Hawkmistress! (19 page)

Now I am free. Now I must decide what to do with my freedom. She pondered, briefly, returning to Falconsward - but that would be taken, by her father, as a sign of abject surrender. Dom Garris might give her a slavery more comfortable that she would find with Rory in the woods; but she had not used all her ingenuity to get free of them, to go back to imprisonment.

No; she would seek the Tower, and training of her laran. She told herself, all the old tales of heroism and quests always begin with the hero having to overcome many trials. Now I am the hero - why is a hero always a man? - of my own quest, and I have passed the first trial.

And she shivered at the thought that this might be, not a road to freedom, but only the first of the main trials on her quest.

CHAPTER TWO

Romilly did not slacken her speed till the moon had set; riding in the dark, letting her horse have his head, she finally eased off the reins and let him slow to a walk. She was not sure herself quite where she was; she knew she had not taken the left-hand fork she should have taken at the bottom of the hill, to set her on the way to Nevarsin - it would have been all too easy for Rory to trace her that way. And now she knew that she was lost; she would not even be sure what direction she was riding until the sun should rise and she could get her bearings.

She found an overhanging clump of trees, unsaddled her horse and tied him at the foot of one tree, then wrapped herself in the cloak and the rough blanket she had caught up in her flight, digging into a little hollow at the foot of the tree. She was cold and cramped, but she slept, even though she kept starting out of sleep with nightmares in which a faceless man who was both Rory and Dom Garris - no, but he had a look of her father too - came down at her with inexorable slowness, while she could not move hand or foot. It was certain that if Rory ever set eyes on her again, she had better have her dagger ready. But someone had thrown her dagger down into the privy pit, and she could not look for it because her only clothing was one of her blood-stained rags, and somehow or other they were holding the Festival dance in the meadow where her father had his horse-fair… . She was wakened by the horse, restlessly snorting and nuzzling; the sun was up and the ice melting from the trees.

She had been lucky, in her breakneck flight last night, in the dark, that her horse had not broken a leg on the frosty road. Now, soberly, she took stock.

Among the things she had snatched up last night were a frozen quarter of rabbithorn meat, which she could cook and smoke - she had no salt for it, but in this weather it was not likely to spoil. At worst she could slice thin slivers away from the frozen haunch and eat them raw, though she had little liking for raw meat. She had lost flint and steel for firemaking … no, what a fool she was, she had her dagger and could search for a flint when the ice was thawed off the road. She had Rory’s coarse cloak instead of her own fur-lined one, but that was all to the good; it would keep her warm without exciting the same greed as her finely woven and embroidered one, lined with rich fur. She had boots and heavy leather breeches, her dagger, a few small hoarded coins in their hiding-place between her breasts - she had abandoned the pocket with its few bits; perhaps that and the good cloak would satisfy Rory’s greed and he would not pursue her. But she would take no chances, and press on. In her saddle-pack she had still a few pieces of the dog-bread on which she could feed her horse; she got out one of them, and gave it to the horse, letting him chew on the coarse grain while she arranged her clothing properly - she had fled the cottage half-dressed and all put together anyhow - and combed her short, ragged hair with her fingers. Certainly she must look disreputable enough to be a runaway hawkmaster’s apprentice! Now the sun was high; it would be a fine day, for already the trees were casting off their snow-pods and beginning to bud again. She shaved a few thin slices of frozen rabbithorn and chewed on them; the meat was tough and unsavory, but she had been taught that anything a bird could eat, a human could digest, and since the hawks were fed on such fare it would certainly not harm her, even if she really preferred cooked food.

She got her bearings by the climbing sun, and set off again toward the north. Sooner or later she must meet with someone who would give her the right road for Nevarsin City, and from there she could inquire the way to Tramontana Tower.

