Flight of the Nighthawks

by Raymond E. Feist

  Marie’s mouth opened and closed before she said, “You fi nally got over your fear of the water?”

  Zane blushed. “I wasn’t afraid. I just didn’t like it very much.”

  Tad sniggered. “He had a good teacher.”

  Zane blushed even more.

  Puzzled, Marie looked at Caleb, who said, “Let’s go to the inn and eat,” he said.

  “Might as well,” she offered. “I haven’t got enough here to feed you three.” To the boys she said, “You two hurry ahead and wash up.

  We’ll be along in a minute.”

  After they left, she kissed Caleb again, passionately. Then she whispered, “Thank you.”

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  “For what?” he replied in a soft voice.

  “For looking after them. And for turning them into men.”

  “They’ve a way to go yet,” he said.

  “But it’s a start,” she said. “When Tad’s father died . . .” She began to weep.

  “What is it?”

  “Just me being foolish,” she said, forcing back her tears. “It’s just so wonderful to see you all, and so much has changed in so little time.” She waved away the moment and took a deep breath. She pre-ceded him out of the door and he fell into step by her side as they slowly walked to the inn.

  He looked at her in the failing afternoon light. “We’ll have a little time tonight, Marie, just the two of us.”

  She smiled. “That is most certain.”

  “How have you been getting by?” he asked, noticing that she had lost weight since he had last seen her.

  “As always: I sell what I grow, and buy what I need. I take on a little sewing now and again when someone needs help, and I am planning to buy some chickens soon so that I can have eggs to eat and perhaps a few to sell.” She hugged his arm. “I get by.”

  He said nothing, but his heart almost broke as he realized what little thought he had given to her needs before he had taken her boys away. He slipped his arm around her slender waist and hugged her as they walked. After a moment of silence, he said, “Perhaps we can come up with something better than just getting by.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Later,” he said as they reached the inn.

  Dinner was almost festive. Even though it had only been six months, many of the local townspeople stopped the boys—after a second glance—to welcome them back and remark on how much they had changed. Several girls had also stopped them to let them know that they would be in the square after sundown should the boys happen by.

  At supper Marie gently informed the boys that Ellie was due to 1 3 1

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  have a baby in a few months’ time. But the pair simply exchanged looks, and burst out laughing.

  “What’s so funny?” asked their mother.

  The boys said nothing. Their feelings for the girl seemed distant now compared to the vivid memories of parting with the sisters. Over a short period all six girls had expressed individual regret at the boys’

  departure in ways that, until then, had been beyond either of their imaginations a year earlier.

  They hurried through supper, anxious to visit their friends. After they left, Marie looked around the otherwise deserted taproom of the inn and asked, “Are you staying here tonight?”

  Caleb rose and offered his hand. “We are staying here. I told the boys to sleep in their old beds tonight.”

  Marie said, “I expect they’re old enough to know what’s going on.”

  “They’ve known for a long time, Marie. But let’s just say that now they have a much fuller understanding.”

  “Oh,” she said, as he led her up the stairs to his room. “You mean—”

  “Yes.”

  “They are becoming men, aren’t they?”

  “That’s more than any mother should know,” said Caleb as he led her into his room.

  The next morning, Caleb and Marie found Tad and Zane asleep in the small hut where they had been raised. Caleb roused them from the pallets with a couple of playful taps from his boot. “Get up, you two.”

  The boys arose with pallid complexions, bloodshot eyes, and groans of protest. “Someone found a bottle of something, it seems,”

  said Caleb.

  “Matthew Conoher and his brother James,” said Zane. “It was . . .

  brandy,” he said. “Tasted more like wood varnish.”

  “But you drank it anyway?” said Marie.

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  “That we did,” said Tad. He stood, stretched and yawned, wearing only his trousers.

  His mother looked at her son’s chest, stomach, shoulders, and arms. “Where did you get all those scars?” she asked, her voice revealing alarm and her eyes narrowing as she crossed the hut to trace a particularly nasty - looking scar on his right shoulder with her fi nger.

  Tad flinched as her touch tickled him. “I was carrying a pretty big stone up the path from the beach and it just got away from me.

  If I’d have let it go, I would have had to walk all the way back down the path and pick it up again, so I tried to hang on to it and it ripped right though my shirt.”

  She glanced at Caleb, then at her son. “I thought for a minute—”

  Tad grinned. “What? That Caleb had been beating us?”

  “Only a little,” said Caleb. “And only when they needed it.”

  “No,” said Marie, her expression slightly petulant as she became annoyed by their teasing. “I thought that perhaps it was from a weapon.”

  Tad brightened. “Not that one.” He pointed to another faint scar along his rib cage. “Now, this one was from a sword!”

  “A sword!” exclaimed his mother.

  “I’ve got one, too,” Zane said, pointing to a long mark across his forearm. “Tad gave me that when I didn’t get my blade around fast enough on a parry.”

  “You two,” she said firmly, pointing to the boys. “Get dressed.”

  Turning, she said, “Caleb, outside.”

  She led him out of the hut and said, “What have you done to my boys?”

