I wake to the wrong kind of quiet.
Grey light leaks under the ruin roof. Drip-rate is up. Rain passed while I slept, rinsed the air, slicked the composite, and left everything smelling freshly washed over something that will not wash out.
I taste anyway. Wet rot. Old blood thinned by water. Nothing fresh enough to belong to a living mouth. The iron is still there, faint and stubborn, worked into the damp like a stain ground into cloth.
Not the quiet of safety. The quiet after violence, when the sound is gone but the shape of it stays lodged in bone.
Heat sits heavy inside me. When I shift, pain answers. Along my wing edges, membrane stings where teeth found it, cuts tight and raw, pulling as if the skin still remembers being stretched apart. My flank aches where claws tried to climb, bruised deep under hide. Even breathing makes it bloom. Around my opercula my chest feels held, not sore, but firm, like something has set in place between muscle and air.
I draw in. Cool stream. Clean movement. Openings flare and close without catching.
That should have been reassurance.
It sharpens the other difference.
Something has changed.
I rise slowly. Test weight. My balance sits farther back than it should, and my tail sweeps wider on instinct to counter it. Wing-talons set on composite and rot, then lift. Rear feet follow, claws biting clean. Stabs unfold a fraction for steadiness, then tuck.
The clearing looks the same.
My body does not.
I lower my head and go by touch first. Then heat. Then sight.
Along my kurus, ridges sit beneath the sheath that were not there yesterday. Not swelling. Not injury. Plates. Rigid, segmented, laid in overlapping arcs.
Armor.
I flex one kuru. The plates slide with it instead of fighting it. No hitch. No drag. They are built to move.
I move my tails next.
The sweep carries farther than it did before. The last third feels heavier and flatter, profile changed just enough to catch air differently. The rest of the structure is still mine. No grotesque shift. A refinement.
Side to side, the resistance is different. The motion steadies instead of snapping back. Balance answers sooner. Control over flourish.
My wing limbs come after.
Along their outer edges, where claws grabbed and teeth scraped, chitinous plating rises in narrow bands. It follows the curve of wing bone and stops short of joints. Precise placement. It sits where flesh opened, where blood ran thin across membrane.
Mid-wing talons have reinforcement at the base. A collar around tendons, leaving the talon free.
Back leg talons match it.
Then my chest.
I lower my head until I can see the opercula clearly. Around each opening, a rigid ring has formed, smooth and slightly raised. Exposed margin narrowed. Airflow unchanged.
That is not all.
Above and between the openings, along the line where collarbones anchor my wings, layered plates have grown inward and down. They follow bone struts beneath muscle, forming a shallow breastwork that covers upper chest without turning into bulk. Angled overlaps meant to turn impact aside.
When I breathe, the structure moves with me.
Protection placed where last night tried to reach inside.
I stand still until the heat in my core settles into a steady burn instead of a rush.
Then I go to the streambed and drink.
Water cools my mouth. The tightness in my chest eases a fraction. I swallow and watch the surface. The water tastes clean until it passes over old residue, then the faint iron returns, diluted, like memory in current.
My reflection breaks in pieces, cut by foam and ripple.
I scan the clearing.
No other warm bodies. No heat-held lungs. No hidden pack. No intruder.
I leave the ruins to check the perimeter.
Low arc around the outer wall. Ruin geometry close. Jungle at my shoulder. Rain softened old scents and pressed new ones into soil.
Blood is still here, but only as a thin metallic ghost under wet leaf skin. A few run marks on bark. Pinpoints on leaves. Water broke the viperwolf blood apart, but it did not erase it.
I stop often, not from hesitation, but to hold breath and draw in slowly. Sorting air into layers. Tails shifting to keep weight centered on uneven ground.
Nothing answers.
The pack is gone, at least for now.
And that is not the same as ended.
North pulls at me anyway.
Finish what began. Remove it completely.
Then the other thought arrives. Cold. Correct.
