He watched her approach, and his stomach rumbled. Aside from a fish or two that had gotten too close, he hadn't eaten since munching down spare Raheerah pieces, and a few stray scales was hardly a meal; it seemed almost too good to be true that a cave deer was wandering right down toward his jaws.

He lurked lower in the water, slipping beneath, watching the water-distorted white form shimmer toward him. As it did, he felt a thread of doubt.

Is that a cave deer...? It's small, but it's white, not glowing. He wasn't even sure how to tell, and for a moment, he debated whether to simply do it anyway, to lunge from the water and seize the drinking fawn in his jaws.

Finally, though, with a faint bubble stream of a sigh, he bobbed to the surface a foot or so from the fawn's head as she drank delicately from the river.

"I don't suppose you can't speak," he greeted her politely, "so that I can eat you?"

His tone was wry; if it was a lesser, after all, she'd bolt and be gone before he could attack. If she spoke, he couldn't eat her anyway; he'd already lost out on a meal.

Perhaps, at least, he could get a little conversation.