Now Tilly was mostly grown, and her parents were starting to despair of her ever finding a husband among the other moon-birds. She was still wild, and ran freely among the other boys, and some were starting to doubt her purity. But she still had every feather in her beautiful tail, so no one could accuse her. But the people still stared at her whenever she went to the moon-dances or moon-temple, and she no longer had any friends, not even among her sisters.

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One day, the king of the moon-birds came to Tilly's house. He said that word had been sent by their cousins, the dodo-birds, and that their need for a new queen was dire. The dodo-birds were dying, and no one knew why. He knew of no one else to send, but he had heard of Tilly's adventures and bravery, so he asked her if she would go. Tilly felt torn: she had yet to walk all the way through the darkness, and she loved her family very much. She had never thought much of the Earth--their small and distant cousin, which rotated beneath the moon--because it seemed so very far away.

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Stay to explore the Dark Side of the Moon / Go to Earth