I never confirmed how many escaped. I never confirmed whether last night's group was the whole pack or only the ones willing to commit first. If I go north and find more, they can draw me into advantage terrain. Dense undergrowth. Poor sight lines. Root lattices hiding drops and binds I have not learned.
I am not yet big enough to spend blood carelessly.
I turn away.
Back in the clearing, I drink again and test what grew.
Wing edge against rough composite. Not to hurt myself. To see what takes contact first.
Membrane still stings where it was cut, but the chitin plates take pressure before flesh. Force spreads. Seams do not reopen.
I press my upper chest against another rough edge. Opercula rings and layered plates meet the surface. Openings do not flare in alarm. Air stays clean.
Step back into shade. Out again. Jump. Pivot. Wings half spread. Hard stop. Mid-wing talons brace.
Nothing catches. Nothing locks. The plating does not slow me.
It simply makes me harder to damage.
That is the point.
I climb to the central rise and hold still long enough for wind to bring me the world.
West is closest. The hexapede herd is still there. Hoofbeats faint but steady, the rhythm of many bodies moving together. Browse. Pause. Move again. Unison.
North is quieter than it should be. Not safe. Just empty of immediate signal.
East carries cool minerals in thin threads, along with the low pressure of larger water. Not the service stream.
A river.
I choose the river.
Not because I am thirsty.
Because it will tell me what else lives here, before it reaches the ruins and bites.
I leave and move east through forest that stays thick even after rain. Canopy drips. Leaves spill water onto my back as I push through. Droplets cling to chitin and run along plates on my kurus.
After the better part of an hour the air cools and opens, and the sound arrives fully.
Water. Moving without interruption.
I stop before the last curtain of foliage. The air changes first. Mineral cold. Algae. A clean pull that dilutes everything else. My body lowers automatically. Rear eyes open.
Heat paints the bank.
The river is a long cool band, motion stealing warmth. Stones beneath read colder still. Fish appear as quick flickers in the shallows when they turn.
Across the way, warm shapes move low through vegetation.
Small. Not threatening.
I taste again.
No overpowering predator scent. No viperwolf line. No nearby heat mass that matches my size.
Only small warm bodies and the river's clean thread.
I step out.
The river is wider than the service stream. It speaks. Constant flow pressing against stone and root, carrying sound downstream. The water looks dark from runoff, but the edges are clear enough to show movement.
Clusters of anchored life cling to submerged rock.
Anemonoids.
Pastel crowns glowing faintly even in canopy shade. Tentacles swaying with current, like grass that learned to hunt. Beds of them line certain stretches, turning the edge into a field of quiet hazard.
I do not touch them.
I step into the shallows where the bottom is firm.
Shock hits first. Cold enough to steal heat quickly. Water climbs my legs, presses my chest, slides over the opercula rims.
Openings flare, then close.
Reflex.
For a few breaths I keep them high and tight. I angle my body so the waterline stays below them.
Boundary learned.
I step deeper anyway.
The river pushes against me. It catches the edges of folded wings and tries to pry them open. I tuck tighter. Stabs press down. Mid-wing talons dig into the riverbed.
Current pulls at my twintails.
Each fin catches water differently now. Flattened length answers flow in a way it would not have before. Swing both and the river shoves my rear sideways. Swing only one and the other holds, rotating me instead of drifting.
One corrects. One stabilizes.
I stop fighting the river with my legs and let my tails do the work.
Weight forward. Wings tight. Tails as rudder.
I guide myself through shallow current. Step less. Steer more. Motion smooths. The water still resists, but it stops surprising me.
Deeper, until the river lifts some of my weight.
For a heartbeat my feet barely touch.
I brace once, then let go.
The water holds me.
Legs paddle clumsy at first, pushing against nothing solid. Tails answer, slicing current, stabilizing my line. Stabs angle slightly and correct roll when the river tries to tip me.
I move a full body length without touching bottom.
The world expands.
