The Enchanted Aviary: The Divination Birds

They were the tiniest of sparrows, the type that had heart attacks and dropped dead whenever stray cats stared at them. The bird men dyed them in different colors so that children would be attracted to them as they were sold in ball-shaped cages outside churches. One never asked whether they were captured or bred in captivity. They were most probably captured in the wild, fed and watered, and inured to the prisons where they met fellow-sparrows from other towns. They were compelled to know a kind of happiness, though not freedom, in being cared for by humans. Thus did they eventually give up hope that, as soon as men and women had finally solved their problems in human trafficking, they would extend similar solutions to the trafficking of other creatures.

The bird man from P_________ was different from the rest. Though he traveled miles from his home to Cubao twice a week and back, he chose to do business only with those who could assure him that they would provide good homes for his birds. He offered his entire bevy of sparrows. The old hermit whose doorstep he came to knew that they were divination birds, as all birds really are.

To the passersby the sparrows were ordinary pet birds in a huge, rectangular, white cage hanging highest inside the small loggia of the hermitage.  They provided cheer with their incessant chirping and hopping about. There were 16 in all. Four of them were dyed a deep ruby, four more, dark emerald, another four, blue sapphire, the remaining four, yellow topaz.

The ruby birds were attuned to fire disasters and could sense them wherever they were occurring in the metropolis. The emeralds were attuned to earthquakes, knowing when they were coming days before anyone did. The sapphires were attuned to rain and thunderstorms, and the topazes to air disasters such as tornadoes, cyclones, and plane accidents. The hermit could tell whether something dark was brewing, no matter how far and no matter how near. The tiny birds, normally perched in rows on their bamboo rods if not pecking at their millet or dipping their beaks in their water dispensers, would be clinging excitedly on the side wires of the huge cage, facing north, south, east, or west, depending on where the vibrations of danger were coming from.

The hermit cloaked the cage with a white scarf to protect the sparrows from harsh sunlight and dawn moisture. The cage was also furnished with five, wooden houses they could nestle in. On normal days the birds would gather round a translucent, green, crystal ball set on a stand on the floor of the cage, gazing into its depths, as though deriving energy from it. It was, as a matter of fact, their favorite pastime. Aside from the joy and empowerment it gave them, it also warded predators off their cage.

Soon the neighbors enjoyed coming to visit the divination birds. They had alerted the hermit, twice since their arrival, of three typhoons long before they were detected by the weather stations. The neighbors came not only to consult the birds on personal matters but to have the pleasure of looking at them as well.