Ankita ran her fingers over the tracks. As fresh as they were plentiful, they were nevertheless shallow. The young lamia knew that meant young prey – easy, if unfulfilling, quarry.

“Tell me again what you will do.”

She glanced over her shoulder. Half-concealed by the trees, a placid expression on her face, stood her Ila, her mother. She was everything her daughter wasn’t. Her long serpentiform body writhed around trees as she passed, flattening the smaller saplings under its weight. Ankita was small. Ila’s scales faded into the undergrowth thanks to their intricate patterns and faded hues. Ankita’s scales glistened under the sun. Ila stared impassively at the world around her, simultaneously alert and placid, as if she were the very sensory organs of the forest, an extension of a bigger consciousness. Ankita had bumped into a tree a few miles back; her head was still sore.

“I will,” Ankita started; a single raised eyebrow from her mother reminded her to lower her voice to a whisper. “I will,” she repeated, “squeeze it until it can’t escape.”

“And if it can?”

“Uhh...”

Ila smiled. “Come. I’ll show you.”

They move soundlessly through the thicket. Ankita followed her mother; Ila followed her senses. The tip of her tongue emerged from between her thin lips, tasting the air. Her tail absorbed even the slightest vibration across the soft earth. Her pupils expanded and contracted as the light shifted. She followed a trail of scent and warmth, of light steps upon soft hooves. She followed the trail of fawn.

Ankita remained silent. At first, it seemed to her as if her mother’s tracking was of the supernatural sort – how could anyone follow a smell that wasn’t there, or tracks so subtle to the point of invisibility? But as she followed, they came to her little by little. A hint of a scent in the wind, soon gone, but enough to make her skin crawl. A snapped twig. A droplet of red on a white mushroom. Sometimes, when they both stopped, she swore she heard, over the buzzing of her own heart, the sound of leaves being stepped on.

They slithered until the shrubbery turned thick, and the earth under their tails, moist. They reached the edge of the forest, and saw the river beyond. And there, on the other side, lapping at the water, knelt their quarry, with its familiar dotted coat.

Ankita stayed hidden, but her mother beckoned her forth. She followed Ila into the open; as soon as they left behind their cover, Ankita saw the fawn’s ears turn. It stopped drinking and jumped to its feet, eyes on the two predators.

The younger lamia sighed, sure that the fawn would make its escape. To her surprise, it didn’t. She looked at her mother for guidance, and Ila just smiled.

“Look at it. What can you tell me about our prey, just from watching?”

Ankita blinked. She turned to the fawn and squinted. “It’s young, so probably not very fast.”

Her mother’s nod encouraged her to continue.

“And… alone? I don’t see any more tracks, but they might be in hiding.”

“There were a few back when we started. Carefully hidden. Lots of dug up roots and leafless bushes. But our prey is too small to be foraging. It is likely that they were being taught.”

“Like me.”

“In a way,” Ila chuckled. “Let that be a lesson for you. Don’t wander off, or the bad things might get you. Well, what else do you see?”

“Umm… she looks wounded. Look at that bit of red on her right leg. I think she must have scratched itself somewhere.”

“He.”

“Huh?”

“It’s a he,” Ila said. She gestured towards the fawn’s head - Ankita had to squint for a long time before realizing what her mother meant. There, atop the fawn’s head, barely visible in the distance - little velvet nubs, an indication of their quarry’s gender.

“And the scratch isn’t too deep,” Ila continued. “Deer are spry, and even wounded, this one can outrun the both of us.”

“And he knows we’re here.”

“Yes.”

“So what do we do?”

“What indeed.”

With a gesture, Ila ordered her daughter to stay put. Ankita’s puzzled look gave her no pause – yes, out in the open, the older lamia’s eyes seemed to say.

The fawn’s wary glare followed Ila every step of the way, but the lamia ignored it. She slithered towards the river, then into it. Nonchalant, she submerged into the muddy waters, becoming little more than a shadow between the algae – and soon, not even that.

