The words of the maiden dangle in the air, poised like a worm wriggling on a hook, waiting for a big, fat, juicy fish to take a bite, and pierce itself upon the hidden sharpness. But these brothers were too wily to be hooked, to cunning and wise to know a baited trap when they saw one - or in this case, heard one. They kept walking, their dark masses intertwining with the tall timbers that surrounded the enclosure, circling the mare like they had when they first came across her, letting her spill drips and drabs about herself, letting her perform for them, a jester bowing to her kings' whims.

She had done exactly as they had planned her to do, revealed something of herself, information that she surely would not allow everyone to be privy to. However, her answer was not all that they desired either. She described her past, her crimes, what she saw herself as in these lands. She declared herself a magician, a wizard capable of dark and poisonous things, and then she wrote them all off to mean nothing, as she paraded about, her voice reaching a shrill octave and her words becoming sharp with the tenacity of sarcasm.

Still, the brothers walked around her, the true panthers to this game, circling their little blue mouse.

Their intentions were still unknown, still undeclared. Did they hope to befriend the maiden? Help her? Harm her? Or were they simply gathering information? Were they simply there to stir chaos, paranoia, to show their prowess in the simple way that they conquered, survived, ruled the lives which they lived?

"Wrong." Madyrn deep, gravelly voice jeered from somewhere at her left, his dark frame lumbering into her view soon after he spoke, as he continued circling her.

"Such a shame." Maskan added, his voice more refined than his brothers, though still fathomless, deep, otherworldly in its existence. "I think the most honest thing you might have said amongst all that useless blabber..."

"..is baby heart."

They thought her to be a fragile, broken little thing. With the allusions to her past that she hinted to, it was easy to draw this conclusion, this assumption that everything she tried to exude was all an act, a parade meant to distract them from what she truly was. Maskan passed in front of her now, his crown bowing into the beam of light that broke through the dark canopy, so that his sharp, piercing eyes might penetrate hers better. It was as if his predator's gaze was trying to lull her in, hypnotise her, look directly into the foundations that made up her very soul.

"Poor little mare." He spoke, his tone openly portraying a mixture thick with pity, disappointment.

"Doesn't even know what she is." Madyrn added from somewhere behind her again. Still, they walked, glimpses of white, haphazard blazes dancing amidst the trees, hints of crimson legs prancing like flames through the under brush, eyes of predators never leaving the roan hide of the mare.

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