Hawkmistress! (30 page)

I do not think I truly wish to be brother to the banshee, Romilly thought, urging her horse forward with a little cluck and the pressure of her knee, trying to throw out soothing thoughts to calm the animal’s fear. But she must not think that way. She must remember that the same Force which created the dogs and horses she loved, and the beloved hawks, had created the banshee for its own purposes, even if she did not know what they were. And the sentry-birds, who looked so fierce, were gentle and loving as cagebirds, when she had gotten to know them; she truly loved Prudence, and even for Temperance and Diligence she felt a genuine affection.

If the banshee is my brother … and for a moment she felt an amusement bubbling up that she recognized as all but hysterical. Her gentle brother Ruyven, timid Darren, dear little Rael, in the same breath with the screaming horrors on the crag?

She heard Caryl whispering to himself; the only words she caught were, Bearer of Burdens and Blessed Valentine … and she knew the child was praying. She caught him tight against her, burying her face against his caped shoulder, closing her eyes. Was this true goodness, or a mad presumption, to think that somehow their minds could reach the mind of a banshee - if the banshees have any mind, she thought, and again forced the rising hysteria down. No one knew she was a girl, she could not cry and scream with terror! She thought, grimly, that both Orain and Dom Carlo looked frightened too; where they were afraid, she had no need to feel shame for her fear!

She shut her eyes again and tried to form a prayer, but could not remember any. Bearer of Burdens, you know what I want to pray, and now I have to try and do what I can to save us all, she said in a half-voiced whisper, then sighed and said, “We will try, Caryl. Come, link with me-“

Her mind reached out, just aware enough of her body to keep it upright in the saddle, moving with the horse’s uneasy step. Reached out - she was aware of the horses, shuddering inwardly yet moving on, step by slow step, out of loyalty to their riders; of the sentry-birds, frightened at the noise, but calm because she and Caryl, whose mental voices they trusted, had bidden them be calm. She reached farther, felt something cold and terrifying, felt again the shrilling scream, shuddering through all creation, but, her hands clasped tightly in Caryl’s, she stayed with it, moved into the alien mind.

At first she was conscious only of tremendous pressures, a hunger so fierce that it cramped her belly, a restless cold driving toward warmth, that seemed like light and home and satisfaction, the touch of warmth driving inward and flooding her whole body with a hunger almost sexual, and she knew, with a tiny fragment that was still Romilly, that she had reached the mind of the banshee. Poor hungry, cold thing, . . it is only seeking warmth and food, like the whole of Creation… . Her eyes blotted out, she could not see, only feel, she was the banshee and for a moment she fought a raging battle, her whole mind alive with the need to fling herself upon the warmth, to rend and tear and feel the exquisitely delicious feel of warm blood bursting … she felt her own hands tighten on Caryl’s warmth, and then with a leftover part of herself she knew she was human, a woman, with a child to protect, and others dependent on her skill.

Linked tightly to Caryl, she felt his soothing mental touch, like a soft murmur, Brother banshee, you are one with all life and one with me. The Gods created you to rend and tear at your prey, I praise and love you as the Gods made you, but there are beasts in this wilderness who know not fear because the Gods have given them no consciousness. Search for your prey among them, my little brothers, and let me pass… . In the name of the blessed Valentine, I bid you, bear your own burdens and seek not to end my life before the time appointed. Blessed is he who preys and blessed is he who gives life to another….

I mean you no harm, Romilly added her quiet mental appeal to the child’s, seek elsewhere for your food.

And for a moment, in the great flooding awareness that she, and the horse she rode, and the child’s soft body in her arms, and the banshee’s wild hunger and seeking for warmth, were all one, a transcendent wave of joy spread through her; the red streaks of the rising sun filled her with heat and wonderful flooding happiness, Caryl’s warmth against her breast was an overflow of tenderness and love, and for a dangerous moment she thought, even if the banshee takes me for its prey, I shall be even more one with its wonderful life-force. But I too want to live and rejoice in the sunlight. She had never known such happiness. She knew that there were tears on his face, but it did not matter, she was part of everything that lived and had breath, part of the sun and the rocks, even the cold of the glacier was somehow wonderful because it heightened her awareness of the heat of the rising sun.

