We were entertaining a friend of ours, Corwyn & I, with stories from that year's Will's Revenge (X). We were telling her about the swamp monster shoot, when all the archers line up and try to hit the sea dragon floating on the surface of the pond. Quite fun, really! The hiss of arrows, the burr of flu-flu's, the whip of atlat'l darts, the soft swearing of a king and his entourage as all the arrows miss ... aahhh, what an evening!
Until the ducks winged by overhead. Now, I'm used to that sound, since I grew up on a river. And I'm the daughter of one of the best hunters around, so I know what that sound means! "Dinner!" I shouted, pointing to the ducks. And some people whirled their bows around, trying to get a bead!
And darned if those ducks didn't do a frantic power dive to get out of the way!
Now, how many blasted centuries has it been since ducks have been hunted with bow and arrow? Okay, I'm overstating my case a smidge. But still! I can see if the ducks heard a bang first, then ducked (pun intended) into a corner of the lake. But these were bows! Are there duck stories around the waterweed, late at night when the humans go to bed, where granther duck tells the young'uns about bows, and boomerangs, and atlat'ls while Papa duck snorts and tells him about how shotguns are sooooo much bigger and scarier?
"Waaaall, when I was yer age, there were no boom-sticks at the lakeside! We didn't have no 'boom' to warn us! We had to see those durned hunters with our own two peepers! Young'uns're gettin' soft, jest listening fer the 'boom'! And we had to fly uphill both ways to get to our pond!"
"You know, great-great-great-great grandpa duck told us the bows would come back, always said they would, and here they are! Everyone thought old Grandda was balmy, never listened to a word he quacked, and here he's been right all along! Geez, next thing they'll be throwing axes or boomerangs at us!"
That's what we talked about. And our friend thought I should write an article about it, and maybe start writing up a book of short stories.
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