There were bright rags hanging off the branches of a tree. A lot of rags, and not all bright any more. Some were new, others fading, and now he could see that what he’d at first taken for swags of lichen or rotting leaves were yet more bits of cloth, mouldering away to nothing. He wondered for a second how the wind had brought so many rags to a single tree, and then saw that each was knotted on.
