As she turned to leave the storeroom with her borrowed bounty, she ran into her uncle Kamal, who blocked the narrow door.
“Just what do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.
“There is an emergency,” she said, flatly, pushing past him. “Sir Festaran’s squadron has been attacked by bandits. One man has returned, but the rest are still out there. Including Sir Festaran,” she explained, hurriedly, as she dumped her gear on the nearest empty trestle table in the Hall. “My brother has already departed with a few Westwoodmen to seek them out. The castle has been notified, and Sire Cei even now is preparing a rescue party,” she said, as she folded and organized the supplies she’d gathered on the table.
“So what do you think you’re doing?” her uncle asked, suspiciously. “Surely they don’t need a half-trained wizard’s apprentice to help them out. Not when they have real wizards and real knights to serve,” he accused.
“I swore to father that I would not go near a horse or attempt the pass,” Dara said, irritated that her uncle was not seeing the gravity of the situation. “I have not. Lumpy is in the stable. And I could never keep up on foot. But that doesn’t mean I cannot do my part,” she insisted. “Now, if you could find me a leather satchel or a sack of some sort, something that can carry all of this, I would be grateful,” she said.
“Dara, this is none of your concern,” her uncle lectured, sternly. “This is a matter for the castle folk.”
“Actually, Uncle, this is none of your concern!” she shot back, hotly. She was beyond tired of her every decision being reviewed and criticized by her father and uncle. “And if you don’t recall, I live at the castle! I am ‘castle folk!’ Will somebody fetch me a satchel?” she hollered, angrily, at the crowd from kitchen and hall that gathered to witness the confrontation. “You may think me a half-trained wizard’s apprentice,” she continued to her uncle, as someone – her old friend Kalen, now grown half to manhood – brought her a bag with a shoulder strap and a flap to close it. Dara flashed him a grateful smile before stuffing her gear within. “But I would like to think that I’ve proven my worth to this hall and the Westwood, at least once. Should that not earn me some respect?”
“This is not about respect, Dara!” her uncle said, angrily. “This is something for Sire Cei to deal with! How can I tell your father I let you go running off into the night to chase some boy—”
“Sir Festaran is not ‘some boy’!” Dara nearly screamed. “He is a good and faithful friend to the Westwood to whom we owe a debt! He is a knight of Sevendor, in danger on a mission to protect the domain, and every one of us has a duty to help in any way we can! Now that Kyre has gone after him, I have double the reason to assist!” she said, finally tying the bag closed and slinging it over her shoulder, after she put on her cloak.
Her uncle was wavering, she could see – her outburst had made him conflicted, she could see, and she regretted that. Kamal had always been as much a father to her as her own. But instead he redoubled his resistance to her leaving.
“I will not allow you to ride a donkey into the wilds of Sashtalia in the night,” he declared. “By the Flame, I will not!”
“Nor do you have to,” Dara said, glancing at the eternally-lit blaze on the circular hearth. She recalled her conversation with Olmeg about the matter, and realized that she had leverage in front of the Flame that she didn’t, elsewhere. It wasn’t really something she wanted to do, but when she thought of Sir Festaran being chased through the darkness by a score of well-armed bandits, she was resolute.
“By the light of the Flame, Uncle,” she said, clearly and loudly enough for everyone in the hall to hear, “I call upon you to fulfill your oath to protect and support Sevendor when requested. As Lady Lenodara of Westwood, on behalf of my master and liege lord, Minalan the Spellmonger, I am requesting your full cooperation in this emergency . . . as required of you by that oath. Before the Flame,” she reminded him.
There was a collective gasp from the assembled onlookers at Dara’s tone and the words she chose. It was a highly formalized invocation of the feudal responsibilities of the manor, and Dara knew she was treading near the edge of a metaphorical chasm by making it. Her Uncle Kamal’s face became even more conflicted, but glancing up at first the faces of his fellow Westwoodmen, and then for a few seconds at the Flame, itself, he finally sighed and relented.
