"We're being hunted."
Those were the next words that Deathbringer spoke, nearly an hour after leaving the site of Tarsier's death. It wasn't comforting, but nor was it surprising. Ever since they'd gone one dragon down, Glory had felt as though there had been another pair of eyes, watching them carefully. She never saw anything, but she was paranoid, and she didn't like it one bit.
"Where?" she asked bluntly, "Have you seen it?"
Deathbringer shook his head. "No, but it's out there. I can tell. I can feel it."
Glory wasn't sure whether or not she should feel relieved by that. "So, you don't know for sure?"
"I'm an assassin," he answered, "I know what it's like to hunt, to be hunted. We are seeking it, yes, but our quarry has prey of its own."
"Do we form up?" she asked him, "If it's here, we stand a better chance not stretched thin. I don't want us to get picked off like Tarsier."
Deathbringer paused and looked at her, the whole line of dragons stopping as well. Behind her and Mastermind was Preykiller, who snorted in annoyance at the halt. Behind her, Lemur looked on in confusion over her shoulder, while Caiman glanced back from up front.
The Nightwing looked her over for a second, then took a deep breath. "Glory, I think you need to go back now."
"What?" she frowned.
"We've already lost a dragon," he told her, "I don't want us to lose our queen next. I know you want to find Jambu's killer, but it's increasingly clear that we don't know what we're dealing with here. Go back to the Rainforest, get more support, then come back with backup. Keep yourself safe, and leave any fighting to us."
She noticed Caiman, of all dragons, step forward with a look of concern and confusion, but she ignored him and focused on the Nightwing.
"No," she growled, "Deathbringer, we went over this. I'm seeing this through. I am going to make sure my citizens and kingdom are safe, if I have to kill this thing myself."
"You're not a trained assassin, or a soldier," he countered, "You can hardly even keep your footing in this jungle. I'm sorry, Glory, but I can ill afford to focus on keeping you safe while making sure we achieve our objective."
"Queen Glor—" Caiman tried to interject, but was ignored again.
Glory lashed her tail. "I realize that. But I can't just sit at home and wait, not for this!"
"And I promised that I'd keep you safe, and I can't do that so long as you're here," his voice raised, and there was clear frustration in it, "Glory, please."
"No, Deathbringer," she barely kept in a shout, "I'm not going back, not now. Not until we kill—"
"You're majesty!" she heard Caiman yell in desperation, and a moment later she heard the sound of wood cracking.
Several things happened very quickly. She looked over, then up, and witnessed a large branch nearly the size of a small tree heading right towards her. She yelped, jumping back but was unable to avoid it completely as it crashed into her side. At once the other dragons leapt forward to help, but were interrupted by what could only be described as a blur cutting right across their group, between Mastermind and Preykiller.
In a flash it was there, and then it was gone. But what it did was recognizable in an instant. Preykiller gasped, clutching her throat with talons that were rapidly being coated with red liquid. Her eyes bulged, she screamed a gurgling kind of scream, and collapsed to the ground.
All of this Glory saw despite the sharp pain on her side from the fallen branch, and she watched in shock as the Nightwing convulsed in the mud. Lemur immediately rushed to her side, applying pressure to her neck, and Caiman joined him a moment later. She could only watch with wide eyes as her fellow Rainwings worked to save Preykiller, but it was only a minute before Caiman looked up and shook his head.
Preykiller was dead.
A stench of death filled the air as Glory staggered back, into Deathbringer. Shakily, she looked up to him.
"Wh—what happened?"
He was silent, but there was a hardness in his face. He slowly set a wing around her, then pulled it away as she winced. "You're hurt."
She looked at herself, realizing that for seemingly the first time. She touched her wing with a claw and found blood on her talons. She moved her wing, and found that she couldn't, at least not without great pain. She grabbed it to move it forcefully and almost cried in pain.
Her wing was broken. Maybe not a literal break, but it wasn't working like a wing should. She was effectively grounded now. Trapped. Even if she'd wanted to follow Deathbringer's advice, that would be impossible now. And the worried look on his face said that he knew it.
"Did, did it do this?" Lemur asked aloud. He'd gotten up from beside Preykiller and was observing the branch that had fallen on her side, damaging her wing so. The end of it was damaged, almost looking as if it had been clawed at. Or maybe it had just snapped. To Glory, it was hard to tell.
"A distraction, then a kill," Caiman mused, standing next to Lemur, "Possible. Or just taking an opportunity. Either way is worrying."
"If it's the former, it's a certain sign of intelligence," Mastermind, so normally quiet, spoke up, "This could be a very advanced creature."
"Advanced enough to get the better of us," Caiman muttered, "Of poor Preykiller, at least."
Deathbringer gave a deep sigh beside her. "Lemur, do you have anything in your pack for Glory's wing? We should wrap it."
"I think I do," the Rainwing nodded, pulling off his pack and rustling through it. He came up with some sort of fabric—it looked like a small blanket—and set to wrapping her wing securely.
"You were right behind Preykiller," Glory said as he worked, ignoring the pain as best as possible, "Did you see anything? Could you tell what it was."
Lemur shook his head. "I…no. It was just a flash of color, then gone. I almost missed it, even, especially with my eyes on you. It was like it was invisible."
"A camouflaged Rainwing?" she asked, almost hopefully.
"I don't think so," he said, "I've seen them enough to recognize the look, especially that close. This was…this was different."
She grunted as he finished with the wrap, then her attention was turned back to Preykiller's body. The Nightwing's eyes stared lifelessly ahead, at least until Caiman reached down and closed them. Glory noticed four claw marks across her throat—the same number as the tracks they had found.
"What do we do with her?" Caiman asked, his eyes scanning the trees more than looking at the dead dragoness. Once again, they faced the same issue of having to figure out what to do with a fallen dragon this far from the village, and once again Deathbringer vouched for pragmatism.
"We need to leave her," he answered, "If we have a marker, put it on the top of a tree. We can't tarry here."
This time, Glory was inclined to agree. No tarp was used to cover her, she was simply left where she was. Glory whispered a silent apology at that, but the situation was how it was. They were now down two members, and after their first real encounter with whatever this thing was, she was no longer confident.
"What now?" Lemur questioned, having hastily tied that marker with something he had in his bag (Glory hadn't seen what).
"We need to keep moving," Deathbringer answered, "Glory can't fly, so that option is not valid. We'll stay with our queen, and move towards the village. If we get an opportunity to kill it, we do, but right now our focus needs to be the safety of our Glory."
Glory opened her mouth to protest that, to say that she would be find and that destroying whatever was responsible was most important, but she was silenced as both Lemur and Caiman agreed. Their dedication was to her protection, they said, and they'd see her safe. The killer could be dealt with once she was away from harm. It was touching, really, although Glory couldn't help but hope that whatever had just killed Preykiller would indeed rear its face again before they reached the village. If it did, they would kill it and avenge the Nightwing, Tarsier, Jambu, and all the others that had fallen.
She would make sure of it.