Hawkmaiden

by Terry Mancour

  She spent most of the rest of the afternoon climbing trees around the cottage, choosing the hardest ones. Dara had been a confirmed tree-climber for years, enjoying a reputation for daring among her fellow children long past the time when most girls gave up such pursuits for those more refined. But Dara was far more active than that, and saw her sisters’ and cousins’ interest in such things as needlework, marriage, and gossip as supremely boring.

  She ascended one tree after another, refusing to rest between attempts as she tried to build her strength and endurance up. It was exhausting, and when she did take a break for water and rest, the only chore she felt at all ready to do was pull the dead flowers out of the planters by the door before she collapsed on the rickety old bed for a rest.

  Then the bed collapsed under her.

  Despite the pain and sudden jarring, Dara stared at the dusty ceiling of the cottage and laughed hysterically.

  * * *

  When she returned to Westwood Hall, comfortably before dinner, she apparently looked exhausted, too, according to her Aunt Anira. After assuring her it was merely from her labors, and not a sign that she was getting ill, she was surprisingly approving, and even slipped Dara one of the tiny cakes that were to be served for dinner.

  She told everyone over dinner how Widow Ama’s bed had collapsed, and complained how long it would take to repair or replace it, just to emphasize how she was really unhappy with her chore . . . and she received the expected number of chastisements for her laziness. Ordinarily that would bother her, but each one ensured that she would be able to use the cot without the danger of folks wandering by. After enduring a lecture from her father on the importance of hard work, she reluctantly promised she would stick with it . . . no matter how long it took.

  The next morning she arose early and left just before breakfast was served, wheedling a tin of porridge and some things for lunch from her aunt before she left, suggesting she wanted to get an early start. While the rest of the household was eating she slipped back into the harness shed and took the second coil of rope. All day that day she practiced tying the ropes together in one long line, then testing her knots against her weight as she dangled from a tree limb.

  Dara was actually good at knots – good enough that her aunt had frequently told her she had no idea why her needlework was so poor. She paid attention when her brothers were tying them, preparing snares and traps for the Westwood. While she was not adept, her nimble fingers knew enough to keep the ropes from slipping.

  At lunch she spent an hour working on the cottage, removing the broken bed outside and sweeping the dirt floor smooth. She would bring fresh dried ferns from the herb house tomorrow, she decided.

  The bed was ruined. It had been old when Widow Ama had taken residence in the cot, and while the headboard was solid enough; the rest of the bed was warped, cracked, and uneven. Once she decided that it wasn’t salvageable, she used her hammer to bust it apart.

  The footboard, she discovered, would make a decent perch, for now. Even if its legs were in no condition to support it, turned on its side the piece was the right height and thickness for a perch, Dara decided. She placed it in one corner of the cottage and piled the rest of the debris with the other garbage outside (cleanly picked through by her raccoon friend, she noted).

  The headboard went into the wheelbarrow, so that it could be used in a new bed. That would take her cousin Keru a few weeks to put together in the woodshop, she knew with satisfaction. Which would extend the time before the cottage was ready even more. Dara had no idea how long she would need the privacy for training, but every day was precious.

  Once she stowed her stolen ropes in the cottage, she headed home again, propping the door shut and leaving the last of her lunch for the raccoon. She was exhausted, after her days of hard exercise. She skipped dinner and went to bed early, earning a look of concern from her aunt

  It rained all day the next day, which forced Dara to actually work on the cottage instead of preparing for her climb. She decided against bringing the dried ferns (no sense transporting them in the rain) and focused on re-mudding the wattle-and-daub inside the house. She noted with satisfaction that her patch over the hole in the roof seemed to be working splendidly. Not a drop was coming through, now. And the cistern was holding water without leaking.

  But there was only so much she could accomplish inside the cottage. Eventually she ran out of easy tasks to do, and she found herself idle, staring out the window. The rain and the forced inactivity also gave Dara time to think.

