WINDSTEED

WINDSTEED

"The beast that bore her now down from the hills of Hallan was of finer breed, striped coat fitting sleek over hollow, buoyant bones, green eyes slitted against the wind, light and mighty wingssweeping up and down to either side of Semley, revealing and hiding, revealing and hiding the clouds above her and the hills below." 

"The striped windsteed rose and stalked softly on thick, hollow-boned legs to the water's edge."

"'Windsteeds!' Then he looked up and saw them, three great gryphon-cats circling down up on them, claws outstretched, wings black against the hot blue sky."

"Half-starved and overladen, the wind-steed gasped at each lift and downbeat of its great barred wings."
Ursula K. Le Guin, Rocannon's World

HERON

HERON
"The Victorian heron was not a heron; it was not even a bird. To describe their new world the exiles had had only words from their old world. The creatures that lived by the pools, one pair to a pool, were stilt-legged, pale-gray fish eaters: so they were herons. The first generation had known that they were not really herons, that they were not birds, nor reptiles, nor mammals. The following generations did not know what they were not, but did, in a way, know what they were. They were herons."

"Silent, angular, elegant, they nested in the drifts of red leaves among the roots, and fished for water creatures in the shallows, and gazed across the pool at human beings with large, round eyes as colorless as water."

"Like the gray heron of the Meeting Pool, there was a silence in her, a silence that drew him, drew him aside, toward a different center."
Ursula K. Le Guin, The Eye Of the Heron

POUCHBAT

POUCHBAT

"Hari watched him with benign amusement, as if he were a pouchbat." 

"Once every eight or ten years they flowered and bore a small edible fruit, the seeds of which were excreted by wotsits, pouchbats, farfallies, tree-coneys, and other fruit lovers."

Ursula K. Le Guin, The Eye Of the Heron

CONEY

CONEY

"The biggest herbivvore was the coney, a fat slow rabbity beast with fine waterproof scales all over it."
Ursula K. Le Guin, The Eye Of the Heron

OTAK

OTAK

“These creatures are found only on four southern isles of the Archipelago, Roke, Ensmer, Pody and Without. They are small and sleek, with broad face, and fur dark brown or brindle, and great bright eyes. Their teeth are cruel and their temper fierce, so they are not made pets of. They have no call or cry or any voice. Ged stroked this one, and it woke and yawned, showing a small brown tongue and white teeth, but was not afraid. ‘Otak,’ he said and then remembering the thousand names of beasts he had learned in the Tower he called it by its true name in the Old Speech, ‘Hoeg! Do you want to come with me?’”

Ursula K Le Guin, The Wizard Of Earthsea

LARVA

LARVA
"The biggest predator was the larva, red-eyed and shark-toothed, half a meter long. In captivity larvas bit and screeched in insane frenzy till they died."

Ursula K. Le Guin, The Eye Of the Heron

WOTSIT

WOTSIT

"And there, materializing like a wotsit out of nothing, and like a wotsit humpbacked, beady-eyed, and vaguely feathery, there was her duenna, Cousin Lores, who she thought had given up and gone home half an hour ago."

"Then with a hop or flight too quick for the eye to follow, it transferred itself to Luz's palm, and she felt the grip of six warm, tiny, wiry feet.

"The wotsit was now turning blue, the pure, azure blue of the sky between the peaks of the Eastern Range on days, like this day, of winter sunlight. The three gold pinhead eyes glittered. The wings bright and translucent, shot out, startling Luz."

Ursula K. Le Guin, The Eye Of the Heron

ALDEBARANIAN

ALDEBARANIAN
“It was, Haber thought in emotionless horror, a giant turtle. Then he realized that it was encased in a suit of some kind, which gave it a bulky, greenish, armored inexpressive look like a giant sea turtle standing on its hind legs.”

“A flat, toneless voice came out of the elbow joint.”

“The figure whirred a little, raised its left elbow over its head (which, turtle-like, hardly protruded above the great sloped shoulders of the carapace), and said, ‘Please excuse’”

“The Alien, though neckless and waistless, gave an impression of bowing, and passed on, huge and greenish above the gray-faced crowd.”

“A huge form emerged, seeming to float forward slowly, silent and reptilian: the proprietor was an Alien.”

“It raised its crooked left elbow and said, ‘Good day. Do you wish an object?’”
Ursula K. LeGuin, The Lathe Of Heaven

SCURE

SCURE

"I thought it was a man at first. Like a man. But it wasn't much bigger than a coney, when it went down on all fours. Dark-colored, with a reddish head--a big head, seemed too big for the rest of it. A center eye, like a wotsit, looking at me. Eyes on the sides too, I think, but I couldn't see it clear enough."

"Scures?"

"Old stories. Creatures like men, with glaring eyes, hairy. My father said they were men--exiles, or men who had wandered off, crazy men, gone wild."
Ursula K. Le Guin, They Eye Of the Heron

FARFALLIE

FARFALLIE

"Only the bright-winged farfallies and the wotsits ever consented to come near. Caged, a farfallie folded its wings and died; but if you put out honey for it, it might set up housekeeping on your roof, constructing there the little nest-like rain-cup in which, being semiaquatic, it slept."
Ursula K. Le Guin, The Eye Of the Heron