"Out! Out! Sun-witch! Kin-eater! Feather-plucker! Get out, out!"

The coast thronged with furious life. Mitts, claws, and tentacles waved in a sea of white feathers and ice-blue eyes that clung to the cliffs like a throbbing paste. Broad wings flapped precariously as those on the edge fought to keep their balance. Stones and sticks flew to clatter and skid across the ice, an ethereal plane lit in a brilliant glow by the rising sun.

Several of the bravest Katyusha - small, white, lithe and feathery things, with feeler-mouths and ocean-eyes - had ventured down the cliffs to stand on the rocky beach at the brink of the ice, waving cane staffs and shouting curses. The object of their rage stood some fifty meters away, not daring to approach the frothing crowd of its kindred on the shore, yet just as loathe to flee into the Great White Unknown. Its talons slipped and clacked on the ice as it scuttled nervously backwards.

With a roar, one of the cliff-dwellers launched itself into the air and, feathers puffed in the chill morning air, soared cleanly downwards; three, five, nine more were quick to follow. The Katyusha on the ice gave a yelp and scrambled away in fright. It hopped, it strained, and its featherless wings swatted mightily at the air, but the creature could not quit the ground. After one more leap the Katyusha resigned itself and put all its energy into bounding away from the rocky beach with its maddened host. Its pursuers flapped up and away and soared back across the ice to the coast, where they were greeted with cheers and swarmed in stifling embraces. As the crowd began to calm and dissipate back beyond the jutting stone cliffs, a lone, sing-song voice drifted like a ghost from far across the white plain, where the fleeing Katyusha had stopped and turned back.

"Horrid forage! Wild beasts!
River shivers! Nothing eats!
Muddied-bloodied, frigid winters,
Scream-dreams, death-days, feather-splinters!
Fish flee, grass die,
Mountains fall, lakes dry!
Brood weep! Children cry!"

But, receiving little response from the faraway cliffs, the Katyusha rested its maw and turned once more into the clear whiteness; in the light of the sun the ice was blinding and the air seemed to shimmer. The plain continued for miles and miles, yet not a speck marred the whiteness in any direction. The creature began its march and this time did not turn back, even as day passed day, thirst came and went, and ground and sky became merged in one singular field of unending blank.

On the cliffs, the most stalwart Katyusha watched as the figure disappeared across the ice, but as the sun climbed higher they each retired to their dens; some had many miles to fly before reaching home. And the sun reached its apex, and fell, and all was quiet on the broad rocky beach.