Ankita waited for her to reemerge. She stayed there for what felt like an eternity. She watched the fawn, and the fawn watched her. Predator and prey. Their eyes met. No smiles followed, but there was an understanding between the two. The uneasy peace could be broken with even the smallest of twitches, and then the other would be startled, and the chase would end in a burst of sudden motion.

So, neither moved. They just watched, entranced by each other’s stillness. The world moved on around them. The birds resumed chirping. The river continued to flow. Seconds flowed into minutes.

It all shattered in a fraction of a second. What seemed to just be a piece of driftwood snapped, breaking surface tension. Before the splash of water blocked her view, Ankita saw the fawn’s eyes widen in terror, and his muscles tense in preparation for a quick escape.

When the water subsided, there was no sign of the fawn, or the piece of driftwood. Ankita clutched her heart. Then they emerged - one soaked, the other slick. Ila and the fawn, locked in a tight embrace. Twitching limbs emerged from between coils. The first scream was also the last, and Ankita assumed the prey had been silenced for good.

Ila beckoned her daughter to approach. Ankita did. The water was ice cold, causing the young lamia to wince when she tried to imitate her mother’s way of crossing the river. She ended up picking the shortest route to the other side and swam, quite happy to emerge again and soak in the sun’s warmth.

Ila released her prey, and he fell limp on the sand. To Ankita’s great surprise, however, it soon moved again, and not with the expected death throes, either. The fawn simply got up, shivering - terror or cold? - and made no effort to escape. Its eyes darted between the two predators, lingering only for a moment on Ila before deeming her much too intimidating and resting on the younger one. He uttered a few words. Gibberish, as far as Ankita was concerned, sounding more like gurgled whines than a language; to her surprise, however, her mother seemed to understand.

Ila rested a hand on the fawn’s head, and gently turned it until their eyes met. Then she brought a finger to her lips, and with nary a sound, silenced him.

When her attention returned to Ankita, she showed no sign of acknowledging her prey’s existence.

“Did you see what I did?”

“You understood him.”

“No. Not that. With my tail.”

Ankita nodded.

“Would you be able to repeat it?”

“I think so.”

“Come here, then.”

But what of the elephant in the room? Ankita couldn’t find a way to bring it up. The fawn was alive, in front of her. Was this not to be a hunt? Why was the prey not dead? Ila saw these questions in her daughter’s features, and answered them with the same matter-of-fact tone she always used.

“He isn’t trying to escape because he thinks he’s already dead.”

As if to demonstrate, the older lamia lifted the tip of her tail, and wrapped it around the little one’s neck. Ankita saw tears in those eyes, and shivers running up and down his body, but no struggle. Not even a whimper. Scales brushed against fur, sagging over his shoulders, gently curling around his neck. They squeezed slightly. Nothing.

“See?” said Ila. Her tail slumped down, falling motionless around the fawn’s hooves. “The prey’s mind is simple. It knows vigilance, and suspicion, and escape, and it knows them well. But what of when it is caught? There’s no use for vigilance or suspicion, and it cannot escape. This one has been captured. What now, he wonders? This is where the lessons end, and he is confused he’s still alive.”

She looked down at him. “Jove mola,” she said softly, and the fawn’s terrified expression seemed to ease just a little bit. She repeated the word once, twice - and each time, the little one reacted to it. “Nar mola.”

Ankita blinked, confused. For her sake, Ila explained. “I have told him that he is a good deer. He knows that his obedience pleases me, and that he should continue to behave well.”

“Jove mola” Ankita repeated, and the fawn let out a sigh of relief. “Is jove deer?”

“Yes. And mola means good.”

“Am I mola?” Ankita asked.

Her mother chuckled. “I would hope not! It means good like a pet is good, not like a young lady like you is good.”

“What am I, then?”

“Good,” Ila said, and seeing her daughter’s confusion, smiled.

Done dealing with her mother’s idea of humor, Ankita leaned down, trying to meet the fawn’s gaze. She found it difficult to do, not because he avoided her, but because he stared past her, and she couldn’t easily distinguish pupils for irises in his dark eyes. Ila allowed her daughter to sate her curiosity. After all, the little one had never been so close to a living prey.

