Khuldral does not think that sulking is the correct term for what it does following its encounter with the wicked old witch. It is too old, too ancient and powerful, too much of a force of nature itself to be brought low by some meager combination of fear, shame, and crushing disappointment. It certainly does not sulk.

It merely lies down for a little while.

The vile evil human seems content to stay on the side of the moving body of water that Khuldral the Nightteeth cannot cross to, and that leaves the less metaphorical monster to lie upon the riverbank and wait. It has waited for a lot longer with a lot more patience, but somehow the nearness of this consummation of purpose makes the wait much, much worse.

So it lurks, and it waits, and it hates the passing of time.

It had thought, for one moment, that there would be a chance. It saw an adequate substitute approach the bridge. But the substitute and the target stopped to speak to each other, and this caused an eruption of violence that was most unexpected, but clearly adds to the tally against the one who it would like to sink its teeth into.

The tall man grabs at the woman and strangles her, using the bow in a way that is very much not the standard purpose of such a weapon. When she kicks her way to freedom, Khuldral feels a rush of pleasure.

It enjoys seeing the man in pain.

The taste of that deserved sensation is sweet, and it gets a rush to witness it from so close. Thick ropes of dark drool leak from between its vicious fangs. It growls anticipation, ready to sink sharp teeth into weak flesh.

But the man recovers, and he kicks sharply at the less-deserving woman. Khuldral watches without compassion as she rolls away and into the water.

The man draws back his traitor’s bow and lets fly a single vicious arrow. It finds its mark in his target’s back.

Khuldral watches a slow smile spread across his face with satisfaction.

But Khuldral cannot smell the rush of blood that should accompany a kill of this variety. It watches, but no blood spills from the flailing woman as the rushing water batters her and drags her downstream by uncaring currents. It looks away to watch for a reaction from its target.

And the smug grin stays plastered on that wicked face. The man is less observant than the beast.

Intent counts for a lot, Khuldral knows, and an incompetent attempt at murder weighs upon a person’s balance of guilt in the eyes of uncaring justice with the same weight as a successful killing. And this, Khuldral can smell, is an attempted murder of a relative.

The monster watches the villain from across the insurmountable barrier of rushing water.

And the man makes a mistake.

He slowly crosses the bridge.

Now Khuldral has a chance. A slim opportunity, but it is an opportunity none the less.

Khuldral was not, however, actually expecting this sudden change of circumstances, and had caught itself sulking. Its legs tangle in thick underbrush as it staggers upright.

The man has not seen it yet. He is watching the river, clearly attempting to predict where the corpse will wash up when it inevitably does. He strides confidently across the barrier, ignorant of the danger that waits for him there.

Khuldral gets his feet underneath him and untangled. The racket frightens several birds, which crash through the canopy overhead in their panic. The monster is still out of sight in the thick forest, lengthening shadows covering it from view.

The man looks directly toward the monster that plots his doom and sees something that shakes him to his core. He runs, sprinting downstream with all haste.

Khuldral gets its ancient bones into motion, thrusting itself out into the open.

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The full view of the beast, dry now, is an intimidating horror show. Its long, thick hair hangs in curtains from its muscular chest. It stands on thin, hairless legs that end in wickedly sharp claws. A thick mane circles its head, it a small, hairless face. The monster’s snout is long and filled with far too many far too sharp teeth. Its soft hair is a black that reflects no light at all. Its skin is iridescent like an oil slick rainbow sheens defining its dark form.

Beady eyes like blazing coals glare from behind a curtain of hair.

Its long, hairless tail whips about behind it, crashing into the shrubbery and slicing through it like a mower’s scythe.

Legs as long as a man is tall carry it swiftly in the target’s direction. It covers ground at a pace unimaginable, but the terrain is uneven and treacherous, even to one such as it.

The man sprints as fast as he can down the riverbank. All intelligence has fled, and all sense of intentionality vanishes from his movement.

The chase is not satisfying. The monster yearns to run down its prey in the open. Its footing is poor, and it slips and slides on the loose gravel. It must dance sideways to prevent falling into the river, where it the water would render it immobile for a lot longer than the hangman’s tree held it in captivity beneath its twisted roots.

Rivers change their course eventually, but that would not change fast enough to achieve this task within the expected life span of the man it so desires to drag down to its masters below the world.

It stops, taking pleasure in the fear it sees before it. And it barks a challenge that is answered only with more scrambling across the pebbly beach. The man cannot even look back in fear. He can only keep moving.

The creature lunged toward him, heart racing with vicious excitement. Its hot breath ruffles the man’s heavy raincoat. It pulls back its head in preparation to strike.

But then the fell creature remembers a warning issued from the dire witch of the woods. This is her domain. She is the master of this territory, not it.

It remembers her warning that if it acts too soon, all its work will be undone. It will be made obsolete. This man will repent or be granted mercy. And that memory gives it pause. If it is obsolete, then it may cease to exist. It doesn’t know. It just doesn’t know.

The pause is just long enough for the man to have an extra few steps of distance between them. Those terrified steps carry him up and over a slick rock. On the other side, he loses his footing entirely.

The man’s heel catches on the algae growing in the rock's lee’s disruption to the river’s swift current. He trips and slides downward, his arms windmilling in a desperate attempt to regain the balance he’d lost. One hand still holds fast to his weapon of choice.

He plunges into the icy water, and the beast makes a desperate second lunge to catch him before he goes under. The deep pool covers him swiftly.

If he drowns, then that counts as a failure to the monster that chases him.

The monster cannot reach him, not as he struggles at the bottom of the deep pool he has fallen into. It can only watch as the man fights the swirling current. Two rocks ensnare his foot at the bottom of the pool, and he kicks repeatedly to force it free.

When it comes free at last, it is without his boot.

Khuldral is thankful that the man has freed himself. It watches with rapt attention as he swims desperately for the surface.

But it does not risk even a single toe in that moving water. It is too close to the end goal to trap itself carelessly now. Its tail whips about impatiently. It snarls into the water.

And the man emerges upwards, propelled by his kicks against the current. He swims, terrified and nearly drowned, fighting the river to gain the relative safety of a shore, either shore, any shore.

Khuldral howls in fury at the sight as the man struggles onto a large, flat rock. It is, against all the monster’s desire, precisely midstream. There is no way for it to reach him at all. The monster snaps and snarls at him as it paces back and forth on the only side of the river it can touch.

The man curls his body protectively around his bootless foot.

Icy water that splashes upward onto the large, flat rock runs off of it with an additional stain of red. The injured foot bleeds from the scrapes it has received.

Even from across the stretch of moving water, Khuldral can smell the injury and the pain. It knows that its prey has wounds. It knows that he cannot run now.

And the despair and misery that accompany the bright taste of pain agree. The man knows he is not running anywhere now too. He lays upon the stone in a fetal position, clutching at his injury and moaning in pain.

The last rays of the sun shine angry and red over the tops of the trees. Night falls upon them, and it traps them in this deadly dance.

Khuldral’s golden eyes glare across the water with hatred and fury. It came so close to achieving its only goal and its singular desire. It came so close to victory over sin. It came so close to bringing a terrible threat to mankind down where he truly belongs.

And now Khuldral is failing at that singular task. And it feels hate. It wants revenge. It wants to sink its teeth into that exposed leg and grind the bones into paste. It cannot suffer this man to live.

The night sky is littered with stars that twinkle like diamonds against that abyssal darkness. The great abyss of the sky looks down upon the monster and the man, and it does not care.

The monster looks back up at it and howls.