The parchment was delicious! First quality goatskin, probably prepared by Elven hands. The ink lent a delicate undercurrent to the fine writing material. Birdie could not help herself. She had barely eaten that evening, and the wine she had drunk before the fire had only stimulated her appetite. She ate until she felt she would burst out of her carapace.
Then the wine and food made Birdie do a very foolish thing, (though the stuffiness of the satchel may have been to blame as well). She fell asleep.
She awoke to a sudden chill of air and five massive logs falling down upon her. They bent and swayed, scraping the sides of the satchel and shaking her as violently as any earthquake. Birdie jumped instinctively upward, landing on a monsterous, hairy arm as she scrambled to keep her balance. But she slid down the arm and back into the groping fingers and masses of shredded parchment.
The gargantuan hand (as she now could see it) grasped letter, neekerbreeker, and all and pulled it into the moonlight. Birdie felt herself being squeezed as if between two tree trunks. She squirmed desperately as one of her antennae was bent painful back. In panic and fear, foreseeing a squishy death, she did the only thing she could do. She bit down - hard!
A sharp intake of breath and a muffled curse; then she was shaken off the hand and dropped painfully to the ground. Barely breathing and aching in every joint, she slowly crawled towards the shelter of the inn's steps, as scraps of parchment like lace fluttered down around her.
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