Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Oxpeckers

Oxpeckers feed on blood, suckling at wounds and staining their yellow beaks red. They pull out soft, half-dead flesh for their chicks to swallow, then tear at healthy muscle for themselves. They can smell blood on the wind from miles away, and will converge on even the smallest cut. Where they range, no open injury is allowed to heal but is pecked and torn and pulled apart until the animal dies from infection, weeks later.

Friday, February 23, 2018

Blackflies

From spring until the first frost, the wetlands of Canada swarm with blackflies. Some feed on nectar, others feed on blood. Most lay their eggs in water, some lay their eggs in flesh. Most of those that lay their eggs in flesh prefer dead flesh, but there is one species that prefers the flesh of the living.

The flies are small, so small that their ovipositors cannot pierce skin. They therefore lay there eggs in whatever soft tissue they can access: open wounds, open mouths, your sinuses, your lungs, your stomach. Throughout summer moose and deer wander the wilderness, snorting blood and larvae.

Monday, February 12, 2018

The Fields of the Sky

Go south. As you pass the equator, you enter the fields of the sky.

Birds rule here. Terrorbirds hunt down flocks of Ostriches and Gamebirds through the grass. The only non-avians are the snakes, which swarm the rivers, and feral cats, introduced by travelers.

The people here carve citadel-manors out of the great pillars of red stone, and surround them with tall white dovecotes. The women keep themselves meticulously hairless, the men take pride in never shaving and being as hairy as apes. The people do not craft metal, but trade honey and eggs to passing merchants in exchange for metal tools and weapons. Their weapons are therefore of a great variety, each of a different type and from a different culture.

I have not seen this land, but this is what I have heard.

Friday, February 9, 2018

Wee Folk

Two millimeters tall, wee folk are easy prey for predatory insects. They therefore seek out virtuous people to keep them safe in decorative glass terrariums. They are masters of sand-grain masonry and moss gardening, and will quickly shape their new home to suit their needs. They resent being kept in captivity,but it is better than life in the wild.

Sometimes their keepers are cruel, and put spiders in the terrarium to watch the tiny people fight. If their need is great, the wee folk will risk an expedition, undertaking a great journey from their home, down the table, across the floor, climb the bed, crawl up their keeper's nose, and set off tiny mining charges. The keeper will awaken to a strange tickling sensation, shortly before dying of internal bleeding.