Feathers
Chpt 1….15 July 18
If you could touch the sky, would you yearn for it as much?
Silvery flakes drifted down, glittering in the bright light of the Harvest Moon. The blackbird swooped down from its nest, and was engulfed by a shadow-The Shadow- under the trees. A few of the bird's feathers escaped to float to the ground and a voice rumbled out from the darkness, malevolent and creeping, "Such a shame. I lost some. Such a waste...oh well...I can always find some more. How many birds will I have to eat tonight? I'm always so hungry...maybe I'll find a nest of babies again. The crunch, the crunch between my teeth is satisfying...or perhaps I'll be in luck. Maybe I'll find an angel...oh yes, an angel would be so tasty to eat right now…"
The creature's mutterings were lost to the underbrush as it slithered, oozed, and seemed to jump from shadow to shadow away to its cave to await the feeling of more wings coming near. More food for him to eat to bursting and never feel full from. Ever.
"So hungry..."
In the dark of the night, anything is possible.
The dark may conceal things, hungry beings who might want to eat you.
No one had told that to the bird who was flying back to her nest with food for her chicks though. It was done in an instant, and she was gone, snatched up by a shadow of darkness with only drifting down feathers to tell the story of where she had met her end before they are lost in the underbrush. The feathers remain on the forest floor for a few days after that until a gust of wind snatches them away and the only testament to the bird's prior existence is gone. Her chicks left alone and defenceless.
This being is called the Grabber. The Grabber is a dark beast. A being that will capture, and sometimes kill birds, with its favourite dish being angels, to obtain a single feather from them. Once a bird's feather has been taken from them, because it only targets magical birds of which this world has a few species, it will eventually lose the ability to fly. Angels that are permanently unable to fly die from misery and despair within a few years so that even those of its victims survive a feather being torn out, which causes excruciating pain, die.
Again and again, it stalks through the night feeling its hunger never diminish as its shadow tentacles reach outward again and again in search of food to shovel into its cavernous maw.
And... if a young angel strays from their flock or wanders out at night, he will come to get you!
Mathew's grandmother finished her story, tackling her grandson to the ground along with his twin brother and tickling them both as they laughed in her arms.
Within just a too short decade though, this would soon become her most treasured memory. A time of innocence before her little Mathew was lost and no one could find him and uneasy whispers talked of the Grabber and how he would be back again for the rest of the children soon.
Hugs and Wuvs
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North of the North