But the dance seemed somehow to be
troubled and broken, and to return upon itself in an eddy, in place
of sweeping smoothly on.
And he soon learned, in the low short growls behind him, the cause
of the imperfection: they wanted to dance all round the tree, but
Lina would not permit them to come on her side.
Now curdie liked the birds, and did not altogether like Lina. But
neither, nor both together, made a reason for driving away the
princess's creature. Doubtless she had been the goblins' creature,
but the last time he saw her was in the king's house and the dove
tower, and at the old princess's feet. So he left her to do as she
would, and the dance of the birds continued only a semicircle,
troubled at the edges, and returning upon itself.
But their song and their motions, nevertheless, and the waving of
their wings, began at length to make him very sleepy. All the time
he had kept doubting whether they could really be birds, and the
sleepier he got, the more he imagined them something else, but he
suspected no harm.
Suddenly, just as he was sinking beneath the waves of slumber, he
awoke in fierce pain. The birds were upon him - all over him - and
had begun to tear him with beaks and claws. He had but time,
however, to feel that he could not move under their weight, when
they set up a hideous screaming, and scattered like a cloud.
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