“To ambush is simple,” she explained, while her daughter circled the fawn, fascinated. “You make yourself unseen, or appearing uninterested. By your apparent absence or constant presence, you trick your prey into lowering its defenses. This works well against small herds or lone individuals, but with big herds, be ready to make a quick escape once you reveal yourself. Even the most skilled predator can still be wounded by numbers. Is this understood?”

“Mhm,” little Ankita mumbled, coyly poking the deer’s flank and watching him squirm. She did it again, and the corner of his mouth curled into a hint of a smile. After the third one - and only after a weary glance at his captor made it clear she would not punish him - he poked back. Ankita jumped back when the wiry finger sank into her belly, and her surprise startled the fawn. But she returned with a vengeance, and soon did the tension fade between the two. Under Ila’s watchful and somewhat amused gaze, predator and prey engaged in a battle of finger stabs and wiggles.

“Ankita.”

The word cut like a knife. The tone made it clear that playtime was over. The fawn froze again. Ankita straightened up, wiping some dust from her shoulders.

Ila raised an eyebrow. She asked again. “Is it understood, Ankita?”

“Mhm!”

“Can you summarize what I just said, then?”

The younger lamia snapped to attention. Ila saw Ankita’s brow furrow, and the tip of her tail wiggle. She chuckled. Kids.

“I know you’re very intrigued with our new friend, but remember, this is a lesson in hunting. If you aren’t going to listen to the boring part, we might as well end him now and bring him home for dinner.”

“No, not yet!”

“Then you will pay attention?”

“I promise I will!”

“Very well, then. Since you seem to enthused with touching him, how about we learn about constriction?”

Ankita blinked. “Constriction?”

“Squeezing.”

“Ah!”

“Come closer. Here’s how you go about it.”

Ankita giggled when Ila held the tip of her tail. Around it went, all the way up the fawn’s legs like a creeping vine, finding support in the very body she sought to kill. With touch came understanding. The fawn’s apparent placidity was anything but. All it took was contact between fur and scale, a way to feel, and he was like an open book before her. A buzzing heart, trembling muscles, lungs whistling with each breath.

“He’s afraid.”

Ila beamed. She let go of her daughter’s tail. It stayed. Instinctively, it tightened its grip, locking limbs between rings of writhing scale. Some hidden urge told her to squeeze. She obeyed. The fawn squirmed at first, but soon had no room to even tremble.

By now, the tail moved by itself. Muscles that had ached to act for years on end, flexed for the first time. It felt good, it felt right - and just as Ankita readied herself for the final squeeze…

“Enough.”

Snapped out of her trance, she looked at her mother, confused. Ila just smiled. With a gesture, gentle as a whisper, she undid all that had given Ankita so much pleasure to do; when the younger lamia, not without reluctance, released her quarry, Ila nodded, and ruffled her hair.

“You’re a born hunter, Ankita, and you will make me very proud very soon. But if I let you have your reward now, you will not learn.”

“Learn what?”

Ila took her daughter’s hand and led her away from their victim. The poor, trembling creature watched them go, and as soon as it dared to move, darted into the forest.

“He’s getting away!” Ankita shouted, alarmed.

“Yes. He is.”

Puzzled by her mother’s lack of reaction, Ankita chased after the fawn. Ila didn’t stop her. She watched her daughter disappear into the thicket. She stayed put, basked in the sun for a few minutes, enjoyed the singing of the birds and the cool breeze that blew, carrying the scents of spring. Only then did she follow, and mere minutes later, came across little Ankita curled up by a tree, wheezing.

“He got away.”

“Yes,” said Ila. “He did.”

“He was too fast.”

Ila sat next to her.

“The slowest among them can outrun the fastest among us. Our maker blessed us in other ways. We will never run like the deer, fight like the bear or soar like the eagle. But what do we have?”

“We can squeeze.”

