals. One spring from the darkness and Their blood would spill into her jaws, Their muscles would feed the ache in her belly, Their strangled screams would sadate the inner cravings of her mind. But she pushes those thoughts aside to follow Them and Their whispers (“Sylva”) until They come to a stop in a dense forest.
She feels at home, weaving between the thick branches and under the tangled brambles in order to circle Their unsuspecting, warm bodies. There’s a scent at Their feet, so thickly-placed she barely withholds an annoyed chitter to rise from the back of her throat. They have successfully aided her, but there is no more reason for Them to exist except for within her own belly. So she remains quiet, a slinking shadow so close to Their warmth that her movements might feel like a breeze upon Their skin.
They speak among Themselves, slippery words she is beginning to understand but still unable to replicate (alone, she might try — words such as “Hi” and “Nexu” and “Sylva” though the latter is the most difficult to reproduce). Her armored head turns slightly — slowly, so as to be imperceptible — to catch Their sliding words.
“This is it. I bet someone will show up shortly, I heard there’s always some psychopath or another on the border.”
It is speaking to another, smaller Prey beside it. She can understand that much. But Their words are useless and empty, in hindsight, because it is just as the other opens its mouth when a trill leaves her throat (sounding like a bird’s twitter in the bush nearby to Them but sounding like “Time to feed” to her own ears) and she springs.
The larger Prey goes down first — her intended target with its thicker meat — before she easily catches the smaller with her blood-stained jaws. She feasts before doing anything further with these woods (“Sylva, Sylva, Sylva”) and her inky, armored body is splattered with varying shades of blood red by the time she’s finished.
Delicious.
She leaves an intentional disaster behind her when she slips into the shadows once more (half-chewed entrails and puddles of dark blood and an entire left hindquarter from the smaller Prey). Before she gets too deep into the thicket, her leggy body pivots to hide among the familiarity of the shadows, waiting in complete silence for some unsuspecting Prey to walk into her trap.
@[Modicum Mortem] + whoever wants to meet her. she won't kill or hurt anyone who joins this thread because she just fed on purpose