“What do you require from us, my lady?” he asked, resigned.
“I need a crossbow,” she said, quickly, as she dragged the rope harness out into the courtyard, Kamal and several others following behind her to see what mischief she was up to, now. “Not a fowler, but a war-bow. And a quiver of quarrels. I believe there are a few in the manor’s armory?”
“I shall fetch one now, my lady,” Kamal said, stiffly, and went to comply.
Dara set her bag down and closed her eyes, taking a deep breath before reaching out with her mind and summoning her bird. Frightful had been circling above, and occasionally sunning herself in the upper branches of the Westwood while she waited impatiently for Lumpy’s relatively slow descent from the pass. Once she was certain that Frightful was aloft and on her way with the burden Dara bid her to bear, she relaxed a bit and looked around at her kin, who were all staring at her.
“Shall I fetch your mule, my lady?” Kalen asked.
“She’s already winded from a rough ride down from the pass,” Dara said, shaking her head. “But run to the mews and fetch Nattia, if you would.” The lad nodded and rushed off to do so. He arrived with the falconer’s apprentice in tow about the same time Kamen returned with a heavy crossbow and a leather pouch full of bolts.
“Hunting quarrels, I’m afraid,” he said, as he handed her the weapon. “The war-points are stored in the castle against need.”
“Wooden shafts will work well enough,” she nodded, thanking her uncle with her eyes, if not her words. “And the bow?”
“Not the heaviest, but likely the heaviest you can draw,” he said, demonstrating the elaborate cocking mechanism that allowed the archer to draw back the powerful bowstring. “More than enough weight to put a bolt through a man,” he assured.
“Thank you, Uncle,” she said, quietly, as she took the weapon. “Let us hope I will not have to,” she declared.
“My lady?” Nattia asked, confused. “What is this about? Kalen tells me Sir Festaran is lost?”
“Missing,” corrected Dara, as she felt, rather than saw, Frightful approach. “Somewhere on the road between here and Sashtalia. In a ruined abbey,” she said, as she raised her arm to the sky. “I’m going after him,” she finished, as Frightful flew to land on her gauntleted fist, dropping something from her talons before she lighted.
Nattia bent down and picked up the object – the small wand that Ithalia had given her. She handed to Dara, understanding her purpose. Dara gave her a grateful look as the falconer’s apprentice took Frightful and carried her to the center of the courtyard and set her down on the cobbles before backing a way.
“You may consider me a half-trained wizard’s apprentice, Uncle,” she said, as she prepared the spell, “but that doesn’t mean I am that, alone. Nor am I without resources,” she said, as she sent a calming wave of emotion toward her bird and invoked the enchantment in the wand.
There were gasps and shrieks as Frightful suddenly transformed, filling half of the large courtyard with her impressive size. The Westwoodmen quickly backed up to the edges, but could not stop staring, their eyes wide.
“So this is the sorcery you’ve been doing up in the high meadows!” Kamen said, his eyes narrowing.
“This is why I need a proper mews for my birds,” Dara corrected, handing the rope harness to Nattia. “This has been a secret project, for obvious reasons. After Cambrian, the Emissaries were looking for a new weapon. Something that can fight dragons in the air,” she explained to her uncle, as the Kasari girl harnessed the great falcon. “The Alka Alon have been helping me transform and train her. Eventually, we’ll have dozens of
birds like this. Enough to keep dragons away,” she said, hopefully.
“Dara, I had no idea,” Kamal said, shaking his head while he stared at the preening falcon. Nattia was fastening the makeshift straps tightly, while she cooed and clucked to Frightful about how majestic she was.
“You weren’t supposed to,” Dara said, angrily. “It was supposed to be a secret. Not even the Spellmonger knows the extant of our progress,” she said, proudly. “But we’ve been working on it since I returned, and we’re nearly done with the prototype enchantment. We were planning on waiting to field-test it, but it looks like I have an excellent opportunity, now.”
