Lion Hawk
In the absence of anything that could take down S. titanuizuloas, a population of wyvern hawks (D. volturcephalus), driven by competition for smaller species from their own kind, adapted to do so. The Lion Hawk, the largest draconiraptor to ever live at the time it evolved, stands at 3 feet tall at the hip and just over 5 feet long from nose to tail. In order to support its increased size, it has a wingspan of 14 feet--however, due to many factors it flies significantly less often than its ancestor did. It is sandy in color and has regained some feather covering up its neck to help it blend in without sacrificing the glare-reducing quality of the dark skin on its face, and its head is proportionally smaller to make it lighter.
Getting large posed a problem for a creature that flies and depends on its teeth. As a result, the lion hawk prioritized teeth in the front and middle of the mouth--gaining an enlarged canine-like pair near the front of the upper jaw, a handful of smaller teeth surrounding it, and some more teeth in the same part of the lower jaw, while teeth further back in the mouth have been lost. This is not ideal, but the other option was losing the ability to fly completely, which would make it unable to lunge for the throat of its primary prey, which in turn would make hunting more difficult. Even with all this done to make it lighter, it is still too heavy to carry itself in the air for extended periods of time; as long as it was still capable of at least some flight, it prioritized keeping its ancestral strength.
The lion hawk is otherwise identical to its ancestor. It has a mane of orange feathers down its back--which it can now raise for mating displays or flatten to make itself less conspicuous, with the new resting position being flatter than in the ancestor--and a fatty dewlap on its throat, which are used to indicate health during mating dances. During mating dances, the mane is raised, revealing its true size to proportionally be like that on its ancestor. After mating, it partially buries 2-4 eggs in the sand and guards them until they hatch, which takes 5-6 weeks. The parents raise the semi-altricial young together, bringing them food by day and warming them at night with their wings, until they are around 4-5 months old and can hunt for themselves. The increased amount of time to grow is caused by their increase in size.
The lion hawk’s primary prey is S. titanuizuloas, though it will also hunt some other smaller strutis such as S. azurelotus, S. oploaftius, and S. richnoceras; juveniles especially will target these smaller prey items, as they are not yet big enough to take on S. titanuizuloas on their own. If it can’t find any prey, it will scavenge instead--its large size being more than enough to scare other predators away from their kills.