“That’s right, we can squeeze. And we can be invisible, and noiseless, and sometimes scentless. We can always find our prey, no matter where they might hide. We can fit in any burrow, climb any tree.”

“What is all of that good for, if we can’t catch a fawn?”

“Now, now, Ankita,” said Ila, folding her hands over her lap. “Have you ever gone hungry? Have I ever failed to bring you prey? Sure, sometimes we have to settle for fish from the river, or eggs from a nest, but if I brought home deer every day, one day we would run out.”

“I guess…”

“I ask again: what do we have?”

“We can squeeze, and be invisible, and always find our prey.”

Ila nodded. “And how did we find our prey today?”

“We followed a trail.”

“And what did we use?”

“Our eyes and ears and nose,” Ankita said.

“So let’s be invisible, and follow our prey.”

Ankita got up. Ila raised an eyebrow. “What are you doing?”

“I’m going to follow our prey?”

“Sit down, Ankita. We’ll wait for night time.”

“But the fawn will get away!” the younger lamia protested.

“He’s tired and wounded. He will need to rest soon. We’ll get him while he sleeps.” She patted her lap; Ankita sat on it, albeit with some reluctance. “I know you’re hungry, but patience is part of being a hunter. How about I tell you a story to pass the time?”

Ankita brightened up. “Oh! Oh! Can you tell the one about the little mouse?”

“Of course.” Ila cleared her throat, and when she spoke, her voice rang rich and full of gravitas. “The weight of a hundred lives weighed heavy on his young shoulders, and yet he stood strong. Knees-deep in the underbrush, he waded through the thick forest. Under his breath, he repeated the Words…”

Mom was right, Ankita thought as she slithered through the forest floor. Without the crutch that was daylight, every other sense came to aid her. But scent, sound, and even the ground’s vibrations under her tail did not help her nearly as much as the ability to see warmth. Warmth gave things texture. It showed her how much life there was. Small rodents scurried around her tail, so assured of their perceived invisibility. Perching on branches, sleeping birds huddled up, and owls scoured the landscape for prey.

But no creature in the night glowed as bright as Ankita’s quarry. Ila had predicted it; the little one slept. But Ankita saw that his slumber was an uneasy one. His little legs kicked at the air. His breathing was shallow. In his sleep, he mumbled.

She approached. Already she could taste him. Her tail muscles tensed in anticipation, ready to crush again. Her fists balled, and her own breathing grew muted - and when she got close enough, she pounced.

The fawn yelped. The crickets fell silent. The trees absorbed his shrill voice, and no aid came. The crickets’ song resumed.

Between her coils, she trapped him. But he struggled. Her embrace tightened, but his thrashing slowed her down. The fawn was like an eel under her grip, constantly moving, refusing to be held in place. Her first time had filled her with such confidence. Another of her mother’s lessons?

Predator and prey struggled with each other, each unable to gain the upper hand. Ankita was strong, but she was also inexperienced. She didn’t know which joints to trap and which to let go, and the fawn proved himself a cunning one, wriggling out of her grip again and again.

A hand rested on Ankita’s shoulder. She knew that soft touch - it was her mother. “Look, mom!” she exclaimed. “I did it! I caught the fawn!”

Ila chuckled. “Perhaps, or perhaps the fawn has caught you. It’s hard to tell from up here. What are you doing now?”

“I’m squeezing! I’m squeezing until he can’t escape.”

“Are you?”

“Yes! But I don’t think it’s working!” There was alarm in her voice.

“Oh, my. What will you do now?”

“Eep!”

The fawn jerked all of a sudden. The desperation behind it gave it enough of a kick to make Ankita reel. His hooves, though small, were still more than hard enough to give the lamia quite a bruise!

“It seems to me,” said Ila, speaking slowly and enunciating every work, “that your venomous bite would do the trick, here.”

The fawn squealed in terror. A flustered Ankita opened her mouth, baring needle-like fangs. But Ila raised her hand, and so great was the authority that she exuded, that not only did Ankita stop fighting, but the fawn, too.

