She is not supposed to be here.
No one is supposed to be here, not this far away from the forest. I have seen more of the metal skycrafts in the past two seasons than I ever have before, except they have never bothered me until now. Whether she is from one ofthem or is part of the reason they are here, I want to know. I must find out if my territory is at risk.
I look over my shoulder toward the tunnel leading upward out of my nest, where the closest entrance to the surface world lies. Without my help, she is too small to safely climb out of here. If she wakes while I am gone, she will not be able to escape.
She cannot be allowed to escape.A dark rumble brews in my stomach, building into a hiss. Unless I discover why she is here and where she came from, she will never be allowed to leave. I did not build my nest near the others of my kind for a reason.
To those in the forest, I am a monster. One of them except not quite right, something that has never been fully placed—something wrong. They think I am dead, as all the others like me are. I would prefer to keep it that way, lest they come after me and disrupt everything I have built. This is my home, my territory, and so is everything within it. I will defend what is mine to the bitter death.
If she is an ally of the forest, then she is my enemy. And if that is true… though I will not kill her, I cannot let her go either.
Taking hold of the rope tied to her belt and unraveling it, I coil it around her hands and re-tie it, trapping her within her own restraints. As I do, my gaze tracks back to her hair, and I pause.
I have not seen hair like hers in more seasons than I can remember. Long and black, it is supple around her neck and shoulders, piled underneath her. As soft as cool water running across my scales on a hot day, it slips through my fingers and continues to fall.
Excusing my desire to touch as born of the necessity tolearn about my enemies, I lift her hair to my lips, luxuriating in the sensation of it against my skin.
I jerk with a hiss, dropping the strands, coughing, alarmed by the scent in my nose. The crisp, sharp citrus aroma is not one I am used to. I’ve never smelled anything so unpleasant, and I straighten away from her, rubbing my nose.
It does not help. Now smelling it everywhere, I turn away with a grunt of displeasure, but refuse to be driven from my own nest by something so small.
It is a good thing my sense of smell is not as strong as my other senses. An advantage my smaller brethren have over me.
Holding my breath, I pick up the human, then carry her over the edge of the pool and drop her into the water. When she fails to wake and sinks instead, I pull her back out and sniff her hair. I flinch, but finding the smell lessened in its citric sharpness, I dip her under once more before bringing her back to the old hide.
Unfortunately, there is nothing nearby to tie her bonds to. Climbing above, I return shortly with a large cement block and tie her rope through the hole in the middle. Making sure her hands are tightly against it, I draw back.
With her resting partially over the block, her arms hugging it because of how she is bound, her cheek pressed against it, she continues to breathe lightly.
After tapping her shoulder and trying to rouse her one last time, I snag the hide with my tail and bring it to my hands, then fan it out and place it around her shoulders. It gets cold down here, especially at night, and I do not know when I will be able to return.
I have failed to hunt for something to eat today—having come across her instead—and my stomach growls as I headfor the upward tunnel. Glancing back, I take in her slumbering expression and the black around her eyes.
If she is not awake by the time I return, then I will have to figure out what else to do about her.
I do not know how to take care of a human…My tail coils around me, my misgivings growing. Tearing my eyes off her, I head up the tunnel path and out into the city before I make a choice I might later regret.
At least the space will give me time for my nose to clear of her scent. Pushing the human from my thoughts, I focus on the hunt ahead.
FIVE
LEAVING NOTHING UNANSWERED
Darolus
She does not rousewhile I am gone, and I am gone for the entirety of the night, searching the rest of the subterranean tunnels around where I discovered her and the world above too. It was not what I wanted to do, or what I needed to do, which was to hunt, but I could not shake the feeling that I had to know more about her as soon as possible.
Shifting the hide off her, I untie her hands and lay her out, checking to make sure she is still breathing and warm. Her skin, now clear of dust and dirt, seems paler than before, but otherwise she looks the same. Spreading the hide out with my tail along the floor, I move her body onto it.
My initial search turned up no new information about her, only a small plastic light source on the tracks—one with batteries in it that had not degraded, still powered on. I turned it off, and left it, preferring to keep the old tech outof my nest. Afterward, I noticed two knives on the ground, too small for me to use, and determined the weapons had to be hers. Unlike the flashlight, I picked them up and sniffed them for blood. Finding them clean of it, I took them with me as I headed up the nearby exit to continue looking around. It was clear by that point that she must have come from above ground.
I know this crumbling city like the scales on my tail. It did not take me long to find her skycraft.
I did not approach it, nor did its presence answer all my questions, though it did answer one of them: she did not merely venture into the middle ofRickton Cityon her own. She came with a machine, and possibly with others. Others who may want her back.
I am not one to start a fight when there are stealthier options. I prefer to avoid violence. Violence is messy, and I have had more than enough of it in my long lifetime.
I may be the biggest of all naga, larger even than those of the Anaconda, Boa, or Cobra clans, but I have refined my ability to remain discreet nevertheless. Because I am also the only one of my kind, like all of those that were deemed ‘monsters.’ There is no other like me. And I am feared for that. Feared for my differences, feared for my size, feared for how hard it is to kill me.
