The songsmith inclined her head as she would have to a human. “Well-met, Steel Talon.”
For a moment those fierce eyes met hers again, then the bird gave a piercing cry. He rose from the boulder in a blur of ebon wings and sailed away, out of sight. Eydryth turned to Alon. “Well? Did he approve?”
Her companion smiled at her. “How could he not? He is an extremely discerning creature.”
The girl felt again that warmth of cheek and hoped that the light was still so dim that Alon could not make out her blush. Confused, she summoned words almost at random. “You were supposed to wake me at first light. We must hurry, or the shepherds will find us here.”
Quickly they broke camp, not stopping to break their fast, only pocketing rounds of journeybread to chew as they rode.
Monso carried his double load seemingly effortlessly, though Alon constrained him to a far slower speed than that of the night before—much to Eydryth’s relief. The Keplian’s paces were uncannily smooth as her companion varied their speed according to the terrain: jog, canter, working trot, walk. Once they reached the road leading to South Wending, he kept the stallion to a slow, ground-covering canter.
Eydryth was amazed at the creature’s endurance. The damp clay of the road flowed from beneath the Keplian’s tireless legs like water running downstream. By the time they halted for their midday meal, she estimated that they had covered nearly ten leagues.
Standing beside Monso as he grazed, the songsmith dared to caress the muscled black shoulder. “He is truly amazing. Few mounts could have traveled the distance he did this morning carrying one rider—let alone two.” The black raised his head, green tufts protruding from his lips, and blew gustily down the front of her jerkin, making the girl laugh.
“What I find amazing is that he has accepted you so completely.” Alon spoke up from where he lay resting in the shade of a tall beech growing on the bank of a stream. “Before yesterday, he welcomed no one’s touch but mine… he would barely suffer Hilarion’s.”
She walked over to drop down beside him, enjoying the feel of the new spring grass beneath her. “How long have you had him? How old is Monso?”
“He was born in the Year of the Werewolf,” he replied. “When I was thirteen.”
Then Alon was born in the Year of the Hippogriff, even as I was, she reflected. Before she thought, she found herself asking, “What month were you born, Alon?”
He rolled over on his side to look at her, his expression suddenly somber. “I know not,” he said. “And when I said that I was thirteen in the Year of the Werewolf, that was my best guess, not something I know for truth.”
“Because you are an orphan?” she guessed, remembering his words of last night, when he had spoke of finding his first home as Kaththea and Hilarion’s fosterling.
He nodded. “I believe that I am nineteen, but I could be older. I will never know.”
Eydryth thought about the warmth and love that had surrounded her while she was growing up in Kar Garudwyn, in the years before her mother’s disappearance. Perhaps, she found herself thinking, there are worse things than growing up without the Gift. Much worse…
For a moment she was tempted to ask Alon to tell her the story of his life, but, again, she repressed that urge. I must avoid… entanglements. I have a duty to fulfill, and nothing must be allowed to alter that…
“How old are you?” Alon asked quietly.
“I was born in the Month of the Gyrfalcon… nineteen years ago,” she responded.
“And why…” he began, then hesitated, as though he had changed his mind about voicing the question. A moment later he glanced up, then grinned. “Steel Talon is back… with an offering. We shall dine in style this evening!”
Eydryth sat up, watching as Alon went over to where the bird sat perched on a low limb of a nearby tree. A brown and white, blood-streaked ball of feathers lay on the grass beneath it. The young man picked up the chicken, shaking his head. “Raiding hen yards again? I told you how dangerous that is! What if the farmer had possessed a dart gun?”
The bird cocked its head, uttering a cry that, even to Eydryth’s ears, sounded distinctly scornful.
“We can make do just as well with rabbit,” Alon insisted. Glancing more closely at the falcon’s prize, he scowled. “No wonder you caught her so easily. This one has seen many springs.”
The falcon ignored him as it began to preen its feathers.
The man sighed audibly, then looked back at Eydryth and shrugged. “I might as well be speaking with the voice of the wind, for all he attends.”
Eydryth scrambled up to stand beside him as he began plucking the hen. “You two really speak together?”
“Not the way the birds can communicate with their Falconer comrades,” he replied. “Steel Talon knows and understands much of what I say to him, that I know, but ours is a very one-sided conversation. I cannot talk with him as Jonthal could.”
The songsmith eyed the falcon, remembering tales she had heard of how Falconers and their birds were inextricably linked, mind-to-mind, and that the death of one partner would almost certainly bring about the death of the other, even when no wound or illness was present. She had heard, once or twice, of Falconer men living after the demise of their winged comrades, but never had she known of a falcon surviving after its human companion died.
Vengeance… she thought. Alon said he was living to avenge himself on Jonthal’s murderer. … It was on the tip of her tongue to ask if Alon knew who had caused the death of his partner, but, again, she restrained herself.
We will reach Lormt soon, she thought, sternly. And then we will part forever. Save your energy for your search!
After allowing Monso to graze for another hour, Alon resaddled the half-bred and they continued on their way. Several times that afternoon Eydryth caught glimpses of Steel Talon, flying so high that he was little more than a soaring black dot against the puffy white clouds shouldering their way across the spring blue sky.
The sun was past its zenith by the time they saw the fork in the road with its signpost indicating the way to South Wending. They did not pass through the town, but skirted it through pastures dotted by cattle, sheep and horses. Several miles past the village, they reached the landmark Alon had mentioned— the vivid red-clay bank with the small trickle of a creek running along its foot.
The turnoff was small and overgrown, but as they ducked beneath branches, Eydryth noticed that several of the tree’s bright emerald leaves lay upon the ground. Bending lower, she observed that the track was scarred by the prints of many shod mounts.
“Look,” she said to Alon, pointing. “At least seven or eight mounts passed this way… probably no later than this morning. Are there outlaws in this region?”
“Some,” he replied uneasily. “But Koris the Seneschal, while he is a good ruler where honest folk are concerned, has little sympathy for those who prey upon others.” He sat staring at the hoof-trodden earth for a moment, then straightened in his saddle, brightening visibly. “It is far more likely, though, that this is simply a party from some great lord’s household, traveling to Lormt to seek out old family records. Many noble families have been doing so since the time of the Turning.”
“I see,” Eydryth murmured, still studying the tracks. There were no signs of wheel marks… or the lighter prints that would indicate a horse-drawn litter. That only means that this party does not include the very old or very young, she reminded herself. It is likely that Alon’s surmise is true.