Laird of the Wind (32 page)

She turned her attention to the goshawk, applying the warmed bread over the joint of his wing and shoulder as she and James had done before. When the bird grew restive on her fist, jerking his neck and lifting his wings, she wondered why James had not hooded him to calm him before leaving her alone with the task.

She frowned and admonished herself for even thinking of blindfolding the bird. Drawing a breath, she began to sing the kyrie eleison in a low, soft tone, repeating it.

Gawain had learned to respond to the pattern of sound. He grew motionless and watched her boldly. She remembered that hawks did not like to be stared at—although they could stare all they pleased—and glanced away, still singing.

She looked up to see James standing in the doorway, leaned against the stone frame, listening. She stopped, blushing, and he came into the room, setting the kettles down by the hearth.

"'Twas lovely," he said. "Do not stop. It calms the bird."

She could feel the heat in her cheeks as she began to sing again. James set one kettle of water over the fire, and turned to pull on the hawking glove that he had set aside.

"Here, let me take him," he said. "You did say you would make us some supper." He smiled.

Her heart gave a curious lurch to see that smile. She nodded and stood as James stepped toward her. She lifted the bread and held out her fist.

Gawain, perhaps startled by the movement of the bread, shrieked and clenched one foot tightly on her first finger. Isobel gasped, a raw intake of breath, at the fierce pain. She tightened her fist in response to the excruciating hold on her gloved finger. She panicked, reaching out with her right hand to pry the clamping talons loose.

James hit her bare hand away. "Open your hand," he said. "Isobel, open your hand and cast him off!" He reached out and slid the jesses off her smallest fingers, then shoved at her arm. Through a haze of pain and fear, she understood what he wanted. She tossed her arm and opened her fingers to release the bird. Gawain spread his wings and fluttered upward, kakking, and was brought up short by James's hold on his jesses.

"Come here, you gos," James said gently, and hummed the
kyrie
. The bird flapped down to his fist and settled there, fixing them both with a baleful eye. "Naughty lad," James muttered, and sat on the stone bench. "Isobel, let me see."

She sat beside him and drew off her glove, wincing. Her finger was reddened and swollen, and as she turned it to show him, she bit her lower lip against the ache.

James took her hand in his, his touch infinitely gentle. "Can you move it?" She wiggled the finger and nodded. "Good," he said. "A hawk can break a bone like kindling wood, even through a glove, if he gets a tight enough hold. Even a strong man cannot break the grip of a talon easily. The only way to loose the hold is to cast them off and let them think they are free." He studied her bruised finger. "You were lucky, lass."

"Why did he do it?" she asked. "I thought he was taming."

"He will never tame," he said, keeping her hand in his. "He's wild, and manning will never change that. 'Tis why hawks must be handled gently, with patience and respect. I know you showed him that," he added quickly. "But goshawks are high-tempered creatures. There is always a little danger in keeping a short-winged hawk, even the best of hawks."

She nodded and looked at Gawain. "Naughty lad," she said sternly. James chuckled. Still he did not let go of her hand, and she leaned a little toward him as his fingers cradled hers.

"He will always be a bit of a rogue, this gos," he said, and stood, stepping near the hearth. He fetched a bowl and a ladle from a shelf, scooped water from the second kettle on the floor, and brought the bowl to her. "Soak your hand here—the water is still cold from the well."

She dipped her fingers into the cool water with a sigh of relief. While she sat, James moved around the kitchen with the hawk on his fist, fetching Alice's sack of food, and setting the spare kettle of water over the fire. He dumped in some oats, a whole onion, and the entire cooked chicken.

"I was going to cook our supper," Isobel said.

"Well, you cannot do it just now, and I am starved," James said. "I have been making my own meals for years, lass. If you do not mind simple foods, we'll eat soon."

"Simple, aye," she said, and laughed. "'Tis not even cut up."

"With a hawk on my fist, I think I did well." He took a long stick from the shelf and stirred the pot, slopping some of the mixture over the side. Then he went toward a pile of rounded stones in a corner of the room, and carried several, two or three at a time in his free hand, over to the hearth.

"What are you doing?" she asked curiously, still soaking her fingers as she watched.

"When the stones are hot, I'll take them down to the spring. I promised you a warm bath. After enduring yet another injury with great courage, I think you should at least enjoy a bath." He glanced at her and smiled.

The feeling of warmth that flooded through her had nothing to do with hearth fires. "Thank you," she murmured.

He nodded and peered into the other kettle. "Now, can you help me? This water is boiling."

She set aside the bowl. "What are you going to do?"

"Cook a naughty gos," he said, and grinned when her mouth dropped open in surprise. "Nay, lassie. I'll show you. We need to straighten his crooked tail feathers."

He ladled boiling water into a deep wooden bowl, taken from a stack of two or three on a shelf with a few cups, and carried the bowl to the slab on which she sat. Isobel shifted over when James sat down. He placed the bowl of hot water between them.

He moved his gloved fist, with the recalcitrant hawk, close to his chest, and smoothed his hand over Gawain's back. His long fingers, large-knuckled and strong, gentled over the bird's plumage, and he uttered a few low, quiet phrases.

"Look at his tail," James said. "The deck feathers, those in the middle, are twisted. A quick dip in boiling water will straighten them out."

"That sounds risky, with him," Isobel said skeptically.

