Master of Hawks

1

The man and the bird were one. Wings stretching, head lifting, the hawk arched upward into the warming dawn. The telepathically linked minds felt exhilarated as the crisp spring air rushed over the hawk's feathers.

The bird wheeled slowly northward above a green-gold meadow splotched with dandelion-yellow and daisy-white, passing quickly over the dark shape of the man who sat and watched his hawk. Through his human senses he studied the hawk gliding above, smelled the smoldering campfire, and heard the alarmed calls of birds catching sight of the hawk. As the bird he was aware of a patchwork of forest and meadow, pungent horse-sweat, acrid burning and cloying blossom odors, and shrill bird cries that slightly excited him, even though he had just eaten.

The bird flew higher, following the winding dirt trail of the overgrown Buchanan Road into the foothills of the Blue Mountains. It rode the strong northeasterly air currents to best advantage, gliding and ascending with the updraft, conserving its energy for the long trip.

Enjoying the sensations of flight, the man immersed himself further in the hawk's senses. He stretched his wings and soared toward the azure-domed heavens. He was in his element, free of the constraints of the earth, no longer isolated or lonely, but now a part of something greater than himself, a part of the sky, a part of the universe.

The wind shifted, and the bird dived toward the earth. The air became a deafening roar that blasted against the plunging hawk. The sensation was breathtaking.

Then as the vast green world seemed to rush up to meet it with almost irresistible finality, the bird opened its wings, pulled out of the dive, and zipped over the treetops. The man's exhilaration was close to ecstasy.

Then he spotted something moving along the road.

Abruptly the thrill of flight vanished as he remembered his mission. Circling for a closer look, he scrutinized the trail for activity.

A party of soldiers traveled down the road from the Blue Mountains toward the town of Threeforks in the southwest. The morning sun glared back at the sky, reflected from the silver buckles and braid and the scabbards of their swords. There appeared to be about two dozen men in the group, but the overgrown trail hid many of the details.

The hawk dropped lower and headed back toward Threeforks, seeking a better vantage point. It drifted over the pines and pin oaks edging the path and then dipped downward into the coolness of the forest.

The bird perched in the branches of an oak overlooking a wider bend in the road. As it pruned and preened its feathers with its curved black beak, the man enjoyed the tickling and scratching sensations as much as the bird.

Leaves rustled and twigs broke as frightened birds and animals bolted through the greenery along the trail. The forest was filled with a cacophony of sounds that frightened the hawk and alerted the man: hoofbeats, clanking, squeaking, voices, leather rubbing on leather—the rushing, grinding sounds of horsemen.

The silver trim on the soldiers' black uniforms glinted through the leaves and branches. Then the shadow-dappled shapes of horses and riders came into full view. The soldiers rode slowly and carefully, as though through unfamiliar and possibly hostile territory. Their horses glistened with sweat.

Leading the company, a tall, wiry man wearing the red cloak of a sorcerer signaled his troops to increase their pace. He wore the insignia of the Imperial Army of the Taral Empire.

While observing the soldiers through his hawk, the man in the meadow some twenty miles to the southwest took out his notebook and jotted down the details. His tanned hands and arms were scarred from years of handling hawks, falcons, and other birds of prey, the same birds that had given him his name.

For the man was called Hawk; but he did not know his birth name or even if he had ever had one.

Hawk had expected to see more soldiers, because a large portion of the Empire's army was almost in position to invade the Kingdom of York from the south. His mission was to locate the smaller contingent of troops massing in the north, estimate their number, and transmit the information to Castle York.

As the last of the soldiers passed the watching hawk, it rose slowly and resumed its flight into the mountains.

Dipping and soaring along the treetops, it searched for any signs of more men, but as the hours passed, the trail remained clear.

Meanwhile, Hawk sipped lukewarm water from his canteen and poured some into a pan for his horse. Then he stretched and bent, slowly working out the stiffness of his muscles. He felt strangely awkward and bulky after the lightness and grace of his hawk. He always felt awkward compared to the birds.

As his control of the bird's mind grew stronger, the sense of oneness returned. He soared through the azure sky, his powerful wings beating in a slow, steady rhythm. But the flight was no longer effortless or exhilarating, and the bird's fatigue and growing hunger became his own.

The hills had become long dark ridges broken to the north by the bright blue beads of a chain of lakes. The first real mountain lay to the south. On its summit stood the ruins of Castle Buchanan.

Although most of the rust-red stones and bricks lay in century-old abandonment, Hawk saw that part of the complex bustled with activity—a large company of Empire troops was using it as a staging area.

