Slitherpin

It basks in the first hour of sun laid out on a flat stone, then hunts the day's warmth for grasshoppers and grubs, striking with a speed that outruns the eye and swallowing prey whole and unhurried afterward. Its diamond pattern breaks up its outline in dappled grass so effectively that most creatures never register it until it moves. It sheds its skin in a single ghost-pale tube several times a season, leaving these behind like discarded socks, and grows longer and bolder with each one.