I really enjoy your story - the action in this one, but also the exquisite writing in general. Normally I reread each chapter a lot of times, because everytime they reveal some new detail to me that I had overlooked previously.
Now I'm left wondering if this misterious creature was a regular Sharpling or something else altogether.
In any case, keep up the great writing, and I'm very much looking forward to the next chapter - which again will let me drop anything I'm doing to read it :-) .