The Emperor's Ostrich by Julie Berry

Author:Julie Berry
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press

20

WHAT A NESTING DUCK MIGHT HAVE SEEN

The carnival caravan headed off slowly down the road. Farther along the beaten path, imperial soldiers on horseback, carrying one forlorn prisoner, traveled at a triumphant trot toward Lotus City and its gleaming palace.

High above the road that had only just been the sight of so many strange doings, a brilliantly colored wood duck swooped down from the sky in a graceful curve to alight upon a tree branch that led straight to the cavity in the tree trunk where his mate had chosen a nest.

Another male alighted upon the very same branch. The colorful drake, if he noticed, did not seem to mind. This male arrival was most definitely not a duck, nor a predator, nor even a bird at all.

A companion appeared at the newcomer’s side. A mate? If he was even watching, the duck couldn’t tell. Humans. They all looked the same. But did they usually float in midair? The branch did not bend or sway for either of these arrivals. If the duck had been of a scientific mind, this might have troubled him.

“There you are,” the newest arrival chirped in the other’s ear. “I’ve been looking for you. How do matters go today, dearie?”

The male said nothing.

The female took a deep breath. “About yesterday,” she said. “I was hasty in my choice of words. I still don’t think you should have tangled with my Begonia. But I don’t like spats between friends. I’ve come to forgive you.”

The male pushed his round spectacles down to the tip of his nose and stared at her over the tops of them.

“This is actually a nice look for you,” the female said brightly. “Big spectacles? Blue vest? Braided beard? I like it.”

The male human scowled at her. “You look like a wrinkled prune.”

She shrugged. “How else should a prune look, I’d like to know?” She elbowed him. “Has your emperor learned his lesson yet?”

No response.

“What’s that face for?” she asked. “I’ll bet you used to strike terror into the hearts of your enemies on the battlefield just by making a face like that.”

The duck’s gray-feathered mate quacked at him from deep within their hidden nest, and he waddled nearer along the limb’s length to give her the squirming crayfish he’d caught and brought for her dinner. She crunched it in her bill and gulped it down in an enthusiastic way that brought affectionate pride to the flying father-to-be’s heart.

Meanwhile, on the other end of the branch, male-female relations were less cordial.

“Go away,” the weightless man in the blue vest told the woman. “I’m busy.”

“Doing what?”

“Thinking.”

“An important occupation. I recommend it. But tell me, in all earnest, how goes your project? Has intervening helped the emperor grow wiser? Are things looking better in Camellion?”

He made a sort of growling sound. “They would be if it weren’t for you.”

“What?”

“The girl. Her cow. The boy. The cat.”

She stuck out her lower lip. “What about them?”

“You find it amusing to send in innocent children and creatures. You put them in harm’s way, you know.

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