Codex of the Eight Wildernesses · The Bone-Marsh Bird
By the black mere of Forgotten Bones lives the Bone-Marsh Bird, which feeds on words left unspoken and cries in broken human phrases. The fisher Da heard it carry his dead brother's last unfinished words.
[Haunt] The Codex says: in the southern wilderness lies a mere called Forgotten Bones. Its water is shallow and black, and in it sink the bones of many beasts, gathered unnamed.
[Form] There is a bird there, shaped like a crane but smaller, its feathers the color of wood long used for coffins. From its beak trails a wisp of blue smoke that never scatters. Its cry is like a child's weeping, and the hearer's heart turns sour.
[Nature] It eats no insect, no fish. It feeds only on unspoken words — when a man by the water wishes to speak and stops, the bird skims his lips, bears the word away, and hides it beneath the bones. Thus its cry often carries half a human phrase, broken and unfinished.
[Omen] When the bird circles the mere thrice and flies south, it portends a death far from home. When it lingers and will not leave, it portends a hidden grief unspoken in the house. By this the folk read ill and well.
[Account] The fisher Da, sleeping one night on the shore of Forgotten Bones, saw the bird circle with a word in its beak and would not leave. He listened closely, and it was the last broken phrase of his dead brother: "Brother, the rice…" Da threw himself down and wept. The bird spat the word upon the water; ripples formed characters, then vanished. At dawn Da found on the bank a worn coat of his brother's, and knew then his brother had long since perished in this mere. Ever after Da brought a sack of rice each year and cast it in; the bird took the rice and wept no more.