  Am I really going to do this? she asked herself as she watched the raindrops collect on the side of the window. She had been thinking about the Silver Hooded Raptor’s majestic flight all morning, imagining herself with wings flying nearby. Am I really going to risk my life, risk my poor behind if I get caught, just for this little bird? Or is this just the stupidest little girl idea I’ve ever had, and I’m too stubborn to admit it?

  She was overcome with doubt, for a while, and seriously considered giving up on her plan entirely. The idea of a twelve-year old girl who hadn’t even flowered yet doing something as preposterously dangerous as climbing a mountain was laughable enough. Even if she didn’t die, what would she do if she actually succeeded? A falcon wasn’t like tending a baby rabbit abandoned by her mother, or taking care of goats or chickens. Raptors were predators, and everything she’d heard her uncle say about the process of turning one into a trained hunter sounded complicated and daunting.

  Dara struggled with the question all afternoon as she cleaned and tidied the cottage in the downpour, until it turned into a drizzle. She took a brief break to pull on her heavy cloak and go dig up some sassafras root from near the springhouse down the trail, so that she might make some tea – she should have brought some from the hall, she chastised herself. But the Forest and the Flame would provide for the Westwoodmen, as the old saying went.

  While she was digging into the dirt with her knife, she heard a screech from overhead. A hawk – not one of the big silver-headed raptors she coveted, but a common redtail – had taken the respite in the rain to hunt. It dove and plucked some unfortunate rodent from a small meadow nearby; its delicate and deadly grace was irresistibly captivating.

  That’s as good as a sign from the gods, Dara told herself, fervently, as she walked back to the cottage. How could it not be? I want that bird, she decided. I want that bird more than I want anything.

  With her doubt resolved, Dara prepared for the journey ahead. Rain or no rain, she couldn’t waste any more time. She had to make the attempt soon. Autumn was coming, and any fledglings in the nest on Rundeval would be empty, if she did not get there.

  The rain held for another day, and Dara begged off visiting the cottage in favor of shadowing her Uncle Keram again, as he made the Master’s rounds in her father’s stead. Dara stopped only briefly to discuss the need for a new bed with her cousin Keru, who acted as the manor’s woodwright when his father wasn’t around. He gladly accepted the headboard and promised the completed project in four weeks. Then it was back to Uncle Keram to pick up whatever morsels of falconry he was willing to impart.

  Getting her uncle to talk about falconry was easy enough – she just mentioned the redtail hawk, and asked innocently if they were good hunting birds, and that was enough to set him off about how poorly they hunted, compared to larger and more majestic birds.

  “Good bird for a beginner,” her uncle acknowledged, reluctantly, “but they’ll never take anything bigger than a hare. A squire’s bird,” he said, disdainfully. “Pretty enough, but hardly worth the time and effort to train them. But that’s where most falconers begin training their first birds. Red tails and kestrels.”

  That got him talking about the arduous process of training a hawk, and with a few leading questions Dara got him to explain the entire process of capturing and training a hawk, from his memories as a youth. She learned again the importance of the hood, the jesses, and the bells.

  Bells. Dara had forgot
ten bells. As her uncle reminded her, bells were essential to attach to the legs of the bird, so the falconer might find the bird in the wild.

  With a sinking feeling, Dara realized she’d have to find bells from somewhere. That was not going to be easy. Such dainties were rare in the Westwood.

  Her uncle explained the difference between taking a fledgling bird – an eyass, she learned the falconers called them – and an adolescent bird still learning to hunt. He went through the long, three-month process of acclimatizing the bird to humans and imprinting on the falconer specifically. How you had to keep the bird constantly fed and dependent upon you, how you had to teach it how to fly from block to glove and back again, how you had to hack it out in the outdoors, and a dozen other vital elements of falconry.

  Dara absorbed every word with special care. It seemed far too easy to accidentally kill a bird, she realized, when her uncle began speaking about the importance of supplements to aid in casting. Dara only had the vaguest idea what casting was, and had no idea what she should supplement the bird’s food with to aid it. Asking such a question might draw suspicions, though, and Dara was adept enough at social relations to know when she was pushing the boundaries of an ordinary twelve year old’s curiosity. Satisfied she had enough knowledge to begin with, at least, she began putting together the final elements of her scheme.