“But,” said the older lamia, paying no mind to the fawn’s obvious terror, or to the way he tried to push away Ankita and her fangs. “If you bit him now, he would surely die.”

Ankita didn’t notice the changes in the fawn’s expression until it was too late. Shrill words - in her own tongue, not his - pierced her eardrums.

“No bite! No bite!”

A glare from Ila silenced him again. Ankita was left confused and with ringing ears; slowly, she backed away from the fawn and returned to her mother’s side. So many questions she could have asked. How many of their conversations had the little one understood?

Ila waited for her daughter to calm down. After the screaming, her soft voice could barely be heard.

“As I was saying, a bite would end it, but we would be left with a useless teaching aid. Some hypnosis, perhaps…”

“Hypnosis?”

“You’ve done it before, dear, you just didn’t know the name. When you channel your will through your gaze. You’ve done it before, yes?”

Ankita nodded. She was no stranger to her kind’s more esoteric abilities. One time, she had stared so deeply into a dormouse’s eyes, the usually skittish creature had crawled right onto her hand. Another, she had been transfixed by her own gaze while looking at her reflection in a pond; the spell had shattered when she accidentally plunged into the cold water, in her eagerness to feed herself the other her. And, of course, she’d seen her mother lure birds into perching on her shoulders and hair…

“I have.”

“But it’s far too dark; we can’t even see the little one’s eyes, let alone hypnotize him.”

“So what do we do?”

Ila sat. “We let him go, of course.”

“Again?!”

“Trust me, Ankita dear, there are few things more thrilling in this life than the hunt. As you become better, it will take you less and less time to capture your prey - so cherish these long hunts, while you can. Even if it keeps you hungry for longer.”

The young lamia huffed. She glared at the motionless fawn in her grasp, and for a moment, considered disobeying her mother. Venom could end it, right? Why learn more later, when she could just be fed now? Of course, she decided against it. This fawn was a fighter; he’d earned her grudging respect. On a second thought, a few more hours of chasing him didn’t sound so bad.

Mother and daughter sat under a tree. The fawn, once free, vanished. Ankita watched him go, but soon turned her attention to Ila, whose interrupted story she now had the chance to hear again.

Ila acquiesced. She regaled her child with the adventures of a little mouse, and a not-so-little snake, and of the ties that bound them. And so soothing was her voice, that after a few twists and turns, a pair of eyes watched them from behind a tree, and a pair of leaf-shaped ears perked up, eager to lap up every word. Ankita saw the very fawn they had hunted emerge, limping, into the clearing. Two steps forward, one step back. Two steps forward, one step back. Ankita’s body grew restless. Her attention shifted from her mother, to the approaching prey. The story did not pause. Ankita bit her lip, the tip of her tail wriggling with unease. Spooked by the movement, the fawn froze. The story still did not pause.

Ankita grew restless. No longer could she pay attention to her mother’s words, however enthralling. Prey was nearby. Everything in her told her to move, to pounce, to kill. The atmosphere shifted from the sense of calm, and the fawn picked up on it, as any prey would. Two steps back, no steps forward.

Ila’s touch calmed Ankita’s nerves. It always did. That tepid hand resting on her shoulder, squeezing gently, put her mind at ease. With the young lamia placated, the deer grew bolder again. Three steps forward. Ila looked to him. One step back. She shook her head, a smooth and precise movement, easily understood. She beckoned him to approach.

He spoke.

“Bei?”

Ila nodded.

One step forward. Hesitation. “Feri?”

Ila shook her head. Paying the fawn no more mind, she resumed telling her story.

A sense of calm descended on the clearing once again. With his heart at rest, the fawn approached - and when neither mother nor child made any gesture towards him, he sat near them, in silence, to hear the tale. His politeness was rewarded when, every now and then, when she saw him struggle to comprehend the narrative, Ila turned to him, and in a few words of that strange language of deer, translated the more complicated parts.

The truce between predator and prey lasted throughout the night. Like in the story.