Then somehow the magical link shattered and was gone. They were on the downward side of the pass, and high above them, the lumbering form of a banshee was shambling toward a cavemouth in the rocks, without paying them the slightest heed. Caryl was crying in her arms, hugging her tight. “Oh, it was hungry and we cheated it out of its breakfast”

She patted him, too shaken to speak, still caught up in the experience. Carlo said huskily, “Thank you, lads. I don’t really want to be the banshee’s breakfast, even if the poor thing was hungry, it can take its breakfast elsewhere.”

The men were looking at them in awe. Orain said shakily, trying to break the spell, “Ah, you’re too big and tough a boy for a banshee’s delicate appetite - it would rather have a tender young ice-rabbit, I’m sure,” and they all guffawed. Romilly felt weak, still under the spell of the wide-ranging enchantment they had woven with their laran.

Dom Carlo rummaged in his saddle-bags. He said roughly, “I can’t say what I owe you two. I remember the leroni were starving after they did such work - here.” He thrust dried meat, dried fruit, wafers of journey-bread at them. Romilly began to sink her teeth into the meat, and then somehow her gorge rose.

Once this was living, breathing flesh, how can I make it my prey? Or I am no better than the banshee. Once this dried flesh was the living breath of all my brothers. She gagged, thrust the meat from her and thrust a dried fruit into her mouth.

This too is of the life of all things, but it had no breath and it does not sicken me with the consciousness of what once it was. The Bearer of Burdens created some life with no purpose but to give up its life that others might feed … and as she felt the sweetness of the fruit between her teeth, briefly, the ecstasy returned, that this fruit should give up its sweetness so that she might no longer hunger….

Caryl, too, was chewing ravenously at a hunk of the hard bread, but she noted that he, too, had put the meat away, though a piece had small sharp toothmarks in it. So he had shared her experience. Distantly, like something she might have dreamed a long time ago, she wondered how she could ever again eat meat.

Even when they made brief camp, with the sun high in the sky, to give grain to the horses and meat to the sentry-birds, she ate none of the dried meat, but only fruit and bread, and stirred some water into the dried porridge-powder, eating a bowlful. Yet, to her own surprise, it did not trouble her when the sentry-birds tore greedily at the somewhat gamy meat they carried for them; it was their nature, and they were as they were meant to be.

She noticed that the men still kept a wary distance. She was not surprised. If she had seen two other people quiet an attacking banshee, she would have been silent in awe, too. She still could not believe she had done it.

As they finished their meal and resaddled the horses, she looked at Dom Carlo, standing straight and tall at the edge of the clearing, with his face distant and listening. She was now skilled enough in the use of laran to know that he was extending his mental awareness along the trail behind them, toward the pass.

“So far we are not pursued,” he said at last, “And the paths are so many, unless Lyondri has a horde of leroni with him, I do not truly think he will be able to pick up our trail. We must keep ordinary caution; but I think we can ride for Caer Donn in safety now.” He held out his arms to Caryl.

“Will you ride behind my saddle, kinsman?” he asked, as if he spoke to a grown man and his equal, “There are things I would say to you.”

Caryl glanced at Romilly, then collected himself and said courteously, “As you wish, kinsman.” He scrambled up into the saddle. As they rode away, she could see that they were talking together in low tones, and Romilly found that she missed the child’s warm weight in front of her. Once she saw Caryl shaking his head, seriously, and a word or two reached her ears.

“… oh, no, kinsman, I give you my word of that….”

Suddenly jealous of this closeness, Romilly wished she could hear what they were saying. So near, now, was her laran to the surface, that it occurred to her; Perhaps I need only reach out and know.

And then she was shocked at herself. What was she thinking, she who had been reared in a Great House and taught proper courtesy toward both equals and inferiors? Why, that would be no worse than eavesdropping at doors, snooping like a nasty child, that would be completely unworthy of her.

