On the Fleet flagship, Rodonis hears the rattling of wings that have been cut from a slave and hung on a yardarm. (Ythrian slaves also have clipped wings although I think that, in that case, they can grow back.) Rodonis imagines her imprisoned husband bearing red stumps on his back.
When, in Neil Gaiman's The Sandman: Season Of Mists, Lucifer Morningstar resigns and retires as Lord of Hell, he asks Morpheus to cut off his wings. One panel, which I could not find by googling, shows red stumps on his back.
A single fictional universe can contain realms as diverse as Gotham City, the Dreaming and Hell. A multiverse contains even more. A version of the Adversary speaks in Poul Anderson's Operation Chaos although, since this prosaic, non-visual version is more like a personified abstraction of evil, he is not described as either embodied or winged.
Addendum: Concerning Ythrians:
"'...the feathers could grow back...'"
-Poul Anderson, The People Of The Wind IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2011), pp. 437-662 AT IV, p. 486.
Kaor, Paul!
ReplyDeleteYes, the clipped wings of Ythrian slaves mentioned in Chapter IV of THE PEOPLE OF THE WING could grow back. Ythrian slavery does not seem to have been permanent. I get the impression that it was used as a punishment for crime and was of varying lengths. Yes, clipping was much milder than the grimmer, and permanent cutting off of a Diomedean's wings in THE MAN WHO COUNTS.
Sean