“You’re going to send Frightful to look for Sir Festaran!” Kamal realized. “And bear him those supplies!”
“I’m going to ride Frightful to look for Sir Festaran, and bring him those supplies, myself,” she corrected, swallowing. This was the part of the plan she knew he would object to the most.
“Ride?” Kamen asked, astonished.
“That’s the goal,” she nodded, as Nattia tightened the rope.
“Dara, you can’t ride that thing!” her uncle insisted.
“You’re a bit heavy for her,” Dara dismissed. “Of course I’m going to ride her! That’s the entire point of the enchantment: a giant raptor with a properly-trained rider who can meet the dragons in the air, before they can rip into castles on the ground.”
“Properly trained? Who is training you?” Kamal demanded.
“I am training me,” Dara replied, as she started securing her gear more closely to her. “Well, Frightful is training me. We’re training each other. That’s why it’s an experiment,” she reasoned. “Master Andalnam is fashioning an appropriate saddle and tack even now. But it’s not ready. I’ll have to ride her with just ropes, like last time.”
“‘Last time’? You’ve ridden her?” he asked, even more shocked.
“We had to test to see if she can bear my weight, and other burdens,” Dara agreed, tucking the transformational wand into her pouch. She encouraged Frightful to take a moment from preening under the admiring stares of the suddenly-small humans around her and crouch low enough for Dara to mount across her feathered back. “I think with one more round of adjustments of the spell, we’ll be fine,” she said, as she settled onto the great bird’s back, tucking her legs under the rope that went around her body. “But Frightful has proven she can bear me in the air,” she concluded, as she entwined her legs through the ropes of the harness. She remembered how much she bounced around last time – and she hadn’t been carrying all of this other equipment.
“Dara, this is madness,” Kamal said, shaking his head as he handed her the crossbow. She tied it firmly to the harness.
“Wizards are all half-mad,” Dara said, chuckling in spite of herself. “But this is one of those times when the mad idea is the one most likely to succeed,” she admitted. “It could take days for either Sire Cei or my brother to reach the patrol. I can be there in an hour,” she boasted. “Soon we’ll have plenty of giant hawks in the air, so you’d better get used to it,” she advised.
“Dozens of Hawkladies?” Kamen asked, shaking his head in disbelief.
“No, they’ll be Sky Riders,” Dara countered. “And I am the first! Tell Olmeg I’ll contact him when I find them. And tell father . . . I’ll be back soon,” she decided, when she realized that no message could possibly assuage his worry.
“I will, Dara. Flame guide you back to us again,” Kamal pronounced, with a sigh of resignation.
“It always does,” Dara admitted. “For Sevendor!” she shouted, as she encouraged Frightful to take two steps and launch her great body into the sky and climb. It was a wild, thrilling, terrifying few moments as the bird struggled to balance the load on her back, and even at that her tail swept across the rooftop of the manor.
But in a few heartbeats Frightful steadied in the air and began climbing over Westwood Hall. Dara could hear screams, cheers, and shouts from below, and she let the great falcon circle the place twice as she climbed on her sail-like wings.
The air was crisp and clean, much different-smelling that the fertile valleys below. Valleys that were increasingly more difficult to see in the approaching darkness. Though Frightful knew where she was, twilight was long past as the sun fell in the west. Sevendor Vale was already dotted with lamps and fires in the gloom, but little else was yet in view in the moonless, cloudless summer night.
But in the east, stars were already appearing out of the darkness. As Frightful caught the thermal behind Rundeval and climbed even further, Dara took a brief moment to appreciate them from this height.
It was strange to think that her people came from one of them, so long ago. And even stranger to think that all of the Alon she knew were from yet-another star, somewhere in that sky. How did both peoples find themselves on Callidore, living next to each other? she wondered. What a grand, strange story that must be. Then she wondered what her new friend Astalia would think of the view of the stars from falcon’s back. Dara realized that she was doing something that Astalia, who had been alive for centuries, had never done. It gave her an odd sense of satisfaction.