Having the power of laran, certainly, did not mean that she had a right to know what did not concern her! And then, frowning as she fell into line - she had taken the sentrybird Prudence on her own saddle, so that Dom Carlo could carry Caryl behind him - she found herself pondering the proper manners associated with laran. She had the power, and perhaps the right, to force her will on the hawks she trained, on the horses she rode, even, to save her life, on the wild banshee of the crags. But how far did this power go? How far was it right to use it? She could urge her horse to bear saddle and bridle, because he loved her and willingly learned what would bring him closer to his master. She had felt Preciosa’s deep love, so that the hawk returned of her free will when Romilly had set her free. (And that was pain. Would she ever see Preciosa again?) But there were limits to this power. It was right, perhaps, to quiet the dogs who loved her, so they would not awaken the household to her going.

But there was trouble, too, and a deep conflict. She could urge the prey into the beak of the hawk she hunted, she could perhaps force the young and stupid ice-rabbit into the waiting mouth of the dogs … surely that was not intended, that was not part of nature, that was a distinctly unfair advantage to have in hunting!

Her eyes stinging, she bent her head, and for the first time in her life found herself sincerely praying.

Bearer of Burdens! I did not ask this power. Please, please, help me use it, not for wrong purposes, but only to try and be one with life… . Confusedly, she added, As I was, for a little while, this morning, when I knew that I was one with all that lived. As you must be, Holy one. Help me decide how to use this power wisely. And after a moment she added, in a whisper, For now I know I am a part of life … but such a small part!

CHAPTER FIVE

All the long road to Caer Donn, it continued to trouble her. When she hunted meat for the sentry-birds, she thought of her laran and feared to use the power for evil, so that sometimes she let game escape them and was roundly scolded by the men. She did use her awareness to seek out dead things in hill and forest which she could use to feed the birds - they had no further use for their bodies, surely it could not be wrong to use a dead creature to feed a living one. She felt as if she wanted to close up her new skill where it would never be touched again, though she had to use it in handling the birds - surely it could not be wrong to show her fondness for them? Or was it, since she used it to keep them quiet for her own convenience?

There were times when she tried to handle them without calling on the MacAran Gift which she now knew to be laran, and when they screamed and rebelled, Dom Carlo demanded, “What’s gotten into you, youngster? Do the work you’re paid to do, and keep those birds quiet!” She had to use her laran then, and again suffer the conflicts as to whether she did right or wrong.

She wished she could talk to Dom Carlo; he had laran and had perhaps suffered some of these same worries when he was her age and learning to use it. Was this what Ruyven had had to overcome? No wonder he fled from a horse-training ranch and took refuge behind Tower walls! She found herself envying Darren, who had none of the MacAran Gift and though he feared and hated hawks and horses, at least he was not tempted to meddle with their minds in order to show his power over them! She could not talk to Caryl, he was only a child, and used his power with pleasure, as she had always used it since she found out she had special skill with horses and used it in training them. And whenever she tried to eat fresh-killed game, it seemed that she could feel the life and the blood of the dead animal pounding through her mind, and she would gag and refuse to eat; she made her meals of porridge and fruit and bread, and was fiercely hungry in the bitter, aching cold of the mountain trails, but even when Dom Carlo commanded her to eat, she could not, and once when he stood over her until she reluctantly swallowed part of a haunch of the wild chervine they had killed for their meal, she felt such terrible revulsion that she went away and vomited it up again.

Orain saw her coming back from the thicket, white and shaking, and came over to where she was, with fumbling hands, trying to cut up offal and remainder of the chervine for the sentry-birds. It was hard to find gravel in this snowy country, and so she had to mix skin and slivers of bone with the meat, or they would have further trouble in digesting. He said, “Here, give me that,” and carried the mess over to the birds where they were fastened on their blocks, safely above the snow. He came back leaving them to tear into it, and said, “What’s the matter, lad? Off your feed, are you? Carlo means well, you know, he just was worried that you weren’t eating enough for this rotten climate.”