for gold and glory

In the pre-dawn light, Aster sleepily blinked open her eyes and straightened up. The forest’s canopy and fog blocked her visibility, but she could tell by the faint glow in the sky the sun hadn’t crested the horizon yet. Too early for her to wake. Therefore, something woke her.

The realization snapped her awake. The blue jay’s crest puffed out, all the feathers on her head standing out like a fuzzy halo. Her feet tangled in her single-night nest. Her feet tripped over the golden chains and shiny stones she’d found amongst the forest’s moss, and the metallic click-clanks sounded as loud as falling trees in the silent forest.

When her feet stilled, her balance still wobbled. Aster realized the tree itself was vibrating. The branch she’d slept on wobbled, and she shrieked in alarm as she took to the air. Other bird cries filled the air from awoken neighbors, but she couldn’t tell from their returning calls what this was. Not an owl or a hawk. Not an earthquake.

Aster circled the tree, her puffed-out crest signaling her fear even as she stayed to investigate. When she glided by the tree’s side where her nest was located, she saw a wolf scaling the branches and with its eyes on her golden stash.

“How dare you! Is it not enough that you wolves own the ground?” Aster shrieked. “That is my nest and I was sleeping and that’s my shiny collection, you mammal!” Mammal, of course, was the highest insult to blue jays. “Leave at once, or I’ll make you!”