“That one does not fly right!” The youngster, dropping the reins of his horse, held his hands together to mimic the wings of a bird. “A true bird goes so — and a falcon so — many times have I watched them. But this one, see — flap, flap, flap — it is not right!”
They were all watching the circling bird now. To Simon’s eyes it was the same sort of black and white feathered sentry as had found them outside the Hole of Volt, as he had seen on the saddle perches of the Falconers. However he would be the first to admit that he knew nothing of birds.
“Can you whistle it down?” he asked Koris.
The Captain’s lips pursed and clear notes rang on the air.
At that same moment Simon’s dart gun went up. Koris turned with a cry and struck at Simon’s arm, but the shot had already been fired. They saw the dart strike, piercing just the point of the white vee upon the bird’s breast. But there was no faltering in its flight, no sign that it had taken any hurt from the bolt.
“I told you it is no bird!” cried Briant. “Magic!”
They all looked to the witch for an explanation, but her attention was riveted on that bird, the dart still protruding from its body, as it made low lazy circles overhead.
“No magic of the Powers.” That answer seemed forced out of her against her will. “What this is, I cannot tell you. But it does not live as we know life.”
“Kolder!” Koris spat.
She shook her head slowly. “If it is Kolder, it is not nature-tampering as it was with the men of Gorm. What it is I cannot tell.”
“We’ll have to get it down. It is lower since that dart struck it; perhaps the weight pulls it.” Simon said, “Let me have your cloak,” he added to the witch, dismounting.
She handed him that ragged garment and looping it over his arm Simon began to climb the wall beside the narrow track they had followed to this place. He hoped that the bird would remain where it was, content to fly above them. And he was sure it drew nearer earth with every circle.
Simon waited, flipping the cloak out a little. He flung it, and the bird flew unwarily into the improvised net. When Simon tried to draw it back the captive fell free, to fly blindly on and smash head first against the rock wall.
Tregarth leaped down to scoop up what lay on the ground. Real feathers right enough — but under them! He gave a whistle almost as clear and carrying as Koris’ bird summons, for entangled in the folds of torn skin and broken feathers was a mass of delicate metal filings, tiny wheels and wires, and what could only be a motor of strange design. Holding it in his two hands he went back to the horses.
“Are you sure the Falconers use only real hawks?” he asked of the Captain.
“Those hawks are sacred to them.” Koris poked a finger into the mess Simon held, his face blank with amazement. “I do not think that this thing is any of their fashioning, for to them the birds are their power and they would not counterfeit that lest it either turn upon them or depart utterly.”
“Yet someone or something has tossed into the air of these mountains hawks which are made, not hatched,” Simon pointed out.
The witch leaned closer, reaching out a finger to touch as Koris had done. Then her eyes raised to Simon’s and there was a question in them, a shadow of concern.
“Outworld—” she spoke hardly above a whisper. “This is not bred of our magic, or of the magic of our time and space. Alien, Simon, alien…”
Briant interrupted her with a cry and pointing a finger. A second black and white shape was over their heads, swooping lower. Simon’s free hand went to the gun, but the boy reached down from his saddle to strike at Tregarth’s wrist and spoil his aim. “That is a real bird!”
Koris whistled and the hawk obeyed that summons in the clean strike of its breed, settling on a rock crown, the tip of the same pinnacle against which the counterfeit had dashed itself to wreckage.
“Koris of Estcarp,” the Captain spoke to it, “but let him who flies you come swiftly, winged brother, for there is ill here and perhaps worse to come!” He waved his hand and the falcon took once more to the air, to head straight for the peaks.
Simon put the other thing into one of his saddle bags. In the Eyrie he had been intrigued by the communication devices which the true falcons bore. A machine so delicate and so advanced in technical ability was out of place in the feudal fortress of its users. And what of the artificial lighting and heating systems of Estcarp, or the buildings of the Sulcarkeep, of that energy source Osberic had blown up to finish the port? Were all these vestiges of an earlier civilization which had vanished leaving only traces of its inventions behind? Or — were they grafts upon this world from some other source? Simon’s eyes may have been on the trail they rode but his wits were tumbling the problem elsewhere.
Koris had spoken of Volt’s non-human race preceding mankind here. Were these remnants of theirs? Or had the Falconers, the mariners of Sulcarkeep, learned what they wished, what served their purposes best from someone, or something else, perhaps overseas? He wanted a chance to examine the wreckage of the false hawk, to try and assess from it if he could the type of mind, or training, which could create such an object.
The Falconers emerged from the mountain slopes as if they had stepped from the folds of the ground. And they waited for the party from Kars to approach, neither denying them passage, nor welcoming them.
“Faltjar of the southern gate,” Koris identified their leader. He swept his own helm from his head to display his face plainly in the fading light. “I am Koris of Estcarp, and I ride with Simon of the Guards.”
“Also with a female!” The return was cold and the falcon on Faltjar’s saddle perch shook its wings and screamed.
“A lady of Estcarp whom I must put safely beyond the mountains,” corrected the Captain in a tone as cold and with the sharpness of a rebuke. “We make no claim upon you for shelter, but there is news which your Lord of Wings should hear.”
“A way through the mountains you may have, Guard of Estcarp. And the news you may give to me; it shall be retold to the Lord of Wings before moonrise. But in your hail you spoke of ill here and worse to follow. That I must know, for it is my duty to man the southern slopes. Does Karsten send forth her men?”
“Karsten has thrice horned all of the old race and they flee for their lives. But also there is something else. Simon, show him the false hawk.”
Simon was reluctant. He did not want to yield up that machine until he had more time to examine it. The mountaineer looked upon the broken bird he took from the saddlebag, smoothing a wing with one finger, touching an open eye of crystal, pulling aside a shred of feathered skin to see the metal beneath.
“This flew?” he demanded at last, as if he could not believe in what he saw and felt.
“It flew as one of your birds, and kept watch upon us after the fashion of your scouts and messengers.”
Faltjar drew his forefinger caressingly down the head of his own bird as if to assure himself that it was a living creature and not such a copy.
“Truly this is a great ill. You must speak yourself with the Lord of Wings!” Clearly he was torn between the age-old customs of his people and the necessity for immediate action. “If you did not have the female — the lady,” he corrected with an effort, “but she may not enter the Eyrie.”
The witch spoke. “Let me camp with Briant, and you ride to the Eyrie, Captain. Though I say to you, bird man, the day comes soon when we must throw aside many old customs, both we of Estcarp and you of the mountains, for it is better to be alive and able to fight, than to be bound by the chains of prejudice and dead! There is a riving of the border before us such as this land has never seen. And all men of good will must stand together.”
He did not look at her, nor answer, though he half sketched a salute, giving the impression that that was a vast concession. And then his hawk took to the air with a cry, and Faltjar spoke directly to Koris.
“The camp shall be made in a safe place. Then, let us ride!”
PART IV: VENTURE OF GORM