She rode all that day without setting eyes on a single person or a single dwelling. She was not afraid, for she could find food in this country and while the weather kept fine, she would be safe and well. But before there was another storm, she must find shelter. Perhaps she could sell the horse in Nevarsin, bartering him for a stag-pony and enough in ready money to provide herself with food and a few items of clothing she should have in this weather. She had thrust her feet into her boots in such haste, she had left her warm stockings.

She sighed, put her knife away, and swallowed the last of the tough meat. A few withered winter apples clung to a bush; she pocketed them. They were small and sour, but the horse would like them. High above in the sky she heard the cry of a hawk; as she watched it, circling, she thought of Preciosa. It seemed to her for a moment - but surely it was only memory or imagination? - that she could feel that faint tenuous touch she had felt with Preciosa, as if the world lay spread below her, she saw herself and her horse as tiny specks … Oh, Preciosa, you were mine and I loved you, but now you are free and I too am seeking freedom.

She slept that night in a long-abandoned travel-shelter, which had not been kept up since the Aldarans declared their independence of the Six Domains of the lowlands; there was not much coming and going across the Kadarin between Thendara and Nevarsin these days. But it kept the rain off, and was better than sleeping under a tree. She managed to make a fire, too, so she slept warm, and roasted some of the rabbithorn. She hoped she would find some nuts - she was tired of meat - but while she was fed, however coarsely, she could not complain. Even the dog-bread she could eat, if she must, but the horse would get more good of it than she would.

So she travelled alone for three more days. By now, she supposed, they must have abandoned the search for her at home. She wondered if her father grieved, if he thought her dead.

When I come to Nevarsin, I will leave a message for him, I will get word to him somehow that I am safe. But no doubt it will be with me as it was with Ruyven, he will cast me off and say I am not his daughter. She felt a tightness in her throat, but she could not cry. She had cried too much already, and had gained nothing from her tears except an aching head and aching eyes, till she left off crying and acted to help herself.

Women think tears will help them. I think men have the right idea when they say tears are womanish; yes, women cry and so they are helpless, but men act on their anger and so they are never without power, not wasting time or anger in tears….

She finished the last of the rabbithorn, and was not sorry - toward the end, she supposed even a dog would have to be fiercely hungry to eat it, and certainly any hawk would have turned up its beak at the stuff. On the fifth night she had only some nuts, found on an abandoned tree, and some woody mushrooms, for her supper. Perhaps tomorrow she could snare some birds, or she would meet with someone who could tell her if she was again on the road to Nevarsin - but she thought not, for this road grew ever poorer and worse-kept, and if she were nearing the biggest city in these hills, she would certainly have come to some travelled roads and inhabited parts before this!

The dog-bread was gone too, and so she stopped several hours before sunset, to let her horse graze for a while. Fortunately the weather kept fine, and she could sleep in the open. She was very tired of travelling, but reflected that she could not now return to her home even if she wished - she had no idea of the road to Falconsward. Well, so much the better; now she could cut all ties with her home.

She slept poorly, hungry and cold, and waked early. The road was so poor … perhaps she should retrace her steps for a distance and see if she could come to more travelled parts? She tore some rags and bound her feet with them to ease the chafing of her boots … heels and toe were raw and sore. High in the sky, a single hawk circled - why was there never more than one in sight at a single time? Did they keep territories like some other animals for their hunting? And again that strange flash, as if she saw through the hawk’s eyes - was it her laran again? - and thought of Preciosa. Preciosa, gone, free, lost. It is strange, I miss her more than father or brothers or home….

The time for fruiting was past, but she found a few small fruits still clinging to a bush, and ate them, wishing there were more. There was a tree which she knew she could strip the outer bark and eat the soft inner part, but she was not that hungry, not yet. She saddled her horse, weary in spite of her long sleep. Slowly it was beginning to come over her that she could lose herself and even die in these lonely and utterly uninhabited forests. But perhaps today she would meet with someone and begin to find her way to Nevarsin, or some to some little village where she could buy food.

