metal birds would one day flock. Our folk have never been too good at looking forward, you see: that's another thing the assembly doesn't like – being reminded of the future.
"'All the time it's getting worse,' he says into the silence of their resentment. 'Soon there will be no room for us even to pipe simple Changing-spells on a fipple-flute, or to sing the song that brings Sirius's winter rising.'
"'But what can we do?' says an eldern dismissively – or maybe it was several eldern, or all of them together, their beards making a sound like cuckoo-spit shaking loose. 'We cannot fight the Ironfolk, not without weapons of crafted metal we can't; and they alone of all the Earth's creatures have ears that are deaf to our music. I have myself hurled a Chord-of-dying straight into the face of one, and he heard not a gnat's whine!'
"'You're right,' says Brightjacket forthrightly. 'We cannot fight them. The time when we could have done that is a million years gone. And we cannot stay, and let ourselves be destroyed. So surely you must see there is only one course open to us?'
"All is silence again. They know what he is talking about – naturally they do, for our folk have never been without wits, although often stupid, and blinkered, and loath to change their doings. But knowing a thing and admitting you know it are two quite different matters."
"Like you not knowing that Daddy's been listening to you the past few minutes?" says Larksease. She looks at me, then cringes back into the crook of her mother's arm as I glower my most impressively.
"That's not quite the same," says Qinefer, a laugh briefly splitting her voice into separate strands, "but it's near enough. Now, pay attention to me, you impudent minx – and you, too, my twitch-nosed buffo – and let your father do as he wills. Otherwise you'll never know what happened to Brightjacket."
They pay dutiful attention, even though they've heard a thousand times what happened to Brightjacket.
"'We cannot fight, and we cannot survive if we but bide,' he says at last, his chin in his palm as if he were thinking all this afresh. 'So what is there that is left for us to do? Why – we must surely flee!'
"This makes a growl rise above the heads of young and old alike, as if Snowdon had heard Brightjacket's words and was registering gruff disapproval. If you've never heard an angry mountain speak its anger, then you don't know what anger sounds like." Two pairs of wide eyes on hers. "For a while it looks as if they may join their voices in a song that would rend Brightjacket one limb from the other, but he holds out his palms to them, and at last the moment is past.
"Another eldern pushes his way to the fore. 'Our people do not flee!' he bellows. 'We have always faced down peril. We are not cowards, are we?'
"And there's a huge bay of agreeing to this, of course. Fine words are always good to cheer to; they've killed more armies than weapons have. Not one of the folk gathered there wants to stand up and say, 'Yes, I'm a coward. I admit it, and I want to save my furry skin.' Not one of them except Brightjacket, but he doesn't put it quite that way.
"'It is our duty,' he says gravely, 'to do all that we can to preserve our kind. To stay here is to accept not just our own deaths but also those of our weans; and from their weans we would be taking away the chance of their first opening of their eyes. Can any among you here say that we have the right to throw away those lives?'
"Once again there's a hubbub. Some folk say he's right; others say he's just weaving spoken-words, making a Deceiving-chord too subtle for any of them to recognize as such. But the end of it all – and the end is a long time in coming, I assure you – is that more than three-fourths of the folk in the cavern say that Brightjacket's right, and that only flight can save the Finefolk. But where can they flee to? Even the ocean's deeps are being plumbed by the Ironfolk and their tools of crafted
"'All the time it's getting worse,' he says into the silence of their resentment. 'Soon there will be no room for us even to pipe simple Changing-spells on a fipple-flute, or to sing the song that brings Sirius's winter rising.'
"'But what can we do?' says an eldern dismissively – or maybe it was several eldern, or all of them together, their beards making a sound like cuckoo-spit shaking loose. 'We cannot fight the Ironfolk, not without weapons of crafted metal we can't; and they alone of all the Earth's creatures have ears that are deaf to our music. I have myself hurled a Chord-of-dying straight into the face of one, and he heard not a gnat's whine!'
"'You're right,' says Brightjacket forthrightly. 'We cannot fight them. The time when we could have done that is a million years gone. And we cannot stay, and let ourselves be destroyed. So surely you must see there is only one course open to us?'
"All is silence again. They know what he is talking about – naturally they do, for our folk have never been without wits, although often stupid, and blinkered, and loath to change their doings. But knowing a thing and admitting you know it are two quite different matters."
"Like you not knowing that Daddy's been listening to you the past few minutes?" says Larksease. She looks at me, then cringes back into the crook of her mother's arm as I glower my most impressively.
"That's not quite the same," says Qinefer, a laugh briefly splitting her voice into separate strands, "but it's near enough. Now, pay attention to me, you impudent minx – and you, too, my twitch-nosed buffo – and let your father do as he wills. Otherwise you'll never know what happened to Brightjacket."
They pay dutiful attention, even though they've heard a thousand times what happened to Brightjacket.
"'We cannot fight, and we cannot survive if we but bide,' he says at last, his chin in his palm as if he were thinking all this afresh. 'So what is there that is left for us to do? Why – we must surely flee!'
"This makes a growl rise above the heads of young and old alike, as if Snowdon had heard Brightjacket's words and was registering gruff disapproval. If you've never heard an angry mountain speak its anger, then you don't know what anger sounds like." Two pairs of wide eyes on hers. "For a while it looks as if they may join their voices in a song that would rend Brightjacket one limb from the other, but he holds out his palms to them, and at last the moment is past.
"Another eldern pushes his way to the fore. 'Our people do not flee!' he bellows. 'We have always faced down peril. We are not cowards, are we?'
"And there's a huge bay of agreeing to this, of course. Fine words are always good to cheer to; they've killed more armies than weapons have. Not one of the folk gathered there wants to stand up and say, 'Yes, I'm a coward. I admit it, and I want to save my furry skin.' Not one of them except Brightjacket, but he doesn't put it quite that way.
"'It is our duty,' he says gravely, 'to do all that we can to preserve our kind. To stay here is to accept not just our own deaths but also those of our weans; and from their weans we would be taking away the chance of their first opening of their eyes. Can any among you here say that we have the right to throw away those lives?'
"Once again there's a hubbub. Some folk say he's right; others say he's just weaving spoken-words, making a Deceiving-chord too subtle for any of them to recognize as such. But the end of it all – and the end is a long time in coming, I assure you – is that more than three-fourths of the folk in the cavern say that Brightjacket's right, and that only flight can save the Finefolk. But where can they flee to? Even the ocean's deeps are being plumbed by the Ironfolk and their tools of crafted
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