Owls

The owls came more regularly now - at dusk, at morning, easily seen, or hooting the way they did just beyond what was predictably known. "Won't they be scared?" asked one of the youngers (fully fledged and in the thick of things for the first time). "Some, yes," the elder answered, "but that is as it may be." "In this place lives a being of promise," their hoots said (this was a thing they learned by repetition as an owlet). "Rise so that this promise may be realized," was the completion of the call. Some of the bipeds would, of course, get a chill or take a warning (growing frantic) and speak about omens of death, but that served the purpose of the owls as well as anything. "Why are we telling them to wake when we're calling them at bedtime?" the younger asked next (and the elders exchanged a look). "They can rise to the occasion of living without getting up," one of the elders explained, but there was no comprehension in the yellow eyes (dense as rocks, some of these newly fledged). "Just trust ... and watch," came the Great Horned Voice and then they were off in every direction.