[Trade] Nimue & Pfell: Cockatrice Hunt

A MYSTERY IN THE CHICKEN COOP


It was a quiet morning in Vitalus, and the woods near Ebrus were as alive as ever. Birds were singing, flowers blooming even in the cool temperatures and a family of Vayrons was working on their little farm, just out of the woods.
Everything seemed peaceful... Until the younger pup of the family started screaming, alerting all the others: something had broken in the chicken coop, and had half-eaten one of their chickens.

At first, they thought nothing of it: it happened sometimes. Unfortunately, they had to reconsider after the seventh chicken found dead. Something was entering their coop, but they hadn't smelt anything different, or seen any tracks of other animals.
It was time to ask for help.

And that was how Pfell and Nimue found their way to that little farm. The two Haedian had seen the help request on their way to Ebrus, affixed on a little signboard. And as always, Nimue wanted to go and take a look, her adventurous personality showing as soon as something interesting happened.
Pfell sighed softly, and followed the sound of Nimue chattering and her steps.

“I wonder what it is! Maybe we'll find a weasel!”

“Vayrons are quick even if they are big, Nimue. I think a weasel would have been caught early.”

Nimue didn't seem to mind that her hypothesis was shot down that quickly, and just kept walking all excited for the hunt towards the farm.
Pfell kept his ears perked and his wings folded, careful of where he stepped to avoid stomping on Nimue fluffy tail.

“We have arrived!”

Nimue nearly shouted, and Pfell had to stop her from running all the way to the door. Soon after they reached the farm, a Vayron exited the house, ready to go work in their crops. He was a puller with an equine tail cut short, and as soon as he saw the two Haedian, his eyes brightened a bit.

“Oh, welcome. Are you here for our chicken problem?”

“Yes sir! We are here to investigate!”

The puller, while kind and calm, looked a bit... Surprised to see a blind Haedian joining a hunt. He frowned, but the shrugged. As long as they didn't break anything, they could have their fun, he supposed.

“Well, the coop is near that big three with the glowing purple flowers all wrapped around the trunk. Have fun.”

The two Haedians nodded as the Vayron left, then turned and went to the chicken coop.
The little construction was... Different from what they expected. It was built with wood, but recently someone had placed rocks and mud to completely close any possible holes, except for the door.
There was some barbed wire running on top and on the sides of the thing, and the chicken were currently out of the coop in a small field nearby, where they could peck at the ground and eat bugs, worms and grass.
Nimue explained what she was seeing to Pfell, and the other Haedian frowned.

“That... Seems a bit much for some killed chicken. Just what is even eating them..?”

He wondered aloud, and Nimue nodded a bit.

“Yep... It must be something quite smart!”

The two Haedian started inspecting the whole structure, both on the inside and outside. The chicken would only sleep in the coop, where they also laid eggs early in the morning.
As Pfell was sniffing the outside grass, trying to find some predator's smell, Nimue stepped on something that crunched.
Lifting her talons, she found herself looking at a shell. A roundish and pink broken shell.

“Pfell?”

“Mh?”

“Did you hear any little chicks in the field?”

“No, why? Did you find something?”

The bigger Haedian stepped near the coop entrance, and the smaller one exited walking on three legs.

“Here, feel this? It's an eggshell.”

Pfell touched the cracked shell, feeling around the cracks and borders of the tiny thing.

“Mh. It is quite dry, must be old. Probably an egg fell from a basket while they were collecting them.”

“If you say so...”

A bit disappointed in a useless discovery, Nimue put down the eggshell, turning to look for some more clues. Hours had passed, and yet they still had no clue on what was killing the chickens.
It was a small animal, as it didn't eat all the chicken, but even a small animal would have left some tracks for sure. It only attacked at night too, so it was when the chicken were closed in their coop.

***

The sun was already disappearing behind the far away mountains, and the two Haedian had yet to find something.
Nimue was pouting a bit, while Pfell felt intrigued and a bit perplexed: for now, they knew it couldn't be a big animal, it only attacked at night and it didn't leave any tracks.

“Ho ho, still at this, younglings?”

Another Vayron, quite similar to the puller they had talked to that morning, approached. He had some very thick glasses on, and white hair were mixed in his brownish coat.

“I'm the granpa of the little ones that found the first chicken. Since it is getting dark, I'm gonna put them back in the coop. You can stop for a bit and have dinner, if you want, and then continue later.”

He said, with a small chuckle when he heard Nimue stomach growling loudly. The two Haedian then found themselves sat around a long wooden table, enjoying some soup with very loud little chasers and their parents.
After dinner, Nimue and Pfell stumbled out of the house with a very full belly, that made both of them quite drowsy.

“I don't think I ever ate this much before...”

Whispered Nimue, reaching the coop with her friend. Then, the small Haedian turned to look at Pfell.

“I'm going to hide in the coop. You stay alert outside, I'll scream if I need help with something.”

Pfell nodded, and then sat in the grass waiting for any movement to be heard.

Nimue curled up on the logs secured to the ceiling of the coop, waiting.

It didn't take long.
After not even a hour, screeches and snarls could be heard from inside the coop, accompanied by a quiet hiss of pain from Nimue.

“Nimue? What's going on?”

The door of the coop flown open, and Nimue hissed and growled, chasing... A chicken.

“Nimue?! What are you chasing?!”

“It seems and smells like a chicken, but it isn't!”

Before the two Haedians, there was... A Cockatrice.
The small animal was big as a chicken, clearly not yet grown, with some brownish feathers that disappeared on its chest where more dark scales started to appear. It had a spade tail, like a wyvern one, and some more feathers around it and its legs, who were exactly the same of a normal chicken, like the head.
It was possible that the Granpa who took care of the chickens never noticed it because of his bad eyesight.

“I know what it is! It's a Cockatrice! I heard they can hatch from eggs... Ergh... I think some toads made them hatch?”

Pfell raised a eyebrow, confused by the information, but the pit-pat of little legs in the distance returned his focus to him.

“Quick Nimue! We have to catch it, or it will escape!”

“Right!”

The two Haedians then started the chase. The little Cockatrice, while still not an adult, was cunning as a fox: it kept leaping around the trees, and jumping way too close to the vegetables that were growing in the field, as if it knew that the two would get in trouble if they stomped on those.

“We need to get it away from the field!”

“Alright!”

Pfell let out a loud snarl, and jumped as far as he could, trying to cut off the Cockatrice. The little beast squeaked in panic, then turned and started running while flapping its half feathery and half leathery wings.
It couldn't fly away, at least, still too small to do so.

Nimue led the chase, with Pfell a little behind. He could hear the Vayrons scrambling out of their home to watch them apprehend the killer. The Cockatrice let out a scream, and stopped so quickly that Nimue flew over it.
Pfell raised his talons and tried to stomp it, but the little animal took off again, running towards the fields behind them this time, passing right under the bigger Haedian.

“You little-”

Pfell hissed, whipping his tail in hopes to catch the chicken-killer, but the Cockatrice dodged the attack, using its wings to balance better while jumping around.
Nimue was getting a little tired of running, even if she was fast and had quite the stamina, the half chicken, half wyvern was faster and didn't seem to mind the whole chase too much.

“We need to catch it, if it escapes it will return and get the other chickens, soon or later!”

Pfell nodded, and opening his wings-flaps, he ran after the Cockatrice. His claws were ready, but every time he got close, they would just scrape sightly against the scales of the beast or comb between the feathers of its neck. The blind Haedian was starting to get frustrated with it, and the Cockatrice just wouldn't stop screeching and screaming so loud that he wanted to stuff cotton in his own ears. They were in the middle of the courtyard, between the chicken coop and the field, so the animal was just using the blindness and big body of the Haedian to its advantage, running in circles and stopping suddenly, before diving under the bigger creature's legs.

“Come here, you-”

Pfell growled, still stomping around in the grass and trying to trap the animal, when he heard a noise. It was someone scraping their claws on something, perhaps a trunk. There was a fence near the field with the vegetables, so the wood cracking and getting scratched were actually the poles and planks of the fence... But why climbing on that?

“Pfell! Go to the field!”

Nimue screamed, balancing on the fence. She was small, yes, but the fence wasn't that robust so she had to be careful. Still... It was high enough to be outside the field vision of the small Cockatrice. If it couldn't see her, it couldn't avoid her attacks.

Now, there was the hard part: herding the Cockatrice to the field's fence, where Nimue could jump on it while it was running near her.
Pfell snarled and flapped his big wings, trying to scare the animal toward the fence. The Cockatrice screeched, unsurprisingly, like a chicken and quickly tried to escape, unfortunately running toward the coop.
Probably it wanted to blend in with its prey, to avoid getting caught... Which, considering the blindness of the Haedian chasing it, could work for enough time to get away for good.

“Pfell!”

“I know! It just keeps running!”

Growled Pfell, angry. He was blind, and had to chase something small and with an unrecognizable smell. Awful experience for him, really.
In the end, he pounced with all his anger at the Cockatrice, snapping his fangs and whipping his tail like a mad reosean, tearing off some of the animal's feathers with a swipe of claws.
The creature squeaked, seeing the way to the coop blocked by the Haedian who jumped over the animal itself. Then it turned, and Pfell finally heard the clawed feet of the Cockatrice stomping toward the fence.

Nimue was there, waiting and perched like a cat who was hunting for mice. As soon as the little Cockatrice tried to sneak under the fence and ran in the field, she lounged, fangs snapping at the not so extinct beast.
The animal let out a final scream flapping its wings uselessly as the Haedian shook her head, taking the kill with a soft crunch.

“Finally.”

She said, spitting the bloodied creature on the grass, then plucking the feathers stuck to her teeth. Pfell slowly made his way to Nimue, touching the now dead Cockatrice with a claw, feeling its form and shape now that it was finally still.

“I thought these were extinct.”

“Nah, they are just rare! And we caught one! It was so fun, we should hunt like this more often!”

Nimue said, all happy and satisfied with the results of the hunt, feathers still stuck to her bloodied maw.

“Huh... Sure. Let's just go for bigger prey next time, yeah?”

After that, they showed the Cockatrice to the Vayrons, who were quite surprised by the appearance of their chicken serial-killer.
The two Haedian got some money and the permission to take the Cockatrice's body with them, as it would be worth more than a few coins.