Page 73 of The Hawk Laird
He stood, about to call out to ask Isobel for her assistance, but he paused. The urge to be near her was suddenly strong. Too strong. His blood filled with fire. Watching her lonely, windblown figure, he held back.
He realized that he had begun to treasure her; God help him, he might even have begun to love her. The feelings that rocked inside him now were too difficult to define. This turn in his attitude toward the prophetess of Aberlady was wholly unexpected.
But one certain fact remained. No matter his feelings, soon he would need to let her go.
Feeling the pushof the wind and the warmth of the sun, she stretched out her arms, despite the ache of her wounded arm. The sun’s heat felt good on the stiff muscles. Standing so high, above the veils of mist floating over the trees, she felt free and unfettered for perhaps the first time in her life.
Only recently had she realized how closely her father had protected her at Aberlady, keeping her inside its walls. She had never questioned being confined and supervised, seeing few people, having few true friends. At Aberlady, she had read poets and patriarchs, embroidered fine work, practiced the skillsof running a castle household—and prophesying whenever her father had deemed she should.
But the siege had brought a new education for her, one that James Lindsay continued. She was discovering untapped strengths and a craving for freedom, understanding that urge more sharply because of a sheltered life and then captivity.
Now James Linsday would send her back to a protected life with a husband for a guardian, a man she did not want. A life she no longer wanted. No longer did she want to be obedient or allow her abilities to be use by men who saw her as a weak female to be directed—and as a political advantage.
Her visions were precious to her, and she endured bouts of blindness for the privilege. But increasingly she wanted her gift to flow from within, from the will of God and not the will of another.
Without the siege, without James Lindsay’s action in taking her away, she might never have realized independence. She would still be a pawn of Father Hugh and Ralph Leslie in her father’s stead.
She sighed at the thought of her father. A vision had shown her that he sat in a dungeon, and though she did not know if it was true in the moment, or true in the past, or simply symbolic, she had to find out.
And that meant returning to Sir Ralph. She hugged herself, looked down at the landscape spreading for miles in the sunlight. For a moment she felt as if she saw it from a hawk’s vantage point, stunning and vast. She did not want to leave this place.
Nor did she want to leave the man who had brought her here. But that was inevitable now.
She glanced over her shoulder to see him standing near the wall, the goshawk on his gloved fist. An outlaw, a solitary figure, sun glinting gold on his head. A legend come to life, allwild untamed power and beauty. Yet inside, she sensed he was manacled to the past—as she was, in her way.
And in her way, she adored him now—for his kindness, the respect he had shown her. He had even erased the blindness from her. The wonder of that, and his kisses, his presence, filled her. She could love him—if he would let her. If life itself would allow that for them.
He stood, lifted a hand. Her heart leaped, and she walked toward him. With him, she could find safekeeping, perhaps even happiness one day—but the forest outlaw did not intend to include the prophetess in his life. Yet before he sent her off to accept confinement again, she meant to cherish the bit of freedom that remained to her.
“Hold the jessessecurely,” James told Isobel. “Wrap them around your fingers, just so.”
She twined the leather jesses around two fingers in a thick glove that swathed her hand. Gawain settled his feet squarely on her fist and blinked his bronze eyes, taking in man and woman both. Isobel shifted her hand a bit and the tiercel lifted his pale wings and squawked, fluttering in a partial bate.
Isobel ducked away, startled by the power of it. A wingtip batted her cheek and James reached out to assist. “I have him,” Isobel assured him, straightening her spine, tightening her arm.
“Very well. