Ranulf's gyrfalcon sat hooded and immobile on his master's wrist as the party rode along the bank. Ariel was aware of a deep, secret pleasure running through her body, investing every corner of her mind with a smugness that made her want to laugh aloud.
She rode a little away from the others, enjoying an apartness that made savoring her lascivious memories all the more piquant. Everything about the morning delighted her: the spritely gait of the roan mare beneath her; the wicked black eye of Wizard on her wrist as he turned his head consideringly around, taking in everything that moved within his sight; the icy bite of the air when she drew it into her lungs; the faint warmth on her face when she lifted it to the sun. She gloried in the energy bubbling in her veins, the deep chuckle that seemed lodged in her throat, the lovely thrumming of a body that still held the physical memories of the dawn as if they had been branded upon her.
Now and again she would glance over at Simon, riding in the midst of the cadre. To her now knowing eyes, he too had an air of quiet complacence, laughing and joking with his friends. She was finding it hard now to imagine that she had once thought him ugly. Now she saw how the scar somehowlent a grandeur to his asymmetrical countenance. The jagged spur of his nose, the prominent jaw, the skewed smile, the heavy bushes of his eyebrows, were all drawn with the thick, strong lines of self-assurance, of utter confidence. And yet she knew how his physical impairments, as he saw them, could at times render him uncertain and self-deriding. But she had never seen or heard him uncertain about the rightness of his convictions or the strength of his purpose.
Her train of thought was abruptly cut off as Simon loosed his bird and the peregrine soared into the vast blueness above the flat landscape on the trail of a minute speck, so high up and so tiny, Ariel wondered how Simon could possibly have sighted it. He must have amazingly acute eyesight and incredibly rapid reflexes. He must have thrown Traveler upward before the bird had even realized what he was supposed to be after.
But now the peregrine was closing in on its prey. The hawking party all watched, eyes squinting against the sun, as the drama played out far above them. The bird ducked, swerved, soared, and the peregrine followed every movement almost lazily, playing with its prey, it seemed to the watchers. And then Traveler struck, one plummeting dive, claws outstretched, curved beak dark against the sky, and the smaller bird was snatched from the air.
The peregrine rose in the air as if taking a victory flight for the watchers so far below. He caught a rising current of warm air and drifted languidly with it, mocking the heavy earthbound beings on the riverbank.
Simon walked his horse out in front of the party. He sat still, gazing upward, his left gloved arm lifted to receive the falcon.
"Do you have a reward for Traveler?" Ariel spoke quietly in the tense and yet reverent hush.
"Aye." Simon didn't take his eyes from his bird, but undipped a leather pouch from his belt.
The peregrine finally ceased his play on the current and flew with long, leisurely flaps of his wings back down to the river. He flew low along the water, his catch securely gripped in his beak, circled once, soared up, and landed neatly on Simon's upheld glove.
Simon gently took the small kestrel from Traveler's beak and slipped it in the game bag on his saddle. The hawk watched with his bright eye as with two fingers Simon extracted a bleeding piece of chicken liver from the pouch. He held the meat up to the hawk perched on his upraised arm ____________________
Ariel caught the deadly swoop of dark wings out of the corner of her eye before the chattering scream of Ranulf's gyrfalcon filled the air. It dived for the meat between Simon's fingers, claws outstretched to rend and tear, directly in front of Simon's face.
Ariel slashed at the bird with her riding crop, catching it across the back. Its screaming cry shivered in the air. Deflected from its path, it turned on her, with red eye and vicious beak open. She slashed at it again wildly, and it landed on the roan's neck, tearing with its claws at the mane and hide. The mare shrieked in pain, reared high, and Ariel flew from her back over the riverbank. The ice cracked beneath her as she fell heavily onto the fragile surface of the river and the freezing water engulfed her.
A silver streak darted from Simon's hand. The roan mare's anguished shrieks suddenly stopped. The gyrfalcon fell to the ground, Simon's small knife sticking out of its gray breast. The horse shivered and whimpered, blood pouring from the tears in her neck.
Simon cursed at the lost minutes as he secured the peregrine's jesses before handing the bird to his groom. He swung from his horse but others had reached the water before he could.
Jack waded through the ice toward Ariel, who was standing waist deep, her face white with shock, her eyes dazed. Jack held out his hand and for a second she didn't take it, then she grabbed it and allowed herself to be half dragged to the riverbank. Her green broadcloth habit, black with water, clung to her legs, hampering her movements.
Oliver bent to seize her free hand, to haul her up the incline of the riverbank. Simon thrust him aside, took hold of Ariel's hand, and yanked her up the bank. "Dear God, we have to get you out of these clothes, come with-"
She jerked out of his hold before he could finish, flinging Jack's restraining hand aside, and stumbled to the bleeding roan. She gazed at the wounds and then turned on Ranulf, who was still mounted, watching the proceedings with an air almost of amusement.
"You swine!" she hissed, stepping toward him, her eyes dark burning holes in her deathly white face, her mouth wrenched, her face a mask of hatred. "I will kill you for this, Ranulf. You had better lock your door at night, because so help me, I will-"
"Ariel!" Simon grabbed her shoulders, shocking her into silence, twisting her around her to face him. "This is not the time for that. You have to get out of those clothes and-"
"Don't you tell me what to do," she raged at him, unseeing in her blind hurt and fury. "Can you imagine what would have happened to your face? Look at my horse! Look at what's happened to her, damn your eyes. She took what was meant for you! Don't you understand that? Your face is ruined now, but just imagine what you would look like then?"
"Ariel." He spoke her name quietly, but his fingers gripped her chin hard. "Ariel." He repeated her name in the same tone, and his fingers gripped tighter until finally she felt them pressing into her skin, forcing her to acknowledge him. Finally she heard his voice, saw his eyes, heard what she had just said.
She dashed a hand across her eyes as if to clear her vision. "Forgive me. I didn't mean…"
"I don't want to hear another word," he said roughly now, releasing his grip. "You're going to catch your death, girl!" He began to unbutton her jacket. People moved forward, offering advice, assistance, but he ignored them, dragging the water-logged coat from Ariel's body. Her white shirt beneath was also soaked, but he couldn't strip that from her before all eyes.
He took off his cloak and wrapped it tightly around her. She was shivering now, her teeth chattering, her lips blue. "Jack, pass her up to me." He mounted the piebald and leaned down to take Ariel as Jack lifted her in his arms and swung her upward.
Simon settled her on the saddle in front of him, enfolding her in his arms. His lips were set in a thin line as he felt the uncontrollable shivers convulsing the slender frame. He kicked the piebald's flanks and the animal broke into a gallop, heading back to Ravenspeare Castle on the horizon.