Daylight shone through his eyelids, casting off unwelcome dreams. Voices he dismissed as the product of nightmares turned real. The language of predators. Their language.

He slowly rose up. The conversation did not as much as slow. The big lamia and the small lamia were discussing something again. He understood only scattered words - chase, tree, bite.

Bite.

Only after several exchanged sentences did the two snakes deign to acknowledge him. The little one spoke gibberish. The big one nodded. The little one slithered closer, as hesitant as he himself had been. The big one nudged her forward.

“Go.”

The fawn tilted his head. The younger lamia looked at him expectantly. “Go,” she repeated, clearer this time. The accent was so thick he thought she might have been saying something else altogether, but when the lamia frowned, pointed into the distance, and said the word a third time, the fawn knew what was expected of him.

He looked up to the older of the two - the mother, he assumed, or maybe some kind of teacher - as if looking for permission. She nodded. He knew what to do, but not why. In his hesitation, they saw the implicit question. Ankita could not answer it. Ila saw no reason to.

Confused, the fawn fled again, and again, the two snakes watched him go, making no gesture to stop him. They waited for an hour, then moved to chase. Ankita led the way. The pursuit came naturally to her. All she had to do was focus, channel those instincts she had been nursing for so long, sic those senses on the trail.

Then, another scent. Similar to the fawn’s, but more… overwhelming. She found no answers or advice in her mother’s placid stare - only a silent encouragement to move on.

The fawn’s trail got easier and easier to follow, as if a carelessness had taken over him. He took longer strides despite his wound, and where before he meandered, now he ran towards a clear goal. Then all of a sudden, as Ankita peeked behind a tree, she saw them. Just standing there, seemingly blind to the lamia’s presence. The fawn… and an adult doe.

Ankita watched in silence. The same instincts that coaxed her forward, now urged her to stop. Her restlessness was put to rest when Ila caught up. She rested by Ankita’s side, looming over her. She put a finger to her lips, and that was enough.

Ankita could tell the two deer had only recently been reunited. They exchanged words whose warmth transcended even language barriers, and they hugged in that way warmbloods hugged; tight but briefly, not to conserve body temperature, but to bond. The mother knelt by her child, uttered a few more words in the crude tongue of prey, and pressed her nose to his. It was then that Ankita understood she had lost her quarry. The doe was fit, all lean muscle and sharp senses; a single bound of those legs could evade them with the greatest of eases, and her ears wriggled at the slightest sound. Ankita looked to her own parent, always unflappable, always self-assured. Ila smiled knowingly.

“Stay here,” she whispered. “It’s time for another lesson, and this one will be the most complex of all. Watch.”

To see such a large lamia so effortlessly climb a tree never ceased to amaze. Only the strongest branches could support Ila’s weight, but she knew how to identify them. Slithering through the canopy, she was little more than yet another shape in an ever-shifting lattice of light and shadow; even her daughter soon lost track of the serpentine form.

For a few moments, silence reigned. Doe and fawn, unaware of the predators’ proximity, savored their reunion. As far as they could fathom, their suffering had ended.

Then, from the foliage, a voice. A voice that Ankita knew, and that the fawn knew, but the doe? The doe’s ears perked up. The forest spoke to her; she would listen.

The conversation between Ila and the doe went by quickly. Ankita had found it hard enough to follow the few simple sounds - barely even words, sounds - her mother had exchanged with the fawn. It left her under the impression that the language of prey was a simple and primitive one. Not so. The guttural, basal sounds were the same, but this conversation between adults was as complex as it was confusing. Ankita could not crack the code, but she could gather from tone that the doe held Ila in great reverence.

The fawn, however, knew better. He knew that voice, and he knew what it represented. He tugged on his mother’s hand, called out what Ankita assumed was her name, but a calm, patronizing word dismissed him. Ankita knew that tone well. Parents - so alike, no matter their place in the food chain. Even second-hand, she couldn’t help feeling a little annoyed in the fawn’s behalf.

