They Have Hunger In Their Eyes

It felt as though there was pure adrenaline in the girl's veins as she squared off with the smaller canines. Dark paws never stopped moving backwards as she neared the edge of the clearing. Once her tail touched the row of bushes, she had no choice but to halt. At least they couldn't come around behind her this way. Still, the odds were stacked terribly against her. Still a child, six against one... things weren't looking so great for the dark girl.

Ravens. Suddenly there were ravens. Dusk was able to peel her gaze away from the coyotes long enough to realize that they were her father's friends. That had to mean that he was on his way! All she had to do was hold the coyotes off until he got here. With the birds heckling them, the coyotes attention was divided, but it never left her for too long. Soon they had come to face her again.

With her stance set and her head lowered, the Carpathius child bared her teeth, snarling and trying to look as intimidating as possible. When the first coyote leaped towards her, the girl's muscles had tensed instinctually. Toes dug into the earth beneath her as she prepared to leap. A shadow overhead stopped her and fire opal eyes stared up at the figure of her father soaring over her head.

Dusk watched in awe as her father decimated the pack of coyotes. At some point Caladia had returned and the older girl draped a foreleg protectively over her, holding her close while her father took care of the last of the coyotes. Dusk was far from being a girly girl. The decapitation, evisceration, blood raining massacre was so terribly impressive to the child that, by the time Artorias was finished and came back to them, Dusk's tail was wagging a million miles an hour and there was a massive smile on her face. Her father looked worried and questioned whether they were both okay but Dusk barely heard him. "That was so awesome!" Hopping up, the girl bounced around her father in excitement. "The way you, swish, swish, swish. Off with their heads!" A giggle ended the girl's reenactment of her father's battle.

Now that the initial excitement of the situation was over with, Dusk looked her father straight in the eye. "I didn't take any risks. I saved Caladia and I called for help." Still, the child's long tail was swishing back and forth atop the bloodied grass as she went to sit next to her cousin once more. The danger was over, so there was no need for Callie to look so afraid. She patted the girl's paw with her own, then looked back to her dad. "I did good, right?" A proud, toothy smile was directed up at her father as Dusk puffed out her chest. In her mind, she'd done exactly what he told her to do after the little encounter with the caiman. She was waiting for her praise.

"Dusk Carpathius"