She must have jumped the time-space barrier somehow. She wasn't in her homeland, not anymore. This place looked the same, but it definitely was not Handren. It didn't smell the same. It didn't feel the same.
Styx had only ever known the stench of the Handren jungle, the everlasting smell of month-old corpses rotting away slowly by some jungle river or under the large, green leafs of some plant or other. To those who came to her homeland from elsewhere, the scent was poisonous. There was no way any stranger to the land could have prepared themselves for it. It had always been amusing to her to watch them cough and cover their mouths and noses as the thicksmell slowly invaded their lungs and from there, moved on to their bloodstream. She found the colours that they threw up to be interesting. She'd seen purples, blues, greens, browns, black, grays, whites, yellows. Name a colour, she'd probably seen it regurgitated.
This place. It wasn't home. That smell was not present. Styx wasn't sure how she'd managed it, but she wasn't anywhere near Handren.
This place was new to her. She couldn't tell what was safe to eat and what was not. She decided not to trust the plants. Her instinct was that of any Hanoi, that of anyone who had lived their lives in Handren - she needed something living, something with blood, something breathing, something moving. She wanted flesh.
She heard leaves crunch a little ways off to her right. Her head snapped in that direction, golden hair following her movement to frame her delicately pale, perfectly contoured face. Styx tilted her head back and opened up all of her senses. She heard the leaves rustle again, faint compared to the silence that surrounded it. It was a heavy silence, one that might have matched the smell in Handren if she gave it enough thought. The air was sticky, humid. It could have been solid if she didn't know better. She lifted her hands, closing her eyes. She could feel it. Her Beast was still with her, it had made the jump to this place too.
In her mind's eye, she could see Him, her Beast. He was hungry, too. They both knew it. He was ugly, even to her. He was big and scraggly, with teeth to rival those of a dragon. He had a crazed look in His eye, one that matched what she felt within. She just didn't let it show on her face. She let it show in her heart, in her soul. They were two of a kind.
Styx let out her breath and with that breath, set him free from his chains. She opened her eyes. Let the hunt begin.
His blood, His will, raced within her
--will finish this tomorrow. must go to bed for now--
