Through Wolf's Eyes (24 page)

T
HE NEXT MORNING
, Derian was nowhere about.

"Earl Kestrel," Ox explained to Firekeeper, "let him go visit his family. His parents."

Ox always spoke carefully, pausing between each word
as if she was stupid, not merely ignorant of the language. Firekeeper
recognized the essential kindness in the big man, however, and didn't
challenge him. When Ox was summoned to wait upon the earl, she sought
out Elation. The falcon rested on a perch near a window, watching the
little birds outside from sardonic golden-rimmed eyes.

"I wondered how long it would take you to wake up," Elation shrilled.

"Why wake?" Firekeeper replied, scratching behind one
of Blind Seer's ears. "There is nothing for me to do. They bring me my
food, so I need not hunt. For the first time I can remember, I am warm
and fed."

Blind Seer huffed out through his nose. "We fed you!"

"After the strong had eaten," she retorted. "Sometimes there was little enough for me."

"Little enough for any," he replied, "when the strong are finished. That is why only the strong survive."

"I have survived," Firekeeper said, "so I must be strong."

But despite the bravado in those words, there was a
singular lack of enthusiasm within her heart. Perhaps Elation heard
this dullness, for she shrieked.

"So, eat and grow fat. That is all you wish?"

"Is there else?" Firekeeper challenged without much heat.

"You came away from your pack to learn about the two-legs," Elation replied. "What have you learned?"

"That the world is far bigger than even the Ones
imagine," Firekeeper said. "That I can talk human talk after a fashion,
but that I fear I shall never be more than a pup among them, even as I
have ever been a pup among the wolves."

"And have you acted as other than a pup?" Elation
prodded, her beak gaping in mocking laughter. "Have you done other than
pad about after your nurse, eating his leavings as if summer will never
end? Take care, wolfling, summer may end and leave you within a trap."

"What do you mean?"

"After last night's rumpus, more than Earl Kestrel
know that you live. Remember, I understand human speech better than you
do, for those who were my masters one brief season
often
spoke of weighty matters while they rode with falcons on their gloves.
If you are not to be chased hither and yon like a rabbit beneath the
falcon's circling flight, then you must make yourself a place within
this aerie."

Firekeeper straightened, some vague sense of purpose licking tongues of fire in her soul.

"Do you think I can?" she asked, almost timidly.

" 'Do you think I can?' " the falcon mimicked
cruelly. "I think you must and from this very moment forward. Your
nurse is away. You can act without risking that Earl Kestrel's wrath
will descend on him."

"I have worried about such," Firekeeper admitted. "My missteps seem to bring blows to Derian's head, not mine."

"So I have observed," Elation said smugly. "It is well to protect an ally but not when that protection weakens yourself."

"What," interjected Blind Seer, "would you have
Firekeeper do? Somehow I don't think that challenging their One would
do her any favors. From what Derian has told us, this is not the way to
earn prestige among these two-legged folk."

"It is not," the falcon agreed. "Let me think."

She did so, raising a leg to nibble on the wickedly
curving talons of one foot, preening her feathers, chortling and
chuckling softly to herself in falcon speech.

"I," Elation announced at last, "shall provide you
with the means to meet more equally with those whom you must come to
know. Here they consider hunting with raptors— especially the great
birds such as myself—a sport reserved for noble folk. We three shall go
out into the gardens and I will fly for you as once I flew for my human
master."

"What good will that do Firekeeper?" Blind Seer asked dubiously.

"Humans are as curious as raccoons," Elation replied.
"Some will come to learn what is happening, younger ones, I suspect,
who do not have so much dignity to preserve. Firekeeper can impress
them and they in turn will tell their elders that she is not merely a
toy."

"Your idea might serve," Firekeeper said thoughtfully, "and certainly sitting in this room does us no good."

"I would," Blind Seer admitted, "like to be outside
in the sun again. My patience with cold stone rooms is near ended. Had
I loved you less, sweet Firekeeper, I would not have borne them this
long."

"Then we are settled," Firekeeper declared.

So it was that when Earl Kestrel came looking for his
ward after his breakfast had been eaten and his plans for the day were
neatly in place, he found the young woman gone and the door out into
the castle grounds standing open before him.

A
LTHOUGH A CITY
had
grown up around it, the castle at Eagle's Nest showed remnants of the
days when it had been constructed as a fortification that could, in an
emergency, take within its walls all the surrounding population and
their flocks and herds as well.

Those days were long past, but not because either the
castle or its grounds had grown smaller. Indeed, the descendants of
Queen Zorana had jealously guarded their property rights, holding on to
not only the gardens, workshops, and stables within the fortified walls
but to the surrounding acreage as well. Most of this flowed behind and
above the castle, rough land, not well suited for cultivation, but
perfect for game parks and meadows.

To one of these lower meadows was where Elation led
Firekeeper and Blind Seer, soaring time and again from a padded perch
on the young woman's shoulder to check which of the winding paths they
should follow. After the coolness within the building, the summer
sunshine was welcome indeed. Butterflies congregated around neatly
ranked beds of flowers and songbirds nested in trees crowded with
ripening fruit. Passage of the three predators caused more than a
little consternation, though not one raised hand, paw, or talon to hunt.

"Through that gate," the falcon directed, "beneath the grey stone arch. Step lively, wingless!"

Firekeeper laughed and began to run, forcing the bird to take flight quickly and without great grace. Blind Seer
bounded
alongside, leaping and almost catching the peregrine by her tail
feathers. Once through the gate, they found themselves in a meadow
yellow and white with wild flowers, thick with green grass yet unmowed
and unbrowned by the greater heat of late summer.

