There was nothing to see at first. Kiley's backward steps were unsteady, with each fearful step on an unfamiliar forest floor giving her the feeling like she might fall back, and down into darkness, still leaving her lost and alone in the woods for her friend to find, tumbling down into another hole to grow cold and hungry in. But that was just fear and uncertainty. She was just moving backwards, there was no reason to really fear that. The problem was the alternative.
There was something following her.
She'd seen the speed these things had, but this part was just as bad. Something remained just out of her vision, but there was no denying the cracking and crunching of leaves below feet, the rustling of leaves still on branches as something scraped across them. It felt like something was following her, slowly. It felt like she was being hunted. She was prey.
As soon as the thought had entered her head, a loud sound broke out, not a scream, but the scraping. She'd heard it the night before, when the thing had tried to get to Chase, but instead took a swing at the house. A hard swing at the trunk of a tree, claws raking across and pulling off bark, causing the whole tree to shake. Kiley instantly had a better idea of where this thing was watching her from. And it was close.
And then the rustling of things on the forest floor being moved turned into a pounding as the form finally appeared to her in the low light of the night. And it was coming at her fast.