will you even notice
Aster stood up and stopped over where the woman started to pack the ground herbs into another smaller cloth. Standing almost a head above her, he realized that she must have been a small human, or he a large one.
The tunic-clad youth fidgeted with the cloth wrapped around his neck, his fingers pressed against the material like a bloodhound runs his nose over a new scent. The sudden urge to touch and taste and smell everything overtook Aster, as he almost reached forward to feel the woman’s hair. An internal discomfort stopped him, as he imagined someone else prodding his feathers in his Hummingform. That may not have been the move to make upon her.
“Tea and clothes, sure.” Now that Aster’s mouth no longer fought against a bitter taste, he could pay attention to the consonants and vowels his teethed jaw was so easily able to form. Now that he thought about it, talking was still a strange experience that introduced weird words to him. He guessed the thing she was packing in the small cloth was tea.
Aster settled for running his fingers across her table instead of tampering with anything else, and observed the peculiar motion of her hanging an object over living flames.
He crouched over beside the fire, watching the flames lap upward and sometimes touch the metal vessel. “You’re called Farrow.” Aster tried to imagine how he’d sing that as a Hummer.
“Aster. I was named Aster by my parents. But that was long ago. Hummers don’t really use names.” He reached out his hands to feel the heat from the flames. Everything in him said to touch, but he knew better than to stare at the sun. It felt the same way, putting his hand close to the hearth’s dancing tongues.
“Why do you keep that so far away from the thing below… do you call that fire?” Aster wasn’t sure how he knew, but it seemed the fitting name. The word fire felt familiar on his tongue, like the green feathers he got from his mother, the birdsong he learned from his father. He wondered if they both spoke human speech like he did.
The tunic-clad youth fidgeted with the cloth wrapped around his neck, his fingers pressed against the material like a bloodhound runs his nose over a new scent. The sudden urge to touch and taste and smell everything overtook Aster, as he almost reached forward to feel the woman’s hair. An internal discomfort stopped him, as he imagined someone else prodding his feathers in his Hummingform. That may not have been the move to make upon her.
“Tea and clothes, sure.” Now that Aster’s mouth no longer fought against a bitter taste, he could pay attention to the consonants and vowels his teethed jaw was so easily able to form. Now that he thought about it, talking was still a strange experience that introduced weird words to him. He guessed the thing she was packing in the small cloth was tea.
Aster settled for running his fingers across her table instead of tampering with anything else, and observed the peculiar motion of her hanging an object over living flames.
He crouched over beside the fire, watching the flames lap upward and sometimes touch the metal vessel. “You’re called Farrow.” Aster tried to imagine how he’d sing that as a Hummer.
“Aster. I was named Aster by my parents. But that was long ago. Hummers don’t really use names.” He reached out his hands to feel the heat from the flames. Everything in him said to touch, but he knew better than to stare at the sun. It felt the same way, putting his hand close to the hearth’s dancing tongues.
“Why do you keep that so far away from the thing below… do you call that fire?” Aster wasn’t sure how he knew, but it seemed the fitting name. The word fire felt familiar on his tongue, like the green feathers he got from his mother, the birdsong he learned from his father. He wondered if they both spoke human speech like he did.
when I'm not around?
Aster
