She's not terribly quiet, walking through the night woods.  Then, neither was he.  The soft, alarmed calls of birds and then sudden silence are telling.  The small ones know when a predator walks among them, even if she chooses to wear the body of a horse.  Something in her eyes makes his skin twitch, a little shiver.  It's like being watched by an old lion.  A lion whose bones ache, who knows that death will come for him soon.  A lion who can no longer hunt, but still looks at you as though you are prey.

Then she speaks, and the smile is almost enough to hide the hunter in her eyes.  Her voice doesn't seem to quite match the warmth of her expression.  He shakes his head, thick mane flipping back and forth over the short arch of his neck, bones rattling.  Imani studies her, first from one eye, then from the other.  Yellow as the moon, then blue as summer sky.  His expression is easy, his body held relaxed.

He does not think she is a spirit.  She seems too solid and has not yet offered him harm.  Spirits are tricky, but they are also not terribly hard to see through, when you know what to look for.  So he smiles, genuinely pleased to have been greeted.  She does not fear him that is clear, and why should she?  Despite whatever memories seem to cling to this forest it is far from Dorobo.  Perhaps another has passed through here- many scattered, after all.  That does not mean they are still here, or that he will meet them.  Better, he thinks sometimes, that he does not.

"Hello, my name is Imani."  Each word is careful chosen and enunciated, but no amount of care disguises his heavy accent.  Clearly this common language is not his native tongue.  Still, he is fluent.  He has had time to practice.  "May I ask what manner of creature you are?"

The question is polite.  His curiosity is clear.  The scales are what prompt him to ask, eager to learn about the place to which he has arrived.  Perhaps in this land there are many like her.  Even if not, she is something he has not encountered.  That alone is enough to make him eager to understand her nature.

And yet he is aware of something in her eyes.  He does not approach her more closely.  Though he is powerfully built for his size, her height exceeds his and her frame is not exactly delicate.  She is different though.  There is something, abstractly, very lovely and strange about the slickness of her coat and the drape of her mane and feathers.

OOC:// @Syrena Let me know if any of this is crossing any lines.  Imani is supposed to be observant but I don't want to cross into metagaming!
"Talk."

Imani