Tuesday 2 December 2014

A Mixed Ecology

Copied from Poul Anderson Appreciation, 11 Nov 2014:

Ferune is an Ythrian:

his ancestor's shields hang in his house;
outside grow Ythrian trees - thick hammerbranch, high lightningrod and water-gathering sword-of-sorrow;
a trumpet calls his sons and chothmates to fly with his litter, led by his widow and torch-bearing daughters.

However, Ferune has lived on Avalon, where his choth is Mistwood:

cold, wet fog blows from the sea;
inland is Old Avalon;
the noise of a boomer tree frightening away animals rolls beneath the house and echoes from the shields;
flying as high as they can, the litter-bearers see on the horizon the sunlit snow peaks of the Weathermother;
at sunrise, the new Wyvan of Mistwood blows the horn, calls the dead and speaks the New Faith;
the litter is tilted above crags, boulders and streams;
Ferune's widow leads a sky dance by a hundred Ythrians watched by hovering human Avalonians.

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