I surface in the shallows and shake water from my crests. Droplets spray into leaf litter. The river keeps moving, indifferent.
Then I hunt.
Fish scatter when shadow crosses them. They bolt between stones and anemonoid beds, using glowing crowns as cover.
Low crouch. Rear eyes open again.
Warm flickers.
Fast.
Heat shows what lies beneath water, disrupted by current and stone, but enough.
I wait until one turns broadside near the surface, then strike with a wing-talon.
Slap.
Water breaks. Talon pins fish against stone. Jaws close a heartbeat later. One thrash, scales scraping my teeth. Gills flare bright, then the rhythm stutters and stops.
The taste is clean, sharp, brief. It does not sit heavy the way mammal meat does.
I eat another. Then another.
Pattern emerges. Where they hold in current. How they bolt. How they avoid the anemonoid beds unless forced.
Hunger dulls.
I stop.
Because something else is louder.
Movement on the bank.
Warm shapes drift closer along the opposite edge, heads low in vegetation.
Tapirus.
Compact bodies, low-slung. Broad feet sinking into soft bank soil without effort. Light brown hides with faint striping. Purple dorsal armor catching dim light. Cyan crests glowing subtly even under canopy shade.
Not large prey.
Steady prey.
And there is something else. I smell it before I see it clearly. Their opercula breathe into the air behind their heads, a soft warm leak that marks where to bite.
A weakness.
A weakness I recognize now that mine are armored.
I watch them longer than hunger demands.
They graze with slow certainty. Snouts working through soft vegetation. Neural whips flicking occasionally, touching leaves and water in brief contacts.
Early warning.
They do not expect a hunter here.
I do not rush the bank.
I cross first.
Waterline rises toward my chest and pushes harder. Opercula stay high and closed tight. Tails steer. Legs and stabs paddle. Wings tucked.
Halfway across, current tries to take me downstream.
One fin corrects. Then the other. Twin rudders carve through flow until my line straightens.
I reach the far bank and climb out slow, careful, silent.
Wet claws find purchase in mud. Water streams off plates and membrane edges.
I stop in foliage and open rear eyes.
Heat outlines tapirus through leaves. Bright cores. Slow breath. One younger body lingers closer to the edge, warmth less pronounced. Farther in, a cluster of smaller heat signatures presses tight together.
Too many to count cleanly.
I choose the one that lingers too far from cover.
The careless one.
I move.
Short burst, low to the ground, through wet plants that slap against my sides. It lifts its head when my shadow crosses it. Opercula flare in startled intake.
It tries to cry.
One breath of sound escapes before I hit.
Body weight and wing-talons pin it to soft bank. Mud gives under ribs. Legs kick short and frantic, spraying wet soil. My jaws close around the base of its neck, not the armored back. I bite into the soft line where blood sits close to the surface.
First pressure makes it shake. Second finds deeper.
Warmth floods my mouth, thick and immediate. The air changes.
The tapirus kicks, but my weight denies leverage. Distress rises again, louder, vibrating through its throat against my teeth.
That sound carries.
Not for long.
My bite tightens. The body jerks once, then slackens. Opercula flutter once, releasing a final warm leak into the air before stopping.
The rest scatter into foliage, crests flashing cyan as they vanish. Calls echo briefly, then fade into the river's constant noise.
I drag the body under cover and feed.
Meat is richer than fish. Heavier. Warmth spreads through my core and settles slower. Dorsal armor breaks under my teeth with a brittle crack, more discouragement than defense. Hide resists in elastic strips, then gives. The sound stays wet and close.
I crack a long bone and drink marrow.
Then I pause.
Different foods move through me differently.
Fish made my body feel quick and clean. Tapirus makes it feel dense. Anchored. As if structure is being built, not only fuel spent.
I lift my head and breathe, tasting the air, tasting myself.
What I take becomes what I keep.
I return to the river edge and drink again, rinsing blood from my mouth. Water runs pink for a moment, then clears. I step back into the shallows and swim once more, not to play, but to practice.
