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Talon lay back on his pallet and closed his eyes while Pasko puttered around in the barn with some items he had brought in from the wagon. Despite having felt alert when he had awoken just a scant half hour before, the boy drifted back off to sleep.
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Patient by nature, Talon let the days go by without pestering Pasko with questions. It was obvious to him that the servant was by nature taciturn, and by instruction not very forthcoming. Whatever he discovered would be through his own powers of observation.
The pain caused by his people’s destruction was never far from his thoughts. He had shed tears nightly for a week, but as the days passed, he turned away from his grief and began to court anger. He knew that somewhere out there were the men responsible for his people’s obliteration.
Eventually he would hunt them down and take retribution; such was the Orosini way. But he was also enough of a realist to understand that one young man on his own had little chance of extracting full vengeance. He would need to gain strength, power, knowledge of weapons, many things. He knew that his ancestors would guide him. Silver Hawk was his totem: the boy once known as Kielianapuna would be a talon for his people.
The days became routine. Each morning he would awake and eat. Pasko and he would walk, at first just around the compound surrounding the huge inn, then later into the nearby woods. His strength returned, and he started helping Pasko with chores, hauling water, chopping wood, and mending reins, halters, and traces for the horses. He was a clever lad and had to be shown a thing only once or twice to grasp it. He had a fierce passion for excellence.
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Occasionally, Talon would catch a glimpse of Robert as he hurried about the inn, often in the company of any of three men. Talon didn’t ask Pasko to name them, but he marked them. The first Talon guessed to be Kendrick. A tall man with grey hair and a full beard, he moved around the property as if he owned it. He wore a fine tunic and a single ring of some dark stone set in gold, but otherwise serviceable trousers and boots. He often paused to give instructions to the servants—the girl Lela, and the two younger men, Lars and Gibbs. Lars and Gibbs had also been regular visitors to the barn when travelers called at the inn, for they cared for the horses.
The second man Talon saw he thought of as Snowcap, for his hair was as white as snow, yet he looked to be no more than thirty or so years of age. He was not quite as tall as Kendrick or Robert, but somehow seemed to look down at them. He carried himself like a chieftain or shaman, thought Talon, and there was an aura of power about him.
His eyes were pale blue, and his face was colored by the sun.
He wore a robe of dark grey, with an intricate pattern woven at the sleeves and hem, which was just high enough for Talon to glimpse beneath it very finely crafted boots. He carried a wooden staff upon occasion, while at other times he affected a slouch hat that matched his robes in color.
The last man bore a faint resemblance to the second, as if they were kin, but his hair was dark brown, almost the same color as Talon’s. His eyes were a deep brown as well, and his manner and movement suggested a warrior or hunter. Talon called him the Blade in his mind, for his left hand never seemed to venture far from the hilt of a sword, a slender blade unlike any Talon had seen. He wore blue breeches tucked into knee-high boots and a dark grey shirt over which he wore a tied vest. He also wore a hat all the time, a twin to Snowcap’s slouch hat, though this one was 9261.01 3/13/03 12:53 PM Page 35
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black. Once Talon had seen him leave the inn at sunrise carrying a longbow, and that night he had returned carrying a gutted deer across his shoulders. Instantly the young man had felt a stab of admiration; hunting was considered a great skill among the Orosini.
Robert, Pasko, and Talon were treated much as if they were part of the surroundings. Only Lela took a moment now and again to call out a greeting to Pasko and Talon, or to nod or wave. Lars, a stocky redheaded lad, and Gibbs, a slender older man, would occasionally speak to them, asking for a piece of tack or assistance in holding a horse that was being tended. But both avoided any causal conversation. Most of the time, Talon felt as if he and Pasko didn’t exist in the minds of those inside the inn.
After a full month had passed, Talon awoke one morning to find Robert deep in conversation with Pasko.
The young man arose quietly, and dressed, then made his presence known.
“Ah, young Talon,” said Robert, smiling at him. “Pasko tells me you’re recovering nicely.’
Talon nodded. “My wounds are healed, and most of the stiffness is gone.’’
“Are you fit enough to hunt?’’
“Yes,” he answered without hesitation.
“Good; come with me.’’
He left the barn, and Talon fell into step beside him. As they walked to the inn, Talon said, “Sir, I am in your debt, am I not?’’
“Agreed,” replied Robert.
“How shall I discharge my debt?’’
Robert stopped. “I have saved your life, true?’’
“Yes,” replied the boy.
“If I understand the ways of your people, you have a life-debt to me, correct?’’
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“Yes,” Talon said calmly. A life-debt was a complex concept, one that involved years of service, directly or indirectly. When a man of the Orosini saved the life of another, the man who was saved was considered to be at the call of the other. It was as if he became a member of that family, but without the privileges of that membership. He was honor-bound to ensure that his savior’s family ate, even should his own go hungry. He was obliged to help bring in his savior’s crops before his own. In every way, the rescued man was in debt to the other. What Robert was telling Talon was that he must now consider Robert his master until such time as Robert released him from service.
“This is a heavy debt, is it not?’’
“Yes,” Talon replied evenly.
The wind blew slightly, rustling the leaves in the distant trees and Robert was silent, as if thinking. Then he said, “I shall test you, young Talon. I will judge your mettle and see if you will do.’’
“Do for what, sir?’’
“For many things. And I shall not tell you half of them for years to come. Should you prove lacking, I will bind you over to Kendrick’s service for a number of years so that you may learn to care for yourself in a world other than the highlands of the Orosini, for that life is now denied you forever.’’
Talon heard those words and felt as if he had been struck a blow, but he kept his expression blank. What Robert said was true. Unless others had somehow survived the attack and crept away into the mountains, he was now the last of the Orosini, and no man could live alone in those mountains.
Finally, Talon said, “And if I am not lacking?’’
“Then you shall see things and learn things no Orosini could imagine, my young friend.” He turned as another 9261.01 3/13/03 12:53 PM Page 37
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man approached. It was the Blade, and he had a longbow across his back, and carried another in his hand, with a hip-quiver of shafts. “Ah, here he is.” To Talon, Robert said,
“This man you have seen, I am sure, for you do well in observing things; that I have already noticed. Talon, this is Caleb. He and his brother Magnus are associates of mine.’’
Talon nodded at the man, who remained silent, studying him. Up close, Talon decided that Caleb was younger than he had at first thought—perhaps no more than ten years his senior, but he stood with the confide
nce of a proven warrior.
Caleb handed the bow and hip-quiver to Talon, who tied the quiver-belt around his waist and inspected the bow. It was longer than the one he had learned with, and as he tested the draw, he felt Caleb’s eyes observing his every move. There was wear at one end of the string, but he didn’t judge it frayed enough to be a problem yet. Even so, he asked, “Extra bowstring?”
Caleb nodded.
Talon set the bow across his back, and said, “Let us hunt.’’
Caleb turned and led the way, and soon they were trotting down the path into the woods.
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They moved silently through the trees. Caleb had not spoken a word to Talon yet. Half an hour into the hunt, Caleb led Talon off the path and down a game trail. The younger man looked around, marking signs in his mind to guide him back to the road should there be a need.
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after the first hour. He was considering asking for a rest when Caleb slowed. He had a waterskin on his left hip, where his sword usually rested, and he unslung it and handed it to Talon. Talon nodded and drank sparingly, just enough to wet his throat and mouth. Feeling revived, he passed the skin back to Caleb. The silent man motioned, as if asking if Talon wished to have another drink, and Talon shook his head. Looking at the rich woodlands around him, Talon reckoned he could not be far from any number of sources of water—streams, pools, and brooks—but as he was from the high mountains, where water was far more difficult to find, drinking sparingly while on a hunt was an inborn habit.
They resumed their hunt, but now Caleb led them at a walk rather than at a trot, looking at the ground for game sign. They entered a meadow after a few minutes, and Talon paused. The grass was nearly waist-high, pale yellow-green from the summer sun and ample rain.
He quickly unslung his bow and tapped Caleb on the shoulder with it. He motioned with his left hand, and Caleb looked to where he indicated. They made their way into the meadow, noting how the grass had been parted and some of it broken and crushed. Talon knelt and looked for prints. In a depression in the damp soil, he found one.
Softly he said, “Bear.” He reached out and tested the broken blades. They were still moist at the break. “Close.’’
Caleb nodded. “Good eyes,” he said softly.
They began to follow the bear’s trail until they had crossed nearly half the meadow. Caleb held up his hand, and they halted. Then Talon heard it. In the distance, the snuffling sounds of a bear, and a dull thump.
They crept along until they reached a small brook. On the other side stood a large brown bear, busily rocking a dead tree trunk and ripping at it with its claws in an effort 9261.01 3/13/03 12:53 PM Page 39
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to expose a hive of bees, which were swarming futilely around the animal. The bear tore open the dried wood and revealed the rich comb inside while the bees stung ineffec-tually at its thick hide, one occasionally finding the only exposed part of the animal, its tender nose. Then the bear would hoot in outrage, but after a moment it would return to its task of getting to the honey.
Talon tapped Caleb on the shoulder and motioned toward the bear, but the older man shook his head and motioned back the way they had come.
They moved silently away from the scene, and after a short distance, Caleb picked up the pace and led them back toward the road.