But there was no turning back. The Forest spoke. The doe answered. With each exchanged word, a step forward, and a glancing look into the darkness. Before seeing the coils, or the hair, or even the smile, she saw the eyes.

The moment she focused on them, her fate was sealed.

What little alertness remained in her body bled out. Her muscles relaxed, her ears flopped, even her gaze softened. She advanced towards the tree, and was rewarded by words of reassurance in a language she understood.

Ila finally emerged. The sight of her would have caused any deer to dart, but these two remained. One, too far gone, entranced by her hypnotizing glare; the other, desperately clinging to his mother, unwilling to die with her, unwilling to leave without her. But Ila moved slowly, with care - as if the very deer she slithered circles around could shatter with as much as a bump.

The fawn, however, grew increasingly panicked. His tugs on his mother’s hands became pulls, and when simple volume could no longer reach her, he kicked at her legs as well. “Mar! Mar!” he called out, tears running down his cheeks, but Mar was deaf to his pleas.

Ila rewarded her devotion as only a predator could. She brushed her fingers against the doe’s cheek, whispered in her ear words now all too familiar.

“Mola. Jove mola.”

“Mar! Plau!” screamed the fawn, words pushing through sobs and spasms, less and less coherent the more he said them. He tried to get his mother to snap out of it, but nothing got through to her. He no longer existed to her; her whole world started and ended in Ila’s gaze.

She gestured for her daughter to come forth, and Ankita did.

Where doe and fawn’s hands met, she placed hers. Her skin was tepid against their warmth. One by one, she pried the little one’s fingers from the limp grip of the doe; Ankita was surprised to see that the fawn, no matter how desperate, no matter how attached to his mother - still knew a predator’s lead was to be followed. And Ila was gentle, and careful, and kind; she infused her gestures with a warmth that confused Ankita, and though the young lamia could not understand the words her mother whispered, she could sense in them the same love usually reserved for herself.

Not by force, but through kindness, mother and son were thus separated; Ila held the fawn’s hand and led him over her coils, until he stood face to face with Ankita; only then did she release him. He did not attempt to flee, or return to his mother. Ankita reached out to him, and though afraid, he took her hand.

Ila smiled. “Prey tend to have wide cones of vision, so they can always be alert. You can exploit this. Focus your will into your gaze. Break through their barriers.” She gestured towards the fawn. “Go, my daughter. I have taught you what you need to know. It is time to put it in practice.”

Ankita did. She rested a hand on the fawn’s head, and like Ila had done minutes ago, ruffled his fur. His eyes rose to meet hers, and she greeted them with a smile.

Something gave her pause.

“The tears,” Ankita said, maintaining eye contact. “I can’t focus on his eyes with all the tears.”

“Of course he’s crying. Would you not be crying if I were in danger?”

Ankita winced at the mere thought. “What do I do?”

“You comfort him.”

“How?”

“If I were in danger, what would you like to hear? What would put your heart at ease? Think about those words, then say them - only, simple.”

“He won’t understand. He can’t understand our language.”

Ila patted her daughter’s head. “But he can understand its meaning.”

What would put my heart at ease.

“Shh… don’t cry,” she whispered, her voice taking on a hint of the depth and cadence of her mother’s. “Don’t cry. Everything is going to be okay. Everything.”

The fawn sniffed. Ankita smiled warmly. She wiped some of the tears away, and whispered her reassurances, and did it again and again until the tears stopped flowing, and until the fear in the fawn’s eyes was all but gone. Ankita found her focus, and her mother beamed with pride.

“Mola,” Ila whispered to the doe.

“Mola. Jove mola,” Ankita whispered to the fawn.

The movements were inside her, she needed only let them out. She focused her will on his gaze. She did so until his muscles relaxed and his shoulders sagged, and until his ears stopped wiggling and his teeth stopped chattering. She stared deep into those horizontal pupils. His body’s warmth dimmed, his heartbeat slowed, his breaths deepened. He took the final step towards Ankita’s embrace.

Not one more whimper made it past the fawn’s lips.