Less thrashing. More line.
I circle a submerged stone and return to the bank with purpose.
Daylight shifts under canopy. The forest begins to dim.
I head back toward the ruins.
Food and water sit in me as stored weight. Not burdensome.
Resource.
Halfway back, a scent stops me.
Even after rain, it cuts through leaf and rot. Venom carries its own sharp signature. It prickles the back of my throat before the body comes into view, chemical and clean.
Arachnoid.
Under a root shelf, carapace black with orange markings, twin stingers curled above segmented body. Bioluminescent lines along its abdomen pulse faintly in the dim.
I do not touch it with my kurus.
I do not let it strike.
Wing-talon pins it hard enough to keep stingers from cycling down. The body convulses, legs scissoring. I crush the head with my jaws before it can commit. Carapace gives with a sharp crack and wet collapse. Bitter fluid leaks out, sharp on my tongue, and the smell rides into my sinuses like a chemical burn.
Then I eat it.
Bitter. Mineral. Wrong.
Throat tightens once, then releases. Core warmth comes uneven, threaded with nausea that rises and fades.
I keep moving.
I find another, then another. Three total before the ruins come back into scent range. Each tastes wrong in a slightly different way, as if venom carries small variations meant to confuse a body.
By the time I return to the clearing, my stomach is unsettled, but not threatened. No paralysis. No limb weakness. No sudden change in sight.
I settle under the collapsed wall and breathe slowly until the queasiness thins.
Then the morning returns to me.
The plates did not appear the moment I ate the viperwolves.
They appeared after time passed.
After rest.
My body worked in silence, and then it showed the work.
The arachnoid will not announce itself immediately, if it announces itself at all.
I rise and practice gliding in the clearing.
A run from one edge to the other, wings opening just enough to catch air. Finned members separate in sequence and hold pressure. Stabs correct the slight roll that used to threaten a fall.
My body lifts longer now. The glide stretches. Landing stays controlled, tails correcting the last drift before my feet touch.
Stronger.
I stop when heat in my chest rises and opercula flare wide with exertion. Rings hold steady. Openings do not feel fragile.
Protection without loss.
I drink again, then settle.
Night comes slow under canopy. Darkness gathers in layers. Fungus along ruin ribs glows faintly. The stream keeps talking.
I do not feel the pull of a dream tonight.
The network warned me once.
Now it is quiet.
That quiet does not feel like abandonment.
It feels like space being given.
I sleep in shallow layers.
Come morning, I head west.
Hexapedes are the nearest reliable mass. If I only grow on fish and small bodies, wings will not reach what they can. Armor along the chest and tails answers weight and force, not scarcity. I need consistent weight. Consistent structure.
I leave the ruins before the day fully warms and push west, deeper than I have gone before.
The forest opens into pockets of softer ground where grazing pressed paths into soil. Herd scent thickens until it becomes presence, grass-musk and warm animal oil ground into routes. Hoofbeats multiply. Heat flickers through vegetation when I open rear eyes.
Not a handful.
A system.
When trunks thin enough to see, the herd spreads wider than the basin I first hunted.
At least a hundred. Possibly more. Dozens of young bodies clustered near the center, smaller heat tight to adult mass. Adults ring them loosely, heads lifting in rhythm, fans flaring and settling.
Sustainable.
If I do not break it.
I stand in shadow and watch longer than hunger demands.
If I take them too often, they will migrate. Emptying them means emptying me.
Once every two days.
Diversify the rest.
Grow fast.
Grow clean.
Do not burn the ground that feeds you.
For a moment, something moves across the edge of awareness.
Not a voice.
Not a command.
A thin layer of pressure, like the network itself, acknowledging alignment.
The aerial predator I am meant to become will not be built only by eating.
It will be built by learning how to take without wasting what remains.
I stay still as the herd grazes, as the west becomes a map I intend to own.