She cupped good earth in her hand, feeling the coolness of its dappled touch as it sifted through her fingertips. She watched it flit away, sucked back down to the forest floor like sand to the pit of an hourglass. It piled on her boot toe in a miniature mountain, only to cascade over the sides in sprays of tiny earthen waterfalls. She closed her hand, focusing all thought on the bit of dirt that she held, feeling every facet of the grains within her palm. Suddenly, she paused. There was something strange there, intermixed with the soil. Something different. Something… artificial. Her palm reopened, the dirt squished between her fingerprints outlining them with new clarity. There in her palm, glinting silver in the moonlight, was something strange. Something artificial.
She plucked the string from her hand, holding it up to study under the glow of the firmament. It was slender, opaque – almost like fishing line. A smirk flashed across her features. It was discarded piece of a poacher's hunting net. The indication of a trail.
She glanced up at the sky, the grey of her eyes eerily mirroring the gray of the moon's gaze. Soft shades of dawn were awakening in the east, and morning would be breathing color back into the black and white forest soon. She had been following the poachers' trail since two nights before, and the emptiness of her stomach was a reminder that she should stop to rest soon. Her mind churned, knowing that a stop would mean letting the prey get a few hours ahead. The instincts of the hunt had been guiding her for two days now, and sensibility was hard to come by after being under their drug like intoxication. She chewed her lip, attempting to justify her futile needs over the loss of prey. Adjusting the dirk hanging at her side, she sat back on her haunches. Sighing at the string she still held, she cursed the limitations of her body, and retreated into the undergrowth.
She found a sheltered spot smelling of old trees and moist earth. She settled into its safety, hidden from view by a tree trunk against her back and a fern grove all around. A fern tickled her cheek with its leafy fingers, and she laughed while she pawed it away. Drawing her knees up to her chin, she sat within the cradle of the old tree's roots, breathing deep the smells of the forest - the kind that collected in her throat and swelled through her body. At times like this, she could spend a lifetime just smelling. Just breathing. The sun had begun to rise, penetrating the foliage roof above her in slender beams of light that splashed upon her body. She drank the sunlight as it dribbled down her chin, savoring the sweetness of the forest.
The shrill trill of a bird, followed by the sudden flurry of many wings and branches, woke her from her reverie. Her eyes followed the slender shapes as they floundered off their perches and flew, disgruntled, to find another resting place. She rocked down on all fours, crouching in the fern grove like an animal. Her muscles tensed, for she knew whatever had startled those birds away must be nearby. Sliding her dirk from its sheath, she wrapped her fingers about it with deliberate slowness, feeling every groove of its hilt. The crunch of tree branches to her left announced the arrival of her visitor – the same visitor that had scared the birds into sudden flight. Her need of a meal and rest completely forgotten, she clenched the dirk between her teeth and crept back on hands and knees, receding into her fern grove. The rustling in the undergrowth grew nearer, and she arched her back, ready to spring from the shadows like a cornered feline. A foot came into view, followed by another. They were clad in leather moccasins, and she watched as they crept by the entrance to her fern grove. The breath was hot between her teeth, and her heavy breathing sent clouds of ebony across the dirk blade that was clenched there. Her fingers gouged the ground, digging deeper in their anxious waiting. She could not strike – not yet. She must wait.