  Caleb shook his head slightly and said, “Exactly what you thanked me for last night, Marie. I’m turning them into men. Things didn’t happen exactly the way I wanted . . .” He paused for a moment. “Let me tell you about the ambush.”

  Caleb told her about the ambush, without glossing over how injured he had been nor overstating how resourceful the boys had proved. He told it as calmly as he could. “So, when it became clear that my father thought they were my apprentices anyway . . . well, 1 3 3

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  let’s say we were too far down a particular road for me to drop them at some fuller’s or baker’s door and say, ‘Turn these lads into journeymen, will you please?’ They are now my responsibility and I’m going to take the best care of them I can.”

  “But teaching them to fight, Caleb? Are they to be soldiers, then?”

  “No, but they will need to know how to take care of themselves.

  If they’re with me and working for my father, they will be in danger occasionally. I want to make sure that they are able to survive those dangers.”

  Marie seemed unconvinced, but said nothing for a moment.

  Tad stuck his head out of the door of the hut and said, “Can we come out now?”

  Caleb waved the boys out, and Marie said, “I’m their mother and they will always be my babies.”

  “This baby would like something to eat, now,” said Tad.

  Marie slapped him on the shoulder. “Then we must go to the market and get—”

  “We’ll eat again at the inn,” interrupted Caleb, “but there is something I need to discuss with all of you fi rst.”

  They stood in the early morning chill, the boys still half - asleep and squinting against the glare of the low - hanging sun. Caleb said,

  “There are perhaps better times and places for these things, bu
t this is where I am, so now is the time.”

  “Caleb,” asked Marie, “what are you talking about?”

  “Your boys have been cast by fate into my care, their lot decided by the unselfish act of returning to see to my welfare, and in so doing, saving my life.”

  He looked at the boys and said, “You know I love your mother more than any other woman I know, and I have been true to her for years.” He looked at Marie and said, “I cannot promise to be here any more than I have in the past, so I want you to leave Stardock and come and live with my family.”

  “But this is the only home I’ve known,” said Marie.

  “We’ll make another home, the four of us.”

  “What are you asking, Caleb?”

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  “Let us wed, and I will name the boys as my adopted sons. If all of you will have me.”

  The boys grinned at one another, and Tad said, “Does this mean we get to call you ‘papa’?”

  “Only if you wish to be beaten,” said Caleb with a smile. But his eyes were fixed on Marie.

  She leaned into him and said softly, “Yes, Caleb. I will go with you.”

  He kissed her, then said, “Zane, go to the inn and tell Jakesh to break out his best ale and wine. Tell him to prepare roast oxen, and trot out his best foods, for tonight we shall treat the town to a feast.

  “Tad, find Father DeMonte and tell him that he has a wedding to perform at sundown.”

  “Today?” asked Marie.

  “Why wait?” asked Caleb. “I love you and want to know that no matter what happens in the future, you and the boys will be cared for.

  I want to know you are waiting for me.”

  With a wry smile she said, “I’m always waiting for you, Caleb.

  You know that.”

  “As my wife?” he said. “That’s what I want.”

  She buried her face in his shoulder and hugged him tightly. Then she said, “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

  The boys whooped and ran off on their errands. After a moment, Marie said, “Are you certain?”

  “Never been so certain about anything in my life.” He kissed her. “I nearly died out there, and the thought of never seeing you again . . .” His eyes shone with moisture and emotion as his voice wavered. “Then those boys, those two wonderful boys that you raised, Marie—” He stopped, then said, “I didn’t know whether to throttle them for disobeying me . . . but had they not, they would now be somewhere in northern Kesh, seeking a man whom they only knew by name, without means, while I would be rotting by some roadside.

  It’s as if the gods had planned this, my love, and I’ll not wait another day.”

  “When will we move to your home, Caleb?”

  “Tonight, after the festival, for that’s what it will be—a festival!”

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  “I have so much to do—” she began.

  “All you must do is be beautiful, and that is already done.”

  “Still, if we are to travel this night, I must pack.”

  “Pack what? What do you need to bring with you? You have the boys, and nothing in the hut is necessary where we are going. You’ll see. What else is there? A few keepsakes?”

  “Some.”

  “Then gather those and spend the rest of this day preparing for your wedding. Find the dressmaker and spare no expense, and fi nd the women you wish to stand with you.”

  She nodded, tears forming. She put her hands over her nose and mouth and said, “Here I am crying like a foolish girl.”

  He kissed her and said, “Nothing foolish about you, Marie.

  Nothing foolish at all.”

  She kissed him again, then said, “I need to go to the dressmaker now. If I know Bethel Roachman she will kick up a real fuss about having to make something for me between now and sundown.”

  “Let her. Just see that it’s done to your liking.”

  She smiled, nodded, and hurried off, holding her hem above the mud, and Caleb watched her go.

  Standing alone, he wondered at his sudden need to formalize what had been unspoken between them. He felt a moment of worry, then pushed it aside. He knew his reason: he wanted the world to know that he loved this woman, and cared for her boys as if they were his own. He wanted a priest of a temple to bless their union and he wanted to go to his father with this ready - made family certain in his own mind that he could take no other course of action.

