"Every few days one or two or a little conclave would arrive with dainty chitin steps. They would enter The Cravat, their fanwings twitching, wearing clothes for display - sashes fronded with fins and filigrees that each caught the wind with a particular sound, as distinct as garish colours." - pg 114

-mild spoilers-

"Before the humans came we didn't speak. We've been like the countless things, we've been all things, we've been like the animals over Embassytown in the direction of which I raise my giftwing, which is a speaking you'll come to understand. We didn't speak, we were mute, we only dropped the stones we mentioned out of our mouths and had the birds we described fly out, we were vectors, we were the birds eating in mindlessness, we were the girl in darkness, only knowing it when we weren't anymore." - pg 336