From Bentari, chapter 16 “The Darkest, Stillest Part of the Night”:

“Not even the river slowed Bentari’s progress. He could have swum the distance rapidly enough, but he knew that crocodiles lurked in nearby dens and hippos dozed in groups in pools along the banks. Like most of his travels, the brave lad flew over the dark waters. He found himself far enough up river that the giant forest trees almost reached across from one shore to the other. With an acrobat’s agility, he gained momentum in two swift, swinging arcs downward from the top of an emergent silver oak. Then he catapulted himself high into the narrow space above the river. His descent brought him perfectly within the reach of an umbrella tree’s branches on the opposite shore. Grasping the huge splayed fronds of the nearest branch, he came to a landing on the ground as smoothly as if the tree had been a net. “Oh! Excuse me, friend,” he said on his way down. “I hope I didn’t wake up the babies.” A colony of Veiellot’s weaver birds chattered disapprovingly as the branch sprang back up. Without a moment’s pause, Bentari sprinted north, but only as far as the nearest dangling liana that offered access to his preferred pathway high above in the canopy.”

Bentari speaks with animals in the novel. And he mimics animal sounds so well that neither human nor animal ear is sharp enough to tell that the author is a little boy.

Later in the chapter, the scene is set for the plot’s crescendo—again with support from an animal friend that speaks—and Bentari listens:

“How on this dark night did a boy so young find the precise whereabouts of his tribe’s enemy? Could his prodigal intuition have been so keen? Could his luck have led him with precision in such a vast land? Or, was it the screech of a distant kite, flying before the dawn to scavenge from man’s waste? No matter where men travelled, it seemed that the hawk-like kite was always overhead, ready to swoop after almost any scrap. Bentari surely knew of this bird’s habits. Or, did Bentari smell the camp? Could his senses, still keen and pure in youth and not dulled by over use or the apathy that can come with growing older; could his own olfactory and aural faculties have drawn him there over such a distance and through such impenetrable, stygian darkness? Was Lobedai, the forest deity, at hand and meddling with man’s destiny? The answers must be yes, and yes, and yes, though Bentari himself could probably never swear to any one, or all. Yet, there he found himself before the dawn began to penetrate the eastern sky. Unfazed by his skill, good fortune, or fate, the lad lowered himself branch-by-branch and gazed upon the oddest scenes that he had yet beheld. It was the darkest, stillest part of the night—a time not safe, not even for Bentari.”