He located the bird, and as he did so the small hairs on the back of his neck erected. That was more than the bird could do. It had no hair to stiffen, or feathers either. Nor skin, nor muscle or insides.
Sitting on the branch and preening itself with its naked white beak, the small flying creature ignored all the attention its presence had prompted. Satisfied, it spread proportionate, compact wings and rose from its perch, flying off into the forest, a small white specter comprised of nothing but naked, fleshless bones.
Ehomba had watched many birds in flight, and dragonets, and even certain specialized lizards and frogs, but this was the first time he had ever seen a skeleton fly.
IX
The skeletal sparrow was but the first of many they encountered as they drove deeper into the heart of the Hexens. There were more birds: crows and robins, jays and grosbeaks, neocaths and nuthatches. But they were not alone. It was not long before they found themselves traveling through a dense and dismal section of forest where flesh was scarce and scoured bone dominant.
Skeletal hares hopped among the roots of sheltering trees. Four-footed white skeletons scampered through the branches trailing furless vertebrae like the whiptails of scorpions. Once, a cluster of capybara peered up at the travelers from the shelter of their stream, staring at the wagon from the mindless depths of dark, voided eye sockets. For the travelers, it was unsettling enough to encounter such sights. To see them staring vacantly back was more unnerving still.