  Dara needn’t have worried about anyone figuring out she was up to something, however, as that night’s dinner conversation was filled with news from market.

  Though Kamen had forbidden the regular market party from the Westwood going to the market in Sevendor Village, he had sent one of her uncles, his two boys and Kyre to the market to pick up a few essential supplies . . . and to listen to the gossip about the castle. Shooting a castle soldier, however brutish, was not the sort of thing a commoner could get away with, but apparently Sir Erantal was not bent on revenge, yet. Indeed, the gossip was about his latest dalliance with the wives of one of his Yeoman, Ylvine of Southridge Hold, and the scandal it had caused.

  Dara’s matronly aunt looked properly indignant – no doubt the thought of fat old Sir Erantal trying to pay her court revolted her. And while Kamen had no wish to be known as a rebel, having the lord of the domain trying to sport with his sister-in-law or wife would have brought every Westwoodman down on the old castle in a swarm. Such a thought was repellant to the traditional Westwoodmen, and the fact that the folk of Southridge Hold weren’t up in arms over the affair only confirmed in their minds the degenerate state of the Vale folk in general.

  Dara was entertained by the gossip, but her mind was elsewhere. She approached her Aunt Anira quietly after the meal with the next stage of her plan.

  “Anira, there’s so much work to do at the nutwood’s cot,” she began, dejectedly. “The rain has really put me behind. I might have to stay over, a few nights, to get it done.”

  “If that’s what needs to happen,” her aunt said, absently. “I do hope you’re getting something accomplished, and not just playing in the forest.”

  “Anira!” Dara protested, holding out her hands. After days of climbing, working with rope, and even actually cleaning they were rough, torn, and calloused. “Does this look like I’ve been gathering wildflowers and dreaming of handsome knights?”

  Anira snorted. “Clearly not. Very well, just take extra bedding, and keep the fire going. I don’t want you to catch a cold,” she warned. “Those cots are sturdy, but they can get draughty.”

  “Thank you, Anira,” Dara said, rolling her eyes. “I’ll try not to die of anything horrible until the job is done.”

  “That would be best,” her aunt replied, already on to another task and not paying attention to what Dara said. As much as she resented it other times, in this one instance she had to admit the lack of careful attention was a good thing.

  That night she packed the rest of the things she thought she would need, both for the climb and staying at the cottage for a few days.

  And, a morbid part of her reasoned, if she did plummet to her death from the top of the mountain, it would save her family the time and trouble of clearing out her room afterwards.

  As an afterthought she grabbed her little crossbow. The arbalest was good for little other than hunting birds or rodents, or shooting rotten apples off of fences, but it might be helpful if a wolf or bear showed up unexpectedly, as was like to happen this close to the deep wood. Her brother Kyre, who was learning the ranger’s craft, had often said a sharp pain to the nose would drive off most predators. The bear he’d killed last autumn proved he knew his woodcraft.

  She took it all in the wheelbarrow the next morning before breakfast and she liberally raided the kitchen for supplies before she left. Oats, bread, cured bacon, some sausage, half a small wheel of cheese, salt, and a few other things to keep her going. A last stop at the harness shed to fetch the last coil of rope and she was half a mile down the trail when the breakfast bell rang.

  Dara barely worked on the cottage that day, beyond setting up a bit of a kitchen and preparing a bed on the floor. After that she just kept practicing her knots, laying out the long, long lengths of rope, and climbing trees using her gloves.

  She was in the process of descending one large tree when she realized she wasn’t alone. And it wasn’t a curious raccoon who awaited her at the foot of the tree, either.

  “Hullo!” she heard a young voice say. “That’s about the highest I’ve ever seen anyone climb a tree!”

  Her heart pounding, Dara got close enough to recognize that her visitor was a child – a boy, she realized, not much younger than herself. She felt relieved. At first she thought she had been caught by her aunt, her uncle, or even her brother. Just a kid, she told herself. Nothing to worry about.

