Het'Riva sat in a gap beneath the ground and an old, knotted and lichen-covered oak root. It had rained nearly all day and night, but now dawn threatened to arrive, making them more visible to every predator in Kelunbar. Their wing ached and lay on the ground uselessly and covered in leaves and twigs from being dragged around. Het'Riva had followed after the creature for an hour before they sense animals--including hunters--returning. The their wing became to painful to manage, and so they had hid.

With their snake body gone...were they just Riva then? Were they just..."she?"

Something approached. It sounded snake like: slow, steady, sensitive. Riva looked toward the sound while attempting to nestle deeper into the hole. 

A mysum approached, about a third of Riva's height and lost-looking. They still had the whiter coloring of a young Bolet, and their cap grew unevenly sticking far out to the front and right. They seemed so lost in thought that they nearly fell into Riva's hiding spot. Riva could have snapped up the mysum if she wanted. 

The mysum looked upward, presumably at the tree, then dropped their gaze and accidentally locked eyes with Riva.

Riva spread her feathers and glared. Were Bolets poisonous? 

The mysum gasped and looked away, instead finding their way to Riva's broken wing. 

"Oh no," it murmured, in a soft, almost mushy version of the language. "What happened?"

Riva spread her feather farther, now angry at the mysum's pity. "I'll eat you." She would probably die either way.

It backed away. "I was told once by a squirrel that I taste poorly."

"The squirrel must not have been hungry enough."

"Would you like me to find you something to eat?"

Riva cocked her head. "It won't keep my alive long eough for my wing to heal."

"I haven't got anything better to do. Do you want to come with me?"

Riva cackled. Did this ground-crawler really think it could gather enough food for her? Or that they both wouldn't get eaten by something else? It was so naive that Riva felt unsure weather to be annoyed or endeared.

The mysum just waited for an answer.

Riva stretched her unbroken wing. "What can I call you, ground-crawler?"

"Shoff, at your service." The mysum tipped its cap forward. "What may I call you?"

With Het gone, Riva wasn't sure what to say. Normally she could feel his presence. Normally they would introduce themself together. She didn't know if she couldn't feel him because he was dead, unconscious, or distanced. 

She needed to believe that he was alive.

"We are Het'Riva."

Shoff's eyes widened. "You're a Druant! I've never met one before!"

"You probably have b--"

"Where's your other body? Is it bringing you food now? How does the whole thing work? It always seemed like way too much to fit two bodies into one mind, like when I first heard about it I tried to imagine seeing out of two sets of eyes at once but I couldn't picture it and--"

"I haven't decided not to eat you yet." Riva snapped her beak once in Shoff's direction.

Shoff stopped for breath. "Oh. My apologies."

Riva peered at Shoff for a long moment. With her wing, she was as good as dead no matter what she decided. "Where is it you're going?"

"Um...well, I'm not entirely sure. I guess I'm looking for help. I thought I'd go to the Great Stump. There might be some bumers there who can help me figure out exactly what I need to know." Shoff's cap twitched.

"The Stump? Wouldn't that be at least a month's walk for you from here?"

"I was hoping to catch a lift with somebody, I think. Could your other body help?"

It was such a rude question to ask that Riva almost forgot to feel sad. She bristled her feathers and leaned over the mysum who shuffled backwards. Riva nipped at the front of his cap, tearing a small piece.

"Ouch!" Shoff continued to scuffle back. "I'm sorry! But I don't know what I did!"

Riva dropped the mysum piece. It did taste terrible. 

Shoff kept running, or at least the mysum equivalent of running, which was more like sliding over the ground at a barely faster pace than normal. 

"Wait!" Riva said, suddenly feeling a bit of panic rising in her. She hopped out of her hole.

Shoff stopped, but squinted at Riva.

"Just don't ask so many questions."

"I'll try..."

Riva wasn't convinced, and also wasn't sure if this person had ever experienced a healthy amount of fear a day in their evidently short life. But she sighed and took a hop closer. "We are...I am alone right now. If you can find someone to help us, I would be indebted to you."

Shoff cocked their cap to the side. "Debts? This is what friends are for."

Now it was Riva's turn to cock her head. She bent down and peered at the mysum. "I'm not your friend."

"Well maybe I'm not your friend, but I've decided that you're mine." Shoff nodded firmly, then looked up at the trees. "Do you think that a larger bird will carry us?"

"Eat us, more like."

"Most things don't like eating me."

"Well, Shoff, there are a great many things in this forest that would like to eat me."

Shoff's eyes lit up. "I'll just tell them that you ate a piece of me and now you taste bad too!"

Riva considered threatening to eat the mysum again, ruffling her feathers a bit. "That's not really your plan, is it?"

"You don't think it will work? All right...I'll think of something else."

Riva navigated herself back towards her hole, trying not to jostle her throbbing wing. The little thing was cute, but turning out to be useless. She would wait it out until she couldn't stand being hungry anymore, and hope a fox or hawk didn't find her first.

"I'll go find someone who can take us to the Tree and helps us find food, I promise." Shoff said. "I'll come back before the sun sets."

Riva watched them slide away, feeling hollow in her chest. She doubted they would come back, and part of her wanted to ask them to stay until she died. The lonely feeling without Het was only getting heavier.