[color=gray][quote=@jordy0403]Well, meat seemed to work, now I just needed to grab one fast enough. I just have to keep putting meat in a cage and trying to close it in time. This is going to be a long hour or so, I thought.[/quote][/color]

The bushes rustled.

A black-furred felidrake padded cautiously forward, its pink nose wriggling and green eyes wide. It sniffed in the direction of the meat. Its scaly tail swished and its wings shifted patiently.

It caught sight of Alex. Its head lifted, ears perked, curious. [b]"Prr?"[/b] It sat down, kneading its paws in the grass, and stared at him again. [b]"Prr?"[/b]

It made no more movement toward the cage or the meat. It only stared at Alex with bright green eyes.

[color=gray][quote=@Bornlucky]Before he handed the cage to Spook he cut and placed a small string of white yarn and a small piece of meat from his leftovers to keep it fed when it woke up.  Theodore gently lift the cage and brought it over to Spook when he was hearing distance from the mask man he softly said with a modest smile, "I caught one, Spook... well not really caught it, I just found it in my cage as I was getting ready to catch others."  as he finished speaking he gently placed down the small occupied cage in front of the strange masked man, the Felidrake softly stirred awake before going back to sleep.[/quote][/color]

Spook paused in his painting and tipped his masked face up to Theodore. [b]"Good,"[/b] he replied smilingly. [b]"Set it down over there."[/b] He shifted his position and knelt on the road again, drawing complex shapes on the stones, completely in disregard of everything outside his work.

[color=gray][quote=@Turboshitter]"Felidrakes? I've never heard of creatures such as these," she said, confused. "If they can teleport, then how are we supposed to catch them? Won't they escape their cages? A noble of the house Anzivino always accepts a challenge when it's given to them, but this sounds like a fool's errand! Do you mean to mock us, Traveller?"[/quote][/color]

For awhile, Spook appeared not to have heard her. His paintbrush moved quickly and accurately, and an ornate magic circle was beginning to take shape in the middle of the road. He was waiting for something.

[color=gray][quote=@c3p-0h]Her smile turned impish. Meryn reached forward and grabbed at the paper.[/quote][/color]

[b]CRACK![/b]

A noise like a gunshot resounded through the forest. The felidrake near Meryn suddenly disappeared and reappeared on a higher branch, tail down and ears back. It peeked down at Meryn around the side of the trunk in complete betrayal.

The felidrake that Theodore had caught -- the one sleeping in a cage near Fiammetta's feet -- also disappeared with a [i]poof![/i]  It reappeared instantly in almost the same place -- [i]pop![/i] -- and the cage and felidrake toppled over together. The felidrake righted itself and paced in a circle and huffed, still trapped within the upended cage.

[b]"The cages are made of iron,"[/b] Spook happily answered Fiammetta's question without looking up from his painting. [b]"They can teleport themselves to exhaustion and never move an inch. Their magic can't cross an iron barrier."[/b]