Rift Plate 083 · Blue Smoke Country
Runnelglass Serpent
A spectral serpent races inside mountain runoff, cutting ankles with a body that hardens only at the moment of contact.
- Plate group
- Blue Smoke Country
- Classification
- Spectral
- Field account
- Recovered
Recovered natural history
Field record
Wool across the runnel
The runnel looked dry. A narrow shine moved inside it, bending around leaves without touching them. When it struck, the shine rose full of wet reflections. My face and the copper tag on my coat stretched along the clear body. The head hardened just before it cut my boot open.
It broke into beads and slipped under a stone. Next time it came from the uphill ditch, carrying my startled face in its scales. We laid wool across the channel. The fabric darkened where the invisible water passed.
Moisture route
It follows drainage beside or under a trail, overtakes travelers, and hardens for a low cutting strike. Only floodwater normally lifts it high enough to attack the torso. After contact, beads carry it away along the smallest connected wet path. It cannot leave continuous moisture.
Bright reflections attract it. It may circle polished metal and ignore dull prey. Absorbent ground interrupts the flow. Several serpents can braid into one stream, then split at obstacles, making it difficult to judge the size of what is hunting.
Read the environment
Signs of its presence
A dry-looking runnel shines as though water moves below it.
Reflections run upstream through still leaves and grit.
Boots are cut at the exact local waterline.
Survival doctrine
Field precautions
01
Break the line, force the turn
Packed ash, wool, or heated stone can make a dry gap that forces the entire Serpent to solidify on one side. If it has to reverse sharply around a dry obstacle, the neck's mineral skin cracks and can be shattered.
Continue through the folio
083 of 100 recovered plates