Hawkmistress! A DARKOVER NOVEL by Marion Zimmer Bradley

She fumbled one-handed in the semidarkness, and blessed the persevering practice which had taught her all the falconer’s knots, blindfolded and one-handed; old Davin had emphasized that, again and again, most of the time you will be in a dark mews, and one hand will be busy about your hawk. And so, hour after hour, she had tightened and loosened, tied and untied these same knots on twig after twig before ever she was let near the thin legs of any bird. The leather was damp with the sweat of her fingers, but she managed to loosen it slightly-not too much or the bird would be out of the jesses and would fly free, perhaps breaking her wings inside the walls of the mews, but loose enough so that it was no longer cutting into the leathery skin of the upper leg. Then she bent again and fumbled in the straw for the strip of meat, brushing the dirt from it. She knew it did not matter too much-birds, she knew, had to swallow dirt and stones to grind up their food inside their crops-but the dirty bits of straw clinging to the meat revolted her and she picked them fastidiously free and, once again, held out her gloved hand to the hawk on the block. Would the bird ever feed from her hand? Well, she must simply stay here until hunger overcame fear and the bird took the meat, or they would lose this hawk, too. And Romilly had resolved this would not happen.

She was glad, now, that she had let the other bird go. At first she had it in her mind, when she had found old Davin tossing and moaning with the summer fever, that she could save both of the hawks he had taken three days before. He had told her to let them both go, or they would starve, for they would not yet take food from any human hand. When he had captured them, he had promised Romilly that she should have the training of one of them while he was busied with the other. But then the fever had come to Falconsward, and when he had taken the sickness, he had told her to release them both-there would be other seasons, other hawks.

But they were valuable birds, the finest verrin hawks he had taken for many seasons. Loosing the larger of the two, Romilly had known Davin was right. A hawk like this was all but priceless-King Carolin in Carcosa has no finer birds, Davin had said, and he should know; Romilly’s grandfather had been hawkmaster to the exiled King Carolin before the rebellion which had sent Carolin into the Hellers and probably ,to death, and the usurper Rakhal had sent most of Carolin’s men to their own estates, surrounding himself with men he could trust.

It had been his own loss; Romilly’s grandfather was known from the Kadarin to the Sea of Dalereuth as the finest man with hawks in the Kilghard Hills, and he had taught all his arts to Mikhail, now The MacAran, and to his commoner cousin Davin Hawkmaster. Verrin hawks, taken full-grown in the wild, were more stubborn than hatchlings reared to handling; a bird caught wild might let itself starve before it would take food from the hand, and better it should fly free to hatch others of the same fine breed, than die of fear and hunger in the mews, untamed.

So Romilly, with regret, had taken the larger of the birds from the mews, and slipped the jesses from the leathery skin of the leg; and, behind the stables, had climbed to a high rock and let her fly free. Her eyes had blurred with tears as she watched the falcon climb out of sight, and deep within her, something had flown with the hawk, in the wild ecstasy of rising, spiraling, free, free … for an instant Romilly had seen the dizzying panorama of Castle Falconsward lying below, deep ravines filled to the brim with forest, and far away a white shape, glimmering, that she knew to be Hali Tower on the shores of the Lake . . . was her brother there, even now? . . . and then she was alone again, shivering with the cold on the high rock, and her eyes were dazzled from staring into the light, and the hawk was gone.

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *