Master of Hawks

by Linda E. Bushyager

  “I’ll send out a search party for the body,” Ramsey decided. “He may have carried papers and maps. Do you have any idea where it might be?”

  “No, I didn’t get any impression of his exact location, but it should be fairly easy to find.”

  Ramsey nodded, knowing full well that the maximum telepathic range was the same as that for sorcery —a few miles at most. The body could not be very far from the castle.

  “Good,” he replied. “But this is another indication that Brian S’York has gathered a wide spectrum of allies to his cause—first those damn League sorcerers, and now telepaths. And what if they should make an alliance with the Sylvan?”

  He stepped past the makeshift pine table and concentrated on the map tacked to the wall behind it. The richness of the gold-illuminated parchment contrasted sharply with the dingy wall blackened by countless wayfarers’ campfires and marked by their graffiti.

  Ramsey studied the oblong kingdom of Cascar lying on York’s southern border and the smaller state of Wessex to the southwest. “We know that the rebels hiding out in the badlands west of York and in Wessex’s mountains have been trying to form an alliance with the Sylvan for years. So far the Sylvan’s distrust of humans has prevented any compact, but those savages must realize that the Empire cannot tolerate them forever. The existence of Sylvan forests scattered throughout the conquered kingdoms is a constant threat to us.”

  “The Sylvan will keep their neutrality,” interjected Jaxton. “Nothing less than an outright attack against them would make the forest people take sides in a human war. They dislike humans as much as we dislike them. Besides, those tree-eaters don’t leave their blasted forests anyway. And the Western League won’t oppose us; they’ll avoid a war at all costs. They still remember the devastation of the Great War against Lord S’Shegan a century ago. They may protest, but they won’t take any action. They prefer to hope that the Empire will be satisfied with annexing the Eastern Kingdoms and will leave them alone. For that matter, the Sylvies remember what S’Shegan did to a couple of their forests.”

  Ramsey sighed. “Sometimes I wish we could avoid this war, but I know Taral, and he won’t stop until he’s conquered the Western League and the Sylvan, and maybe not then.”

  He turned from the map and sat in one of the chairs. Then he stared beyond Jaxton as though he saw the future etched among the wall’s graffiti. “And he will do it. I’ve seen his plans for destroying the Sylvan after we’ve finished with York. When the League finally realizes that they’re a target, they’ll fight, and Taral will make the Great War look like a skirmish and S’Shegan look like an amateur.”

  “He did that when he destroyed the powerstones of the Triad,” added Jaxton. “After the Eastern Kingdoms erected it as a barrier against S’Shegan’s sorcery during the Great War, S’Shegan spent years trying to destroy it without success. In fact, if he hadn’t wasted so much of his time and energy trying to neutralize the Triad, S’Shegan might have been strong enough to defeat the alliance that finally broke him.”

  “Fortunately, Taral has learned from S’Shegan’s mistakes,” replied Lord Ramsey. “That’s why he’s conquering one area at a time instead of trying to take on everyone at once, as S’Shegan attempted.”

  An urgent rapping on the outside door interrupted their discussion.

  “Enter,” called Ramsey.

  A man wearing soiled riding clothes slammed open the door. “Important dispatches, Lord Ramsey.”

  Ramsey extended his dark hand to receive a bundle of papers in a leather pouch. “Thank you.”

  As the messenger left, Ramsey quickly reviewed the letters. Then he looked up and nodded at Jaxton.

  “From Douglas S’Stratford. He’s landed at Swego Bay with the major part of our troops. They are marching east and should meet us at the town of Threeforks in four days.”

  Jaxton excitedly slapped his palm against the tabletop. “Good. We’ve all become a bit impatient with this waiting.”

  “So has Lord Taral. He’s sent a note reminding me that his army is just south of the Twin Lakes and will move toward Castle York as soon as we join forces with S’Stratford.”

  “Another note? As if we didn’t know that—sitting here on our hands waiting for the storms over the Inland Sea to abate so that S’Stratford could reach York.”

  Ramsey picked up another letter and waved it toward the door. “Sinclair, please notify Sergeant Waltner that we will be moving out in the morning. Oh, you’d better tell S’Akron too, he hates being left out of things.”

  Jaxton stood. “Certainly, Lord Ramsey.”

  As Jaxton left, Ramsey continued studying the dispatches. Then he edged his chair around so that he could see the map.

  The artist had painted the Empire a royal purple, the Western League dark green, and the Eastern Kingdoms red. To the left, the states outlined in green stretched out along the Sissi River like a fat finger pointing southward. The purple dominated the center of the map in a great U shape, with the top left prong poking into the Inland Sea, then arching down and to the east through the former Eastern Kingdoms of Carlton, Richmond, and Westvirn along the coast, and then northward through Cumberland, Wessex, and Cascar. Only York and the smaller kingdoms of Aderon and Douglas to the north remained red.

  Ramsey’s fingertip traced York’s border. “It’s isolated,” he thought, “and our army is divided into two arms that will strangle York between them.”

  He studied the map, searching for some error, something he had overlooked, and found nothing. He knew they should win, that they must win. Then with a deep sigh he turned back to the letters, pushing the wisp of foreboding into the back of his mind.

  3

  Into the nothingness that was everything, the timelessness that was forever, came the sound. It pierced. The sound ebbed and flowed unceasingly and incessantly, giving the blackness substance as it grew in intensity.

  The sound broke the darkness into a billion fragments of light and pain. The tones became color—gold and azure; the patterns of yellow and blue battled with the blackness like sun and sky tugging at the night. The azure shrilled and shrieked. The gold harmonized and quieted.

  In agony, he recognized the sound. He reached for it, stretching through the emptiness, searching for it, straining for it through the black that became red with pain into the blue and gold, clutching it in the sky and sun.

  Scores of birds lifted from the still form as they felt the disquiet of struggling man-thoughts.

  Through the throbbing, lingering pain, Hawk returned to consciousness and recognized the sharp, penetrating sound of the birdsongs. Then he opened his eyes to find the birds, which had covered him like a blanket, rising in a blur of beating wings. As the pain surged again through his skull, he closed his eyes and pressed his back into the cradling warmth of the earth.

  Through the pain, he gradually became aware of the comforting avian thoughts. The songs continued to wash over him in soothing waves until he merged with the birds’ thought patterns completely. Then the birds returned and covered him with fluttering wings and soft bodies.

  By the time the late afternoon sun had become a haze of red in the west, Hawk felt strong enough to force his thoughts back through the layers of pain to determine what had happened. He gently sat up and sent the birds toward their resting places in the forest. Then he sorted through his memories.

  He remembered clinging to dissolving shreds of identity as the enemy telepath overwhelmed his mind. Then, in the split second of agony before he became unconscious, Hawk had felt his enemy’s elation at victory followed by his disappearance as his mind-link to the hawk finally broke.

  Suddenly Hawk realized that only his greater than normal telepathic range had saved him—the enemy bird-path had been unable to reach over thirty miles to finish him off. As a rule, most telepathy could send no farther than three to five miles.

  But he had been unable to save his hawk, and that knowledge left him with a deep sense of loss. Although he ha
d other trained birds, he felt empty, as though a part of himself had disappeared forever.

  Then he heard the plaintive call of a whippoorwill above him. Linking minds with it, he felt somehow comforted. His hawk was gone, but he was not alone.

  At least the hawk’s death had accomplished something. He had not only gained information about the Imperial troops massed in northern York, but he’d also learned of the enemy bird-path’s presence. It seemed ironic finally to meet another bird-telepath, only to find that the man was his enemy.

  Now he had to relay that information to Castle York. First he broke his bond with the whippoorwill. Then he picked up his notebook, brushed it off, and flipped it open. Finally he linked with the bird that he’d left at Castle York, about thirty-five miles south.

  Lord Brian S’York jumped slightly when the brightly plumed parrot entered the window of his study and landed lightly on the mahogany stand of the globe in front of his desk. But as the parrot spoke in a raspy imitation of Hawk’s voice, he couldn’t help laughing.

  He addressed the parrot: “I’m never going to get used to these damn birds of yours, Hawk.”

  “And I’m never going to get used to your castle, Lord S’York,” replied the bird. “I had to scare two kitchenmaids and peer into half a dozen windows to find you. The accommodations you’ve provided for my birds atop the east gate are too isolated; no one there knew anything about your daily routine.”

  “You’d probably prefer that I keep this damn parrot with me at all times in case you have something to report.”

  “As you wish, sir. Perhaps I’d better get on with my news, controlling this bird’s speech is rather difficult.”

  While Hawk reported on the soldiers he’d seen, the fortifications at Buchanan, and his clash with the falcon-telepath, Lord S’York couldn’t help but smile at the sight of a parrot expounding on enemy strategy. Although bizarre, Hawk’s method was expedient.

  Then he interrupted Hawk’s narrative. “Did our substitute messenger arrive?”

  “Not while I was there, Lord S’York.”

  “Although we can’t be sure that he’ll be accepted, we have to work on that assumption. You’d better ride on to Threeforks and tell Derek S’Mayler what’s happened, or send one of your birds,” decided S’York.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t send a bird. I only have one trained parrot to communicate through. Since that first company of soldiers I saw will probably be there in the morning, intending to capture the town, I’d better ride in tonight.”

  “Very good.” Brian S’York smiled grimly. “I hope they like our reception.”

  For a moment both were silent, each thinking of York’s scheme to outwit the Empire’s more numerous forces.

  Hawk knew that York’s allies from the Western League states, Lady Suzanne S’Elgyn and Lord Patrick S’Decatur, were maintaining a sorcery-formed storm over the Inland Sea. They hoped to delay the landing of S’Stratford’s troops and their takeover of the Swego port. Hawk didn’t know their overall strategy, but he was glad that such powerful sorcerers were on their side.

  Derek S’Mayler, another League sorcerer who’d become a personal friend of his, commanded the York forces at the village of Threeforks. A messenger from Taral had been intercepted and replaced by a York man carrying forged dispatches. With any luck Ramsey’s troops would walk into an ambush at Threeforks.

  Lord S’York broke the silence. “By the way, give my regards to Derek S’Mayler when you see him. Thank N’Omb he’s helping us. He’s a more powerful magician than I, and almost as good a strategist.”

  “I will tell him,” replied Hawk. As he thought of Derek S’Mayler, he wondered how it was possible for him to be friends with such a man. In many ways they were exact opposites: Derek was noble, the Lord of the Kingdom of Mayler, while Hawk was a commoner, an orphan; Derek was as extroverted as Hawk was shy; and Derek was a leader of men, Hawk only a follower. Yet they had been drawn together from their first meeting and had discovered a wealth of common interests and a mutual respect for each other’s abilities that had forged an immediate bond between them.

  Suddenly Hawk felt his control of the parrot begin to slip. He had spent a tremendous amount of energy controlling the hawk and had not really recovered from that ordeal.

  “I’m sorry, Lord S’York, I’d better go now.”

  “All right.”

  Then, without any outward change, it became apparent that Hawk no longer dominated the parrot. “Want a cracker, awwwkkk,” it mimicked, and suddenly flew to Brian S’York’s shoulder.

  Laughing, he called out to the guard, who entered the room immediately. “Take this damn bird back to its cage before it has an accident.”

  Hawk concentrated on his galloping horse and the dim trail, which was highlighted more with the contrasting shadows than the fading sun. He tried to ignore the numbing migraine that plunged from his forehead to the base of his neck like a shard of ice-cold steel, but the strain of the telepathic duel, coupled with the effort of controlling the birds, had left him in a state of near exhaustion. He hunched forward and shivered as a northern breeze whipped through the canopy of leaves and slashed his dark wool cloak.

  “Halt!” commanded a voice suddenly from the long gray shadows ahead.

  His horse reared, almost trampling the men who had emerged from the twilight to block its path. For an instant Hawk clung to the saddle precariously, then he regained control and halted the animal.

  “Rusty,” called one of the men. “Nail,” replied Hawk.

  His shoulders sagged in relief as he realized that the men were York sentries guarding the road into Threeforks. The sentries waved him on and faded back into the trees.

  Then he rode into the village. Lights blazed from the windows of the black-and-white-timbered Three Sisters Inn, which dominated the intersection of the Buchanan, Tompkins, and Yorkdale roads. A few stores and homes clustered about fifty yards farther along the Yorkdale Road.

  When Hawk rode into the inn’s courtyard, a dog barked sharply from behind the building. Its yapping drowned out the lilting music and laughter that drifted from the tavern, bounced against the cobblestones, and reverberated over the empty street.

  He clutched the perch-shaped horn of his saddle tightly and eased himself down from his horse. Still grasping the horn, he shivered as the inn’s door swung out and a tall man stepped from the bright rectangle of light.

  “Derek,” Hawk murmured, his voice hardly above a whisper. Then he felt Derek S’Mayler’s strong arm around his shoulders. As Derek pulled him into the warmth and light, he realized that most of S’Mayler’s forces had crowded into the inn for what might well be their last night of revelry before battle.

  He tried not to stumble as Derek led him through the crush. Smiling faces turned toward him and grew calm with concern; the way cleared ahead of them; and then they reached the great stone fireplace at the far end of the room. Derek pushed him into a huge, overstuffed chair by the fire. A moment later the sorcerer pressed a cup of steaming liquid with a pungent, yet not unpleasant, odor into his hands.

  Then Hawk tried to report. Derek silenced him, ordering him to drink first. The liquid must have been one of Derek’s special potions, for almost immediately Hawk felt a surge of well-being. His headache faded into a prickling sensation that spread downward until his whole body tingled.

  When Hawk seemed to have regained his strength, Derek pulled over a small table and signaled to Stephen, the innkeeper, who quickly thrust some biscuits and stew in front of Hawk.

  The delicious aroma penetrated the fog enveloping him, and automatically Hawk’s fingers fumbled and grasped for his fork. Disoriented, he almost dropped it, but managed to get some of the food into his mouth. A drop of the gravy dribbled from his lips onto his curly brown beard.

  As he ate, he felt more strength return, and his fingers slowly lost their clumsiness. Although he had breakfasted well, he felt as though he hadn’t eaten for about three days. The watery stew and biscuits
seemed a banquet.

  After a third serving Hawk began to notice his surroundings and, between forkfuls, studied the crowded room. Normally he would have felt ill at ease among so many people, but whether through the effect of his fatigue or of Derek’s potion, he felt quite relaxed.

  He noted that S’Mayler’s forces were a rather motley-looking group of soldiers, farmers, hunters, and woodsmen. Since York’s regular army guarded Castle York to the south, the defense of northern York fell to locals protecting their homeland, supported by refugees from the defeated kingdoms who sought to regain theirs.

  Now many of these crammed the village, and most jammed into the inn, filling it with laughter, voices, and music. In one corner, several regular York soldiers dressed in green and gray uniforms drank beer in huge quantities to the unending choruses of a drinking song.

  Near the center of the room, a group of men and a few women talked earnestly of the war and illustrated their strategies with plates and salt shakers. Hawk recognized Coleman S’Wessex, leader of the refugees, watching them with an amused smile. Some local farmers tossed dice against the far wall with boisterous good humor. In their denim overalls and dark shirts, they hardly looked like soldiers, but bright green armbands identified them as part of S’Mayler’s troops.

  A striking young woman caught Hawk’s gaze and held it. She hummed soft golden notes to the accompaniment of her guitar as she perched on the registration desk next to the entryway. Although she was dressed in woodsman green like a hunter, her rough garb could not conceal her feminine form.

  Her song floated above the inn’s common room, mingled with the drinking song, and collided, with many voices, producing a mixture of happy noises.

  At last Hawk waved his fork at Derek, who reclined nearby in an armchair. “Derek, I have to talk to you.”

  Although Derek S’Mayler seemed unperturbed by the note of urgency in the other’s voice, he eased his chair closer to the table. As Derek leaned toward Hawk, his calm hazel eyes studied the bird-path’s response until he was certain that Hawk hadn’t suffered any permanent damage. He had seen both telepathy and sorcerers overextend themselves to the point of destroying their power and health. Since they needed enormous amounts of energy to utilize their powers, both groups could too easily burn themselves out.