She turned an unkind eye upon him, and that was what made Larus go silent. It was a brief affair - no sooner had Caiaphas rumbled her words did the boy remove himself from her presence. He didn't want to be eaten. Why did everyone want to eat him? The big lady at home, the lynx (he assumed), and now this lady. But he didn't cry out or cringe... Essentially calling Caiaphas' bluff, although he hadn't meant to. The boy returned to the section of the soil where an old fish had been buried, and watched it with as much interest as he had shown to the half-dead bird Tuwawi had brought in to the den, that one time.
Hunger won out over his lethargy.
Positioning himself over the hole, Larus dove meekly towards the fish with his mouth open. The first attempt had him tasting dirt more than fish - and he recoiled, sputtering and licking at his lips in order to remove the dirt that had gotten stuck. He was a very particular child, apparently. After swallowing some muddied saliva, he tried again. This time his little teeth sank in to the fish near its exposed tail, and he began to pull... And pull... And pull some more, going so far as to brace his paws against the stone floor.
When the fish was finally worked free of the earth, it was an abrupt moment. Larus bowled backwards with the pike's tail gripped tightly in his mouth. The back of his head konked against the hard floor of the cave, and the fish's body lay upon his exposed belly. After a moment Larus released the tail and lay there, prone, hugging the dead fish.