She said, her words stumbling over themselves, “I was-I said-brought up-I know some of them-”
“Born the wrong side of the bed? Aye, it’s an old enough story in these hills, and elsewhere too,” said Dom Carlo, “Which is why that ruffian Rakhal sits on the throne and Carolin awaits us in Nevarsin.”
“You know the king well, sir? You seem one of the Hali’imyn.”
“Why, so I am,” Dom Carlo said easily, “No, Orain, don’t look like that, the word’s not the insult in these mountains that it would be South of the Kadarin. The boy means no harm. Know the king? I have not seen him often,” Dom Carlo said, “but he is kin to me, and I hold by him. As I said, a few too many bastards with ambitions put Carolin in this difficulty – his father was too tender-hearted with his ambitious kinsmen, and only a tyrant assures his throne by murdering all others with the shadow of a claim to it. So I have sympathy with your plight, boy – if the usurper Rakhal laid hands on me, for instance, or any of Carolin’s sons, their heads would soon be decorating the walls of his castle. I suppose you have some of the MacAran donas, though, or you could not handle beasts as you do. There is a MacAran laranzu in Tramontana – it is to him and his fellow workers that we mean these birds to go, in the end. Know you anything of sentry-birds, then, my boy?”
Romilly shook her head. “Not until today did I ever set eyes on one, though I have heard they are used for spying.”
“True,” said Dom Carlo, “One who has the laran of your family or something like to it, must work with them, stay in rapport as they fly where you wish to see. If there is an army on the road, you can spy out their numbers and report their movements. The side with the best-trained spy-birds is often the side that wins the battle, for they can take the other by surprise.”
“And these are to be trained for this?”
“They must be trained so that they can be handled easily,” said Carlo. “A royal gift this was, from one of Carolin’s supporters in these hills; but my men knew little of them, which is why it is as if the very Gods sent you to us, who can keep them in health and perhaps gentle them a little to working.”
“The one who will fly them at last should do that,” Romilly said, “but I will try hard to accustom them to human hands and human voices, and keep them healthy and properly fed.” And she wondered; for Ruyven was at Tramontana, so she had heard, and perhaps he was the laranzu for whose hands these birds were destined. How strangely Fate turned . . . perhaps, if she could make her way to Tramontana, her gifts could be trained to the handling of such birds. “If your men have any hunting skills, it would be well if they could bring down some medium-small game and feed it to the birds, but not too fresh, unless they can cut it up very fine and feed them skin and feathers with it…”
“I’ll leave their diet to you,” Dom Carlo said, “And if you have any trouble with them, tell me. These are valuable creatures and I’ll not have them mishandled.” He looked up into the sky, crimsoning as the great sun began to decline somewhat from noon, where, just at the very edge of sight, Romilly could see Preciosa, a tiny dark speck hovering near. “Your hawk stays near even when she flies free? How did you train her to that? What is her name?”
“Preciosa, sir.”
“Preciosa,” jeered the man Alaric, coming to saddle Dom Carlo’s horse, “Like a wee girl naming her doll!”
“Don’t mock the lad,” Dom Carlo said gently, “Till you can better his way with the birds, we need his skills. And you should take better care of your own beast – a chervine can be well-kept, even if he is not a horse. You should thank Rumal for finding the stone in Greywalker’s hoof!”