Adrian Anderson

NEST

A flicking, forked tongue samples the air, sensing its prey. The atmosphere was dark and damp inside the worn timber and tin structure. During the day, very little light managed to enter through gaps that weren’t already obscured by the gumtrees outside. Everything was quiet and still at night, not even the flicking of the snake’s sensory preceptor made a decibel. But it could taste its target, far above, in the wooden lofts, and it could also taste its young in the nest.