"Beel! Beel!" Mercedes was jerking at Parker's leg. "What is 'appening?"
"Something," Parker answered. "I don't know what." There was fear in him. He could feel it in his heart, sense it in his bones, taste in his mouth. He rose above it.
The sound swept through the air. It came out over the trees above them. On the ground, the kneelers moaned in response.
The harping sound leaped up, became a melody of weird notes filling the night air. Mingled with the eerie music were the moans from the prostrate humans.
Looking upward, Parker caught a glimpse of something moving through the sky. It blotted out the light of the stars and it looked a lot like a bird but like no bird he had ever seen before. It was too big to be any bird that had ever flown through Earth's air, but yet it flew. As it flew, it made the sound of a gigantic harp.
The bird passed over the village, moving along the cliff. As it slid into the distance, the harp music faded slowly away, became again the sound of a sleepy bird.
Around the village, the prostrate humans moaned, stirred, began to rise.
"What the hell was that thing?" Parker gasped.
"The damned fools call it the Jezbro!" Retch snarled. "The yellow cowards are afraid of it. I don't know what it is."