  Dara dropped the last ten feet and landed nimbly, without injury, on the soft loam under the tree. “I’ve gone higher,” she boasted, brushing off her gloves. “But that’s the highest tree around here, so I thought I’d give it a try.”

  “I’m Kalen,” the boy said, suddenly. He was maybe ten, and stood no higher than Dara’s shoulders. He had light hair – a certain sign one of his parents had likely come from the Vale – and a runny nose. “I come to bring some beans and biscuits to my gran – he’s Old Kori, two cots up.”

  Dara knew of Old Kori. He’d been a great hunter, once, and had sired many children, but the toothless old man had been living in the nutwood for as long as Dara could remember. “I’m Dara,” she mentioned. “Lenodara, actually, but only my aunt calls me that.”

  “Lenodara?” the boy said, his eyes growing wide. “You’re . . . you’re the Master of the Wood’s daughter!”

  “One of them,” she admitted. “The lesser one. I’m the one they don’t like talking about. Not the tall one,” she said, referencing Leska. “And not the pretty one,” she grumbled. For as long as she could remember, she had heard how pretty her older sister Linta was, and how well she would wed someday. No one had said as much of Dara.

  Kalen blinked. “What do you mean? You’re plenty pretty! And no girl I know can climb a tree like that!”

  He had such earnest admiration for the skill that Dara was forced to laugh. “Thanks! No one’s ever called me ‘plenty pretty’ before. Or complimented my tree climbing. Quite the opposite,” she chuckled.

  “So what is a lord’s daughter doing down here in the nutwood, climbing trees?”

  “The Master of the Wood is no lord,” she corrected. “He’s just the yeoman of the forest. Sir Erantal is lord in Sevendor. And I’m supposed to be getting this cot in shape,” she said, nodding toward the little hut.

  “Old Widow Ama’s place,” Kalen nodded, sagely. “I remember her. She died.”

  He said it in such a matter-of-fact way, Dara was surprised. “Yes, you’re right,” she admitted. “She was very old. And she had a good, full life. I’ll be spending a few days down here, getting it repaired and re-stocked.”

  The kid didn’t seem concerned. “Can I help?”

 
“The tree climbing or the cleaning?”

  “The cleaning,” he said, quickly. He glanced warily up at the fifty-foot spruce tree. “I’m not so good at the climbing.”

  She laughed and invited the boy inside. Kalen proved to be very smart, and well-behaved, though she suspected that being in the company of her father’s daughter had much to do with his good behavior. He was a curious boy, and immediately asked about the lack of bed, the smear of tar on the cistern, the empty planters by the door, and the ropes. She had very good explanations for everything but the ropes.

  “I’ve got a project I’m working on,” she said, hesitantly. “It’s kind of complicated and . . . well, if you wouldn’t mind not mentioning the ropes to anyone . . .”

  “Then you’ll command me to help you fix the cottage?” he asked, brightly. “Otherwise I have to gather nuts.” He did not make the task sound appealing.

  “Command you? More like ask you. And I won’t need you much, but there are a few things that having a second pair of hands to help with might be good.” The advantages of having a confederate immediately presented itself to Dara’s mind . . . but then so did the disadvantages. Security, for one. “But you mustn’t mention more than you are helping me. To anyone. No need to get specific about what we’re doing. Can I trust you to do that?”

  “Sure,” the boy answered with a shrug. “No one ever asks me about anything, anyway. I’ve got two brothers and a sister. All older,” he said, making a face. “I barely even get to speak, at home.”

  Dara, being the youngest, could sympathize. “All right, then, Kalen, I’m going to start on the floor, sometime tomorrow. Let’s take a look at what kind of horrible task is ahead of us.”

  She took the boy inside and poured him a cup of tea, apologizing for the lack of honey. Kalen looked startled and mentioned he’d never tasted honey. Dara kicked herself, inside her head. The folk of the Westwood weren’t poor, exactly, but such luxuries that did come into the manor were usually reserved for the manor house. Only at Yule and at special occasions did delicacies such as honey trickle down to the working folk who lived in the hamlet outside. Apparently that hadn’t happened in Kalen’s short memory.