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Mar. 20th, 2014 04:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icecreamemperorAt first, the miners were pleased to discover such a rich vein of birds. Deep underground, lit only by their head-lamps, they broke them free -- whole flocks of wings, tumbling out of the dark, damp walls. The sound of frantic flight echoed down the shafts, along with the miners' laughter; even the foreman looked on with delight as they gathered them up, gently, so as not to scare them, and bore them up to the surface, there to release them or take them home to their wives or children, along with a story to tell.
It turned out, however, that that was only the beginning. The very next day, tilling her vegetable garden, a woman dug up a crop of doves; kneeling in the cool earth she unearthed them one by one, her fingers brushing crumbs of dirt off their warm and trembling bodies. A carpenter, boring a hole in freshly-bought lumber, found himself suddenly surrounded by the joyful singing of sparrows, who climbed out of the wood as though it had always been their nesting place. Children in the town square looked on in amazement as buckets, lowered into the well, emerged full of strangely-plumed parrots and cockateels, each batch more colourful than the last.
The townsfolk began to worry.
It turned out, however, that that was only the beginning. The very next day, tilling her vegetable garden, a woman dug up a crop of doves; kneeling in the cool earth she unearthed them one by one, her fingers brushing crumbs of dirt off their warm and trembling bodies. A carpenter, boring a hole in freshly-bought lumber, found himself suddenly surrounded by the joyful singing of sparrows, who climbed out of the wood as though it had always been their nesting place. Children in the town square looked on in amazement as buckets, lowered into the well, emerged full of strangely-plumed parrots and cockateels, each batch more colourful than the last.
The townsfolk began to worry.
