Havens by AdmirableMonster

Crane

The cranes are flying south, great grey wings passing overhead in a dream-like rush.  Pengolodh shields his eyes and looks up at them.  At first there are only a few, passing overhead one at a time, but soon the entire sky is filled with feathers.  A few drop, catching the wind and fluttering down like leaves, and Pengolodh catches one.  It is half the length of his palm, made of soft zipper-like spines along a light, central backbone.  He thinks, before he catches himself, that Maeglin ought to have studied birds more often, for the cleverness of their feathers sealing up against the damp and the rain.

The cranes move swifter than the weary refugees.  Within only a few hours, the sky is empty.  Pengolodh feels the loss with a queer acuteness.  He concentrates on putting one foot in front of the other and tries not to imagine what it would be like to fly, untethered, in the blue sky above the weight of the earth.