After an hour of riding she came to a fork in the road, and paused there, indecisive, aching with hunger, exhausted. Well, she would let her horse graze for a bit while she climbed to the top of a little knoll nearby and looked about, to see if she could spy out any human habitation, the smoke of a woodcutter’s fire, a herder’s hut even. She had never felt so alone in her life. Of course not. I have never been so alone in all my life, she thought, with wry humor, and clambered up the knoll, her knees aching.

I have not eaten well for days. I must somehow find food and fire this night, whatever comes of it. She was almost wishing she had stayed with Rory and his abominable old grandmother; at least there she had been warm and fed … would it really have been so bad, to marry that oaf?

I would rather die in the wilderness, she told herself fiercely, but she was frightened and hungry, and from the top of the knoll she could see only what looked like a wilderness of trees. Far away, at the furthest edge of her sight, a high mountain loomed, to the Northwest, and pale shadows around it which she knew to be snowcapped peaks … there lay the Hellers themselves, to which these foothills were only little lumps in the land, and beyond them, the Wall Around the World, which was, as far as she knew from traveller’s tales, impassable; at least no one she had ever known had gone beyond it, and on every map she had ever seen, it delimited the very edge of known country. Once she had asked her governess what lay beyond it.

“The frozen waste,” her governess told her, “No man knows… .” The thought had intrigued Romilly, then. Now she had had enough of wandering in unknown country, and felt that some human company would be welcome.

Although what she had seen already did not make her feel very hopeful about what she would meet with from men on the roads..

Well, she had been unlucky, that was all. She sighed, and pulled her belt tighter. It would not hurt her to go on fasting another day, though tonight she must find some food, whatever happened. She looked around again, carefully taking the bearings of the great peak - it seemed to her that there was something near the top, a white building, some kind of manmade structure; she wondered if it was castle, Great House or, perhaps, one of the Towers. Northwest; she must be careful to keep track of the angle of the sun and the passage of time so that she would not begin walking in circles. But if she followed where the road led, she would be unlikely to do that.

She should get back to her horse. She glanced up again. Strange. The hawk still hovered. She wondered, on wild surmise, if it could be the same hawk … no. It was just that hawks were plentiful in these hills and wherever you cast your eyes on the sky, there was sure to be some kind of bird of prey within sight. For an instant it seemed as if she hovered, seeing the white pinnacle of the Tower and a faint blue lightning that struck from within … she felt faint and dizzy, not knowing whether it was the hawk or herself that saw … she shook herself and pulled out of the rapport. It would be all too easy to lose herself in that communion with sky and wind and cloud….

She went back to her horse and painstakingly saddled him again. At least the animal was fed. She said aloud, “I almost wish I could eat grass as you do, old fellow,” and was startled at the sound of her own voice.

It was answered by another sound; the high, shrill crying of a striking hawk - yes, the hawk had found some prey, for she could feel, somewhere in her mind, the flow of warm blood, a sensation that made her mouth tickle and flood with saliva, reawakening fierce hunger. The horse startled nervously away, and she pulled on the reins, speaking softly - and then dark pinions swooped across her vision. Without thought she thrust out her arm, felt the cruel grip of talons, and fell blindly into the familiar rapport.

“Preciosa!” She was sobbing as she spoke the name. How, why the hawk had followed her through her wandering, she would never know. The shrill cry and the flapping wings roused her from her tears and she was aware that there was a good-sized bird, still warm, gripped in the bird’s claws. With one hand she gripped the bird’s legs, lifting the claw away from her wrist - it was bleeding a little where the claws had cut, it was her own fault, for she had no proper glove. She set the bird on the saddle, her heart pounding, and pulled out her dagger; gave head and wings to Preciosa, and while the hawk fed - praise to the Bearer of Burdens, the horse knew enough to stand quietly when his saddle was made into an impromptu perch - she plucked what was left of the carcass, struck flint and steel and made a small fire where she roasted the carcass.