She hadn’t quite decided yet how to view the animal people. On the one hand, there was an exceptional beauty about them, an otherworldliness. Their “human” bodies moved across the world with an unusual ease, as if Earth’s gravity did not pull them too tightly. And their voices had a keenly musical quality. It wasn’t that the animal people barked out literal instrumental notes or sang when they spoke. Rather, their words ignited emotional responses Nina had previously only experienced through music.