"Aye, 'tis," he said. "But we can do it together. I'll move him toward the water, and you grasp his tail and dip it."

Isobel grimaced. James grinned, fleetingly, as if he acknowledged the risk and enjoyed it. She wiggled her bruised, aching finger, and nodded, holding out her hands. Her right arm, while stiff, was improved, and she could use that hand if she moved the arm carefully.

James lowered the hawk on his fist and murmured quietly, soothing his hand over the goshawk's back, coaxing him to spread his tail in a wide fan.

"Six bars out," he said. "See the gray bars across his tail feathers? That tells us his age. He'll have seven bars showing when he's full grown. Aye, you gos, you're a young lad, and act like one, too."

"He acts like a bairnie who does not get his way," Isobel grumbled, as James lowered the hawk toward the water, spreading his hand firmly over the back and wings. Isobel grasped the tail feathers.

Shrieks, footing, a wildly flapping wing, and the dipping was over. James pulled his arm up, murmuring to the bird, and reached into the pouch at his waist. He withdrew a piece of raw meat and fed it to him; Isobel saw that it was a segment of the rabbit that Patrick and Quentin had brought for the bird.

"What a fine tail you have now," James murmured. "And soon you'll be soaring out there, where you belong.
Ky-ri-e e-lei-son
," he intoned, repeating the melodic phrase while the bird devoured the bit of food clenched in his talons. "
Ky-ri-e e-lei-son.
" He sang it again, and then again, spinning a beautiful pattern of calming sound.

Isobel leaned her back against the stone wall behind her, and listened, cradling her finger and closing her eyes. James's voice combined mellow serenity with rich power. She breathed in the sound, let it soothe over her and through her, its peace easing her doubts, her fears, her sadness.

Then she lifted her chin, drew a breath, and began to sing with him. Her voice, fainter than his, without his truth of tone, gained power in the blended harmony, and rose into the air with assurance.

After a while, his voice hovered on a long, vanishing note. Isobel ended her own song, listening as the glorious thrum of his voice vibrated through her body.

"Isobel," James said softly, into the silence. "I think my porridge is burning."

Chapter 21

Isobel tested the water gingerly with her bare foot. The water in the shallow end of the underground pool was indeed warm. After they had eaten their meal—the porridge and chicken had been overcooked but hearty—James had carried the hot stones to the pool and stacked them in the water for her.

She stripped out of her gown and chemise and set them beside her boots. The late afternoon sun sent amber beams into the cave, creating a warm rainbow sparkle in the trickling water.

She eased herself into the water and sat, sighing with delight. Above, on the crag's summit, she could hear James whistle to the hawk. He had told her that he intended to work with the tiercel, coaxing him to jump a short distance, on a leash, from a perch to his fist. While he set off for the task, she had eagerly gone to the cave, a square of linen tucked in her belt ready to be used as toweling.

She shimmied deeper into the pool and leaned back against the rim. The natural stone bowl had been rubbed smooth in some places by flowing water, and she stretched out and sank nearly to her chin once she found a comfortable niche.

Water lapped in a gentle cadence against stone, and trickled musically down the ridges and furrows in the rock wall. She relaxed as tension flowed out of her. The warm water eased her aching arm. A current of colder water, carried from the deeper, far end of the pool, swirled among the warmth.

She thought, dreamily, that she could stay here forever. Water had always given her a sense of tranquility. As a child, she had loved going with her mother, along with a few children of Aberlady's tenants, to swim in a small lochan outside the castle.

She leaned back her head, wetting her hair, sluicing it through with one hand. Closing her eyes, she felt the drifting water surround her.

Blended with the myriad sounds of the water, she heard a low melody as James sang to the hawk somewhere overhead, out on the crag. Isobel smiled softly as she listened.

Splashing the water gently over herself, she smiled again as she thought how much the Craig resembled a paradise. She could easily spend her life in this solitary, beautiful place without regret—so long as James was with her. She sighed sadly.

She listened to the faint, true notes of his plainsong, and to the blending melody of the water. The warmth, the lapping water, the harmonic murmurs of the spring eased her deeply. The edges of her awareness dissolved into the harmony, and she saw delicate lights dance behind her eyelids.

Within moments, she sat upright in the water and grasped the edge of the stone. But she could not dispel the shimmering images that had already begun.

* * *

A man sat in the darkest corner of a dank chamber, his back leaned against the wall, his ankles manacled. His large frame was so thin that he appeared skeletal, and his long gray hair had lost its silvery tone under layers of grime. When he looked up, his striking blue eyes—so like her own—were hollow with a loss of hope. Then the shadows closed around her father's image.

She saw several horsemen in the forest, riding along a track in pairs, with Sir Ralph Leslie in the lead. He was strong and bull-like in build, his smile complacent, his posture commanding as he rode his dappled horse. He turned to look at the woman who rode beside him, her glossy black hair braided beneath a gauzy veil, her gown an embroidered and costly blue silk.

"Wife," he said, and smiled. The woman did not look at him.

Isobel knew that his bride was herself. She gasped, gripping the stone rim of the pool, and opened her eyes, but all she saw was darkness, a broad field for the swirling images.

She saw the pilgrim again, as she had before, cloaked and hooded, walking past a church in the rain. This time he pushed back his hood as he walked toward the hawthorn tree. This time he knelt by the green mound under the tree and clasped his hands in prayer, while the goshawk fluttered past him into the tree.