  After a moment, he muttered under his breath, “Sun’s hardly up and I need a drink already.” With doubt gnawing at his stomach, he forced himself to turn and walk back to the warehouse. He had to send a message to his parents and brother, and he needed to do it now.

  Pug and Miranda stood to one side, and watched their youngest son and the woman he loved exchange their vows before Father DeMonte, 1 3 6

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  the local priest of Killian whose tiny church served the Stardock region.

  Magnus stood a few feet behind his parents, studying his young brother with a mixture of pleasure and envy. That Caleb could fi nd a little joy in the dark world they inhabited pleased Magnus enormously.

  Pug was impressed by how much had been done in so short a time. Garlands of blooms hung from a lattice of grape stakes constructed by some local boys under Tad’s direction. Zane had organized the food and drink, and the tables around the town square were loaded. Once word of the wedding had passed through the town, the local women had pitched in with freshly baked goods and preserves, and by sundown it was—as Caleb had predicted—a full - blown festival.

  Tad and Zane stood on Marie’s side of the square, behind the three women who were standing with her. They glanced at Ellie and Grame Hodover who stood watching silently. Ellie smiled back at the boys, who noted her swelling stomach and silently agreed that fate had put them on a better path than they had anticipated.

  Spending a few minutes with Ellie during the course of the afternoon had restored the balance of their lives, and she was once again like their sister. Grame, as always, was a self - important bore, and neither Tad nor Zane could understand what Ellie saw in him, but as she loved him, they decided that was a good enough reason to put up with the pompous fool.

  When the priest had finished and the crowd had cheered, Pug motioned for the boys to come over and join them. He whispered something to his wife and she nodded. Miranda turned her attention to Marie, and as Pug led the boys off to the side of the crowd, Pug felt a faint pang. Marie looked older than Miranda. She would grow to be an old woman while Pug, Miranda, and probably Magnus would remain unchanged. What would become of Caleb wasn’t clear. There were aspects to his son’s nature that no one else understood, or even suspected, save perhaps Nakor. Pug had realized years ago that it was futile to try and keep anything the Isalani found interesting a secret.

  Reaching a quiet corner of the town square, Pug said, “Boys, I 1 3 7

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  suppose it’s a good thing that I decided not to have you drowned when you first came to my island.”

  Both boys looked startled for a moment, then grinned.

  “From this moment you are grandsons to me, and with that comes privilege and responsibility. We’ll talk more in the morning, but for the moment, go to the festival and share your mother’s joy.”

  They hesitated, then with a spontaneity that surprised Pug, hugged him fiercely. “Thank you, Pug,” said Zane. “We’ll make you proud of us.”

  Pug suddenly found himself flushed with emotion. “I know you will,” he whispered hoarsely.

  They hurried off to the party while Magnus and his mother moved to where Pug stood. Miranda said, “You look nonplussed.”

  “Just taken by surprise, that’s all.”

  “What were you surprised by, Father?”

  “That two boys I hardly know could suddenly become important to me.”

  Miranda smiled. “You have always allowed people to bec
ome important to you, Pug.” She slipped her arm around his waist. “It’s one of the things I love about you, yet which causes me no end of annoyance.”

  Softly, Pug said, “They remind me of William.”

  Neither Miranda nor Magnus said anything for a moment. William, Pug’s fi rstborn child, had died years before, but his father still grieved. Magnus rested his hand on his father’s shoulder and the three stood motionless for a long time before they moved back to rejoin Caleb and his wife in the festival.

  As the festival came to a close, Pug joined his younger son for a short walk. When they were out of earshot, Pug said, “I’ve just gotten word from home.”

  “And?”

  “There has been another murder in Kesh.”

  Caleb didn’t need to hear any more. He knew that since Nakor had returned from his visit to Knight - Marshal Erik von Darkmoor, 1 3 8

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  Pug had alerted every agent the Conclave had in Kesh to be on the lookout for evidence of a Nighthawk resurgence. For this murder to have come to their attention so swiftly, the victim had to have been someone significant. “Who was it?”

  “Just a minor noble, but one linked directly to an important faction in the Gallery of Lords and Masters. I don’t have a completely clear picture of what’s taking place down there, but I think we could be seeing the beginning of a major power shift in the Empire.”

  “A little murder has always been part of politics in Kesh, Father.”

  Pug nodded and said, “Yes, but many murders remind me too well of the last time someone tried to seize power down there.” He grinned. “Although that odd set of events also led Nakor to me.”

  “I’ve heard the story,” said Caleb, following his father’s news with a sigh. “I had hoped that Marie and I could spend a little more time together to celebrate our nuptials.”

  “I’m sorry to say you only have a few days, as I need you down in Great Kesh within a week. Marie and the boys will have to get used to the idea that although you often travel by common means—horse or wagon—you’re just as likely to be whisked from here to there by magic.” Pug glanced over his shoulder and, seeing no need to be cautious, continued, “I’ve already sent Tal, Kaspar, and Amafi to the capital. Kaspar looks so different we hope no one will recognize the newly named Comte du Bassillon from the court of Bas - Tyra until he reaches the palace.”