A dream(or a nightmare) —

        Something whispers home. He catches it first in the corner of his eye: a flash of white, an opal lost, as if discarded amongst the trees. And the first response is fear. And it's a memory — the sound of jackals laughing in the night. His own feet, running... He is there again and he is in the trees. He is home, he is — scouting. Something bites his ear. The ear twitches; the knot of blue and grey scales living in his mane retreats. The whisper of her body against his is a soft hiss, and it says now. Now Caneo stands beside the road between Helovia and Nothing, a creature of knives and bright laughter, a creature more hunter than prey. Fear bleeds from him like dirty water and he breathes again. The snake, the hunger haunting his head, curls and coils and points her blunted snout at something on the road, something coming rather than going. She smells heat and sand on his hide; Caneo sees sunlight and distance in his blood, an impossible resemblance.

        Caneo has yet to meet anyone more sapling-built than he here in Helovia. But compared now to the pale beast he moves toward, he's almost strong(dirty-blooded, fouled). The way he moves, he appears from the trees at the stranger's back, and when he gets noticed - he doesn't quite care. The stranger's awareness speaks only to its abilities; not to his. Still his gait is long and smooth, his every footfall soft. And the hunger in his eyes - it never goes away. It appraises. And he's sickened, though he doesn't show it, by the almost familial resemblance he sees.

        (they are not cousins. cannot be.)

        "You're lost," he says — a question and not. You don't belong here, he says without saying it. Still his voice is the same old song it always is, bright and pleasant, as if he just appeared — as if he haunts this forest as a helpful spirit and not a hungry one. It doesn't matter what he feels about the past or if he's recognized as kin and kind - he isn't. He tilts his head and his tail twists at his haunches and he's waiting, judging, wondering. Some half-forgotten sense of duty brought him to the woods and it's what pilots him now, though a very desperate part (the child refusing to die) demands flight. "Can I help you?"

More subtle than her silver heart, the snake upon his crown slides her head up under the delicate curve of his ear. She watches. Her eyes are black.