Dara realized she was stalling with her contemplation: she was on a mission, she chided herself. She quieted her mind and cast the Cat’s Eye spell she’d perfected at Cambrian on Frightful. That allowed her bird to see in the gloom as easily as if it were morning, and when Dara relaxed yet further and joined Frightful behind her eyes, the ground below them was lit up under the power of the spell.
“Let’s go find our errant knight,” Dara encouraged Frightful, both aloud and in her mind.
***
One thing Dara noted almost immediately, as Frightful climbed over the castle and Rundeval, was that flying at night was much, much colder than flying during the day. Without the warming rays of the sun, the high-altitude winds cut through her clothes and froze her. She pulled her cloak tightly around her, but the wind seemed to whip through the fabric as if it wasn’t there. She was chilled to the bone, and her teeth started chattering.
The other thing she noted about flying was that her hair was a menace. It was fine if Frightful was climbing or diving, but any deviation in her level or the angle of her wings sent Dara’s long red hair flying into her eyes, her face, and her mouth, which she found distracting.
But she could see! With the eyes of a falcon, she could see the details on the ground clearly enough to make out incredible detail, when she got Frightful to focus. She peered down at the Westwood through the bird’s perspective until she could see a few onlookers still peering up at her . . . and she continued to focus until she could make out Nattia and Kalen.
Satisfied in her ability to see so minutely, she instructed the bird to turn north and head for Caolan’s Pass. Along the way she noted that a party of horsemen was climbing to the pass at an unusual hour, already beyond the road to the Westwood. She had Frightful let out a tremendous creel as she flew overhead, quickly overtaking the knights and zooming up the slope and over the ridge in moments.
The settlement at the top of the ridge looked like a toy as she sped by. The gate was already down over the road, indicating the pass was closed for the day, and the watchmen were taking their places on the roof of the hall for the night’s watch. Dara doubted they saw her – they were peering into the vale below for invaders, not looking into the sky. She and Frightful followed the road down the mountain and into the next domain, banking at the base of the mountain and following it north again.
Dara was exhilarated, the parts of her that weren’t numb from the cold. She found her gauntlets gripping the rough hempen rope tightly as she tried to keep her body from being flung around the bird’s back too much. Frightful seemed unconcerned by the burden, eager to prove herself as a giant and enjoying the novelty of flying at night.
The world was different, through Frightful’s eyes. She was used to the elaborate traffic in the sky during the day, but a whole different ensemble filled the night’s air:
bats, owls, nightwebs, moths and a host of other insects who preferred the darkness to the light. From the great bird’s perspective what was happening in the air was far more fascinating than anything on the ground, but Dara insisted the falcon focus. She had to resort to calling her an owl, for her nocturnal interest. That was insulting enough to keep the raptor on her task.
She’s as bad as I am! Dara thought to herself, when Frightful complained. We’re both as bad as ravens seeing something shiny!
Chapter Fifteen
The Night Flight
It took but a few minutes for Frightful to follow the road into Sashtalia, a journey that would take several hours on foot, or even by horse. It helped that the road twisted and turned around the foothills of the Uwarri range for miles and miles. Frightful was not impeded by the geography below. The great bird soared through the cloudless night in a straight line. From the air, the long twisting road into the next domain passed by in the space of heartbeats.
The settlements beyond Sevendor’s frontier quickly swam underneath them. They soared over tiny villages and small castles, fields of ripening wheat and barley, great pastures and hilltop meadows, manor houses and isolated farmsteads. Most buildings were dark at this time of day, or shone with only a small fire outdoors or a feeble taper from inside. None were aware of the passage of the giant bird overhead.
In a few minutes she passed over another group of galloping horses several miles ahead of the knights: her older brother and his men. They were making excellent time, likely trotting their horses between gallops; already they were deep into the next domain, much further out than Dara had expected. But she flew beyond them in an instant and continued ahead on the wind, faster than any horse.
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