here once was a bird who stole the moon on her wedding day.

  It’s an odd place to start a story, but a story needs a beginning. Some come slow and quiet, like a thief making a grab. Others roll over you hard and fast, a battle between the words and your mind. This tale comes from a time before the gravediggers made the barrows that gave the place its name, and long before the valley folk.

  Shared tales are tricky, as each person tells it a bit different. The choice of words, the strange inflections, make each telling a unique piece. Stories are not plays, nor are they prayers. Stories are the creation and the created, and impart their wisdom in different ways. Now, the folk above the Bridge of Fleas tell this story to warn against the thieves who wear bird names, while The folk of the Barrow tell the tale as a man who was a bird, or a bird who was a man.

  No one asks the River Folk. If they did they would learn the truest form of the legend, and understand why it’s so important to know.

  How can you steal the moon? The valley folk know the moon was a gift given by Father Mountain to Mother River on their honeymoon, one that came somewhere between the golden fields to dress Her body and the rainbow to wear upon Her brow. The men before, or so those who study them say, called the moon a second sun, a dead sun that glowed in the heavens like a smith’s dull coal, and when the ember finally goes out the great beasts of the dark heavens will devour us all. And all know the moon is still in the sky.

  No one asked the River Folk, because they could tell you the moon was once a bride.

  She was a beautiful bride, her hair braided,skin pale and sweet as milk. She was locked away from the light of her mother, the fiery sun whose name is never spoken. It was a cruel man who stalked her down by the river, springing a net to catch her as she looked upon her reflection. He swore to wait until she grew old enough to wed, for he was a thief and a kidnapper but not some monster.

  Any River Folk will laugh then, as they know the trick the moon’s life played on the cruel, foolish man.

  You see, the moon is reborn anew every cycle. She is born, grows, swells with a child that is never born, then wanes, wasting away to a seed the size of a barleycorn - or, to the River Folk, a single grain of pearly white rice - only to be born again in the next cycle.

  What confusion! What dismay! The man - a great warrior or a powerful sorcerer depending on who you ask - wanders the land with a great palanquin upon which his desired lay. She grows, swells, and shrinks, and the sky is black without her in it. The stars still come, don’t worry, but from where may surprise you.

  The man went to the ones the River Folk call bakti, those sullen beasts with long tails and knowing purrs. The hunters fed him fish, birds fresh from flight, and red meat raw and bloody. He asked their leader, a great queen the size of a castle, “Can you make my wife stay still?”

  And the master of the bakti, she says to him “I can wait until she is grown to whatever size you like. Then I will kill her. And she will stay the same size, at least until you eat her.” And so the man sought further, because bakti are foolish creatures, knowing only claw and tooth and blood.

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  He went to the hanu, those beastly folk that look like tiny men covered in coarse hair. They fed him green plants, ripe fruits he had never seen, and bugs in all the colors of the sky. He asked their leader, a hanu so wise he was said to know the howling name of all things of the ground and trees, “Can you make my wife stay still?”

  And the master of the hanu, their lord he says to the man, “she has not always been of the land. She has climbed no tree, eaten no yellow fruit nor ruby red apple. I can feed her, fatten her up, and maybe she will not waste away.”

  And so the man sought further, because hanu are foolish creatures, knowing only fruits and the land, and eating until their bellies are full and happy.

  He went to the garu, the great birds. Once, it is said, their wings were shadows on the earth, and all feared them. They had sharp teeth, and sharper minds. They knew the names of all that flew through the sky or were trapped in their shadow. And so the man climbed to the highest mountain, the father of all mountains. Not Father Mountain, you must see, for there are tales of the contests between the two.

  He climbed the peaks and could hardly breathe. He shook and chattered in the cold, and the animals who bore his wife froze solid to the earth. He traveled so close to the sun mother that he feared being seen, so he walked on only in darkest night, carrying his beloved on his back.

  And so he came to the leader of the garu, the greatest of beasts above or below. The garu was the size of the world below, and brought night as he chased the mother Sun across the world, trying to defeat the only threat to his rule of all things.

  And the man, this foolish man, he asked “Mightiest hunter, greatest of beasts, can you tell me how to make my wife stay still?”

  And the garu snatched his wife, the daughter of the garu’s greatest enemy, off the man’s back and tucked her within the feathers of his wing. And with one mighty flap of the beast’s world-wrapping wings the man was tossed from the father of mountains to the ground below.

  He survived. Men were stronger in older times, as any father will tell his son.

  The man called a mighty council. He swayed them with his travels, his words - and if some are to be believed - his magics. The words are not important, though he called to his banner a thousand thousand spears.

  And so they waited. And then the man saw his wife in the dark beat of the garu’s wings, and he told the men not to hit her. They screamed and cursed, spoke spells and warcries, and threw their spears at the great beast.

  And each of their spears poked a hole in the garu’s mighty wings, and through those holes man now sees the light of the heavens as a star. And as the scraps of his wings fell they learned the cries of the men, and became the birds of the sky.

  There is no garu to be seen in the world today, but their leavings are all around the world. They sing, warble, and hoot. Some are fierce as the garu, still some as clever. But one must be wary of all.

  Because one day a bird may come again and steal the moon.