Firekeeper dove into it as she might have into a deep
pool, rolling neatly on one shoulder and bounding to her feet without a
pause. Around and around her, in spiraling circles, Blind Seer ran,
stretching muscles stiff and aching from confinement indoors. He
started a rabbit and gave chase, but let it escape since he was not
really hungry.

Wolf and woman played in this fashion for some time before a shriek from Elation alerted them to the approach of strangers.

There were two: a male and a female. Neither were
adults, of that Firekeeper was certain. She was less certain about
their actual ages. Derian had made some effort to educate her on this
matter, using as models the few children at the keep and a few others
glimpsed along the road or from the windows of the Kestrel manse. After
some consideration, Firekeeper decided that the boy was the younger,
more from how he deferred to his playmate than from anything else.

That the two had not expected to find anyone else
here was obvious from the way they paused beneath the gateway arch.
That they were curious was evident from how they stood, hand clasped in
hand, staring.

"I wouldn't swear it," Blind Seer said, plopping on
his haunches next to Firekeeper, "but they smell familiar. Could they
have been among the pack yesterday?"

Firekeeper tilted her head to one side, studying the
pair. After a moment, she nodded, a human gesture that was becoming
habit with her.

"Yes, I think so," she replied. "They were the two
who laughed hardest during the meal. I think they thought my manner of
eating amusing."

This last was not something about which she was
particularly happy. She had been rather pleased with her progress in
human customs. The mockery of these small ones—and
the better-concealed reactions of their elders—had proven to her that she still had much to learn.

"Talk with them!" the falcon urged from a perch high
in a peach tree. "From what I can see, none of their elders are about.
You may learn something here."

Firekeeper nodded, swallowed past a sudden hard spot in her throat, and managed a soft "Hello. Good morning."

Girl and boy exchanged glances. Then the girl stepped a pace forward.

"Good morning. What are you doing in our great-uncle's garden?"

Firekeeper frowned. "Running. The castle is very cold."

The girl took another step forward, her apprehensive
gaze on Blind Seer rather than on Firekeeper. She was solidly built,
but not heavy, with chubby cheeks and red hair highlighted with gold.
In the center of her forehead a dark reddish-orange stone glimmered,
set in a band of woven gold. Firekeeper hadn't seen enough of humans to
decide if the girl would be judged pretty, but suspected that she was
as yet too gawky, too young to be considered so.

Pulling straight the skirt of her mid-calf-length flowered frock, the girl continued her interrogation:

"But do you have permission to be here? These are the king's gardens."

Even Firekeeper could hear the pride in the girl's
voice as she said these words, but the wolf thought it a pardonable
pride given the importance humans placed on kings.

"I do," she replied. "King Tedric told me last night, when he asked us to stay at the castle."

"Asked you?" began the girl, but the boy interrupted, hurrying forward to tug one of her puffed sleeves.

"Don't you get it, Citrine?" he hissed in what
Firekeeper guessed were meant to be hushed tones. "This is Earl
Kestrel's ward. This is Blysse!"

"Oh, Kenre!" Citrine protested, looked again, then frowned. "Oh!"

"I am called Blysse," Firekeeper confirmed. "What are you called?"

"I," said the girl, "am Citrine Shield."

"I'm Kenre," the boy said. "Kenre Trueheart. Is that your dog?"

"Wolf," Firekeeper answered. "Blind Seer, because he have blue eyes."

"They are!" the boy said, leaning forward to look, but not closing with the wolf. Firekeeper respected him for his prudence.

Kenre Trueheart was as sturdily built as Citrine,
perhaps given slightly to fat where she was not. With his soft light
brown hair and big brown eyes, his body all quivering with excitement,
he reminded Firekeeper, not unkindly, of a baby rabbit.

"I didn't know wolves ever had blue eyes," Kenre said.

"Most do not," Firekeeper answered, feeling a certain
thrill. She was actually talking to humans on her own, without Derian
there to intercede or clarify!

The little girl, Citrine, pushed her way through the
tall grass. As she came closer, Firekeeper caught her scent, a mingling
of soap and flowers, overlaid with the bacon and bread from her
breakfast.

"Can I pat him?" she asked, gesturing to Blind Seer.

Firekeeper tilted her head, considering. "He bites."

"Oh! And Earl Kestrel lets you keep him?"

"Blind Seer stay with me," Firekeeper replied, avoiding the awkward issue of permission. "So does falcon."

She raised her forearm, encased from hand to elbow in
a heavy falconer's glove that Race had bought for her along the road
from West Keep to Eagle's Nest. With a showy screech, Elation launched
from the peach tree's branches, spiraled upward, then plummeted down to
land with deceptive gentleness on Firekeeper's glove. Even so,
Firekeeper had to steady herself against the weight of that landing.
Elation was to the average peregrine falcon what Blind Seer was to
Cousin wolves—bigger, stronger, and far wiser.

Kenre and Citrine both scampered back at the falcon's
descent, but curiosity brought them forward almost immediately.
Skirting the wolf, they stared up at the falcon, who obliged by
intelligently returning their regard.

"It looks like a peregrine," Kenre said hesitantly, "but bigger than any in my father's aeries."

"Kenre's father is a Merlin," Citrine said, confusing
Firekeeper to no end. "My father is a Goshawk, though my mother is a
Gyrfalcon."

"I not," said Firekeeper, feeling a sinking sensation
that this would not be the last time she made this statement,
"understand."

Citrine looked delighted rather than exasperated,
soothing Firekeeper somewhat, and put on what even the wolf-raised
woman had come to recognize as a lecturing tone.

"Each of the six Great Houses has two names," Citrine
said. "One is the original family name; the other is the emblem given
by King Chalmer the First in the Year Twenty-seven of this Realm."