The hawk circled down over the crumbling keep and half-fallen watchtower that were the tallest structures remaining among the disintegrating walls and overgrown courtyards. New fortifications had been hastily erected around them, and the black and silver banners streaming from hollow windows indicated that they were now inhabited. Where the north wall of the Great Chamber had fallen away, the army had set up tents and some small wooden buildings. Pieces of wall with magnificent, empty arched windows and stone paneling now formed the target area for an archery range.

The hawk swooped lower, seeking a perch near the new fortifications. Suddenly it heard a low shriek from behind and felt the vibration of wings in the air. A large male falcon was overtaking it.

As the hawk turned swiftly and ascended, the falcon followed. It attacked the hawk with raking claws and jabbing beak.

Startled by the unnatural attack, Hawk telepathically probed the falcon to dissuade it. But instead of reaching a falcon's primitive thought pattern of hunger and flight, he felt the strong will of another telepath.

For a moment the two human minds touched through the falcon-link, then the enemy erected a shield that pushed Hawk from the falcon's mind.

Surprised and confused, Hawk tried to use his bird's advantages of height and greater maneuverability to escape the larger falcon. However, the falcon was fresh, so it quickly outdistanced the tired hawk.

Realizing that it could not get away, the hawk turned to fight before it lost the advantage. It dived in a rapid movement to gouge at the falcon with hooked beak and talons. The falcon pressed upward, using its larger body as a battering ram to slow the hawk.

As the hawk attacked with a series of downward thrusts that forced the falcon to dive and circle in a protective effort, a second, female, falcon soared into the sky.

The female reached the grappling birds and flew above them.

Seeing her, the hawk broke off its attack and attempted to outdistance the male falcon and reach the forest beyond the widespread ruins. But the female swooped down on it and clutched at its black head with ironlike claws. The broad wings of the hawk flared as it tried to descend, only to be met by the male falcon butting from beneath.

Hawk felt for the female's thoughts and discovered that it was also under human domination. As he withdrew his probe, the enemy telepath thrust deeply into the hawk's mind in an attempt to wrest control. Hawk fought back, but his foe seemed to possess greater telepathic powers than he.

Realizing that he could not save his bird and that as long as he remained in telepathic contact with the hawk the enemy could attack his mind through the bird-link, Hawk tried to break contact. But the enemy telepath assaulted his mind and held the link open, blocking his retreat.

Hawk lashed back, dodged behind mental barriers, and again tried to escape the hawk. However, his opponent followed, engulfing Hawk in waves of pain, destroying his shields, and disrupting his thought patterns.

Although Hawk tried to protect himself from the blows, the strain and the hours of long-distance telepathy had tired him. He no longer had the strength for an adequate defense. Further, he had not expected to meet another bird-telepath—they were so rare that he had never even met another one—so he had not been prepared for such an eventuality.

The enemy's assault became a razor-sharp sword that cut through Hawk's mind with a force that intensified with his opponent's growing elation at victory.

As his innermost shields began to crumble under the onslaught, Hawk used the last of his strength to break the bonds holding him to his bird's mind. Then as the enemy's presence flooded over him, overwhelming him in a haze of intolerable agony, the bonds snapped, and Hawk's mind hurtled back toward his human body and into a black void that swallowed him and left no trace upon its surface.

The three birds spun through the sky, fluttering and drifting for a moment like three autumn leaves in a whirlwind. They suddenly closed together in a mass of feathers and blood.

The female falcon's claws again raked at the hawk from above, and crimson fluid ran into the hawk's left eye and down its breast. The hawk jabbed at one bird with its beak and at the other with its talons, then quickly released and dove, striving to reach the haven of green beyond the stones. But the other birds worked as an unrelenting team, constantly ripping and clawing at the smaller bird blocking its attempts at escape.

Below, some of the soldiers had stopped their work to become spectators. They now cheered and some clapped as the birds disengaged and the smallest dark shape fluttered downward.

The falcons darted at it once more, and then the hawk's high-pitched screech echoed briefly among the ruins. When released, it fell through the sky like a small black rock.

2

Geoff S'Akron, Lord of the Kingdom of Akron, wielder of the Pendant of Thantos, and second in command of the Northern Imperial Army invading the Kingdom of York, belched twice, loudly, and poured himself another glass of cheap red wine. Lord S'Akron didn't mind the wine's imperfections; it was the first bottle of the day, and therefore the least important.

He was a short, balding lump of a man in his early forties who had recently inherited the title and lands of Akron when his uncle Gregory died without living progeny. This turn of events had annoyed the Council of Seven that ruled the Taral Empire, for Lord Geoff had few of the sorcery skills to which a S'Akron should have fallen heir.