Wabi by Joseph Bruchac

eyes can move farther on their own.”
    That was true, disconcertingly so. My eyes were not acting properly. Instead of moving with my head, they seemed able to float around on their own. Up and down. Back and forth. It made me dizzy. I closed my eyes tightly. Finally, cautiously, I opened them again, trying to keep careful control of them. Turning both my head and my new, wobbly eyes, I looked once more at the deep, man-shaped indentation in the earth where I had lain.
    â€œMy great-grandfather?” I said.
    â€œHoo-hooo,” Great-grandmother replied, bobbing her head. “You have taken back what your great-grandfather left behind.”
    â€œThen my mother was not the first in our family to change shape? My great-grandfather too was a human who changed?”
    It may seem silly that I spoke it as a question, but there was so much going through my mind at that moment. On the one wing, I had never been more confused. On the other I felt as if I knew and understood more than I had ever known and understood before.
    â€œHis human name was Nadialid. He who hunts,” Great-grandmother hooted in a voice that was both sad and proud. “But I will not tell you his story today. It is your time, great-grandson.”
    â€œBut I have more questions,” I said. “There are more things I must know. Will I always stay a human now? Can I ever change back into an owl again?”
    It was strange how speaking with human lips made words flow so quickly. I had always asked lots of questions, but now I had twice as many to ask and it seemed that I could ask them twice as fast.
    Great-grandmother looked amused. “You are who you are,” she said. “It will be your choice, great-grandson. Who you really are will never change. Feel your ears.”
    I reached up. To my surprise, the tops of my ears were long and feathery. They stuck up out of my thick black hair just as the two tufts on top of my head had done when I was an owl.
    â€œOh no,” I moaned. “Now anyone who sees me will know I am different.”
    My new ears felt pleasant to the touch, but they were a major problem. If I looked in any way like an owl, the humans would not accept me. They might even suspect me of being a monster in disguise.
    â€œGrandmother,” I pleaded, “this is serious. I have to hide these.”
    â€œAre you sure you want to cover your lovely ears?”
    â€œYes,” I said. “I am very sure. Tell me what I can do.”
    Grandmother did not reply. Instead she just lifted her foot and pointed with her claw at the leather headband that still remained on the ground. I had seen such headbands worn by the men of Dojihla’s village. I understood. I picked up the leather and wrapped it tightly around my head. Now my owl’s ears were pressed down and concealed by the headband. Now I looked like a proper human being.

CHAPTER 17
    Hello, My Friends
    THERE ARE MANY GOOD REASONS to listen to stories. That day I learned yet another one. If you have heard many stories told to you, it is easy for you to make up new ones to tell to others.
    I sat next to the fire looking around the circle of smiling people. Well, not all of them were smiling. Some of the young men who clearly prided themselves on being the best hunters in their respective villages no longer looked so sure of themselves. They did not look so self-satisfied as they had been before I walked into the circle of light cast by the campfire that burns each night in the center of Wolhanadanak.
    Wolhanadanak, Valley Village. That is the name Dojihla and her people call this little town where they live. I learned that and any number of things I had never taken notice of before by listening, listening in a different way.
    Just as my eyes were not the same as when I had been an owl, so too were my ears changed. Unlike my owl ears, these human ones were set exactly opposite each other on my head. An owl’s ears are placed in a better way,