"You have not known me, O traveler, but I pray you listen to the tales and misfortunes that befell a most curious old she-deer. Such a tale comes smooth and strong from oil-black lips, flicked away by tremendous ears. Once more however, ye olde stags with tines that thorn the heavens, and ye hinds with withered visage, come hither, and I pray you listen. This tale of a most curious old she-deer is not to be repeated, it will escape the lips of a nomad as the truth only once, and only the air shall retain its melody. The tale of a most curious old she-deer whom I never met, in which a thousand soft stares of pity could not arouse her from her dillusions. I watched her live, and I watched her die. Now; time rolls back and many suns fall, and we arrive nearly one year ago in The Endless Forest."
The First Encounter
[=9]"The first time I saw her, she never saw me. She was emersed in her activities; browsing the grass and lower branches with a syrupy-warm demeanor. Her belly was round with fawn, and now and again she lifted her head to chatter sweetly to the sleeping infant. I moved on, uninterested, clodding along to the fading maternal tune of her voice.
The evening drawled on uneventfully, and while I rested wearily in the reeds, a noise startled my rumination. From the cattails poked a most curious older hind, adorned with vivid plume and the same tasteful cheeriness. She drank deeply and noticed me not. She was not very keen on her surroundings, this one, humming with pleasure and having her fluff of a tail fly madly behind her. This old hind was more birdlike than I had given her credit; even the forest floor was draped with a magnificent train of feathers, long and glittery green.