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Nightfall found the two hunters returning to the inn, a deer across Caleb’s shoulders and Talon carrying a pair of wild turkeys tied together at the feet.
Robert waited at the gate. When they got there, Gibbs appeared and took the turkeys from Talon. Robert looked at Caleb.
Caleb said, “The boy can hunt.’’
Talon watched Robert’s face and saw a flicker of satisfaction. He wasn’t sure what had been said, but he was certain it had to do with more than merely hunting game in the woods.
Caleb followed Gibbs around the side of the inn, toward the kitchen door.
Robert put his hand on Talon’s shoulder. “So, it begins.’’
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THREE
SERVANT
Talon struggled.
He followed Lela up the hill from the stream that ran through the woods, carrying a large basket of dripping-wet laundry. For the previous week, he had been put in her charge, essentially providing an extra pair of arms and legs for her.
The one oddity had been Robert’s insistence that she speak only the language of Roldem to him, answering him only when he correctly asked a question. A few of the words in that language were used in the Common Tongue, but Common was mainly the hybrid of Low Keshian and the King’s Tongue, developed by years of trading along the border of those two vast nations.
Still, Talon had an ear for language, he discovered, and quickly picked up the speech from the constantly cheerful girl.
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She was five years his senior, and had come to Kendrick’s in a circuitous manner if her story was to be believed. She claimed to have been the serving girl to a Princess of Roldem, who had been en route to a state-arranged marriage with a noble in the court of the Prince of Aranor. Depending on his full understanding of her language and the frequency with which the story changed, she had been abducted by either pirates or bandits and sold into slavery, from which she had been freed by a kind benefactor or escaped. In any event, the girl from the distant island nation across the Sea of Kingdoms had found her way to Kendrick’s, where she had been a serving girl for the last two years.
She was constantly happy, always quick with a joke, and very pretty. And Talon was becoming quickly infatuated with her.
He still ached inside at the thought of Eye of the Blue-Winged Teal, lying dead somewhere with the rest of her family. Left unburied for the carrion eaters. He shoved the image aside as he lugged the huge wicker basket he carried on his back.
Lela seemed to think his being assigned to her freed her from the need to make several trips to the stream to clean the clothing. So she had found a basket four feet in height and had rigged a harness so he could lug it up the hill on his back. Taking the clothing down to the stream was the easy part of the morning; carrying the sopping-wet garments back up to the inn was the difficult part.
“Caleb says you’re a good hunter.’’
Talon hesitated a moment, as he had to think about the words before he answered. “I’ve hunted my life for all.’’
She corrected his sentence structure, and he repeated what she had said. “I’ve hunted for all my life.’’
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what she said was lost on him and the other half was mostly gossip from the kitchen, about people he had barely glimpsed. He listened hard, but much of what she said was still lost on him.
He felt lost in a lot of ways. He was still sleeping in the barn, though alone, as Pasko had vanished on some errand for Robert. He saw only a little of Robert, glimpsed through a window of the inn or as he was crossing from the rear of the inn to the privy. Occasionally, the man who had saved his life would pause and exchange a few idle pleas-antries with Talon, speaking in either the Common Tongue or in Roldemish. When he spoke the latter, he also would reply only if Talon spoke in that language.
Talon was still not allowed inside the inn. He didn’t think that strange; as an outsider, he wouldn’t have expected to be admitted to an Orosini lodge, but these were not t
he Orosini. As he was a servant now, he assumed his sleeping in the barn to be a servant’s lot. There was so much about these people he didn’t understand.
He found himself tired a lot. He didn’t understand why; he was a young man, usually energetic and happy, but since he came to Kendrick’s, he battled black moods and nearly overwhelming sadness on a daily basis. If he was set to a task by Robert or Pasko, or in the company of Caleb or Lela, he found his mind turning away from the darker musing he was prey to when he was left alone. He wished for his grandfather’s wisdom on this, yet thinking about his family plunged him deeper into the morbid introspection that caused him to feel trapped within a black place from which there was no escape.
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even by the standards of his people, Talon appeared almost mute at times to those around him. Inside he ached for that free expression he knew in his childhood, and though that childhood was only weeks earlier in his life, it felt ages past.
Pasko and Lela were open enough, should he ask a question, but Lela was as likely to answer with a prevarication or misinformation as Pasko was likely to merely dismiss the question as being irrelevant to whatever task lay at hand. The frustration within that grew from this situation only added to Talon’s bleak moods.
The only respite from the crushing darkness in his heart was found in hunting with Caleb. The young man was even more reticent than Talon, and often a day of hunting would go by with fewer than a dozen words spoken between them.
Reaching the stabling yard, Lela said, “Oh, we have guests.’’
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