—MN

The first ymbryne wasn’t a woman who could turn herself into a bird, but a bird who could turn herself into a woman. She was born into a family of goshawks, fierce hunters who didn’t appreciate their sister’s habit of becoming a fleshy, earthbound creature at unpredictable times, her sudden changes in size toppling them out of their nest, and her odd, babbling speech spoiling their hunts. Her father gave her the name Ymeene, which in the shrill language of goshawks meant “strange one,” and she felt the lonely burden of that strangeness from the time she was old enough to hold up her head.

Goshawks are territorial and proud, and love nothing more than a good, bloody fight. Ymeene was no different, and when a turf war erupted between their family and a band of harriers, she fought bravely, determined to prove she was every bit the goshawk her brothers were. They were outnumbered by the larger, stronger birds, but even when his children began to die in the skirmishes, Ymeene’s father would not admit defeat. In the end they repelled the harriers, but Ymeene was wounded and all her siblings but one were killed. Wondering what it had all been for, she asked her father why they had not simply run away and found another nest to live in.

“We had to defend the honor of our family,” he told her.

“But now our family is gone,” Ymeene replied. “Where’s the honor in that?”

“I don’t suppose a creature like you would understand,” he said, and straightening his feathers he leaped into the air and flew away to go hunting.

Ymeene did not join him. She had lost her taste for the hunt, and for blood and fighting, too, which for a goshawk was even stranger than turning into a human now and then. Perhaps she was never meant to be a hawk, she thought, as she winged down to the forest floor and landed on human legs. Perhaps she was born in the wrong body.

Ymeene wandered for a long time. She lingered around human settlements, studying them from the safety of treetops. Because she had stopped hunting, it was hunger that gave her the nerve to finally walk into a village and sneak bites of their food—roasted corn put out for chickens, pies left to cool on windowsills, unwatched pots of soup—and she found she had a taste for it. She learned some human language so that she could talk to them, and discovered that she enjoyed their company even more than their food. She liked the way they laughed and sang and showed one another love. So she chose a village at random and went to live there.

A kindly old man let her stay in his barn, and his wife taught Ymeene to sew so she would have a trade. Everything was going swimmingly until, a few days after she’d arrived, the village baker saw her turn into a bird. She hadn’t yet grown accustomed to sleeping in human form, so every night she changed into a goshawk, flew up into the trees, and fell asleep with her head tucked under her wing. The shocked villagers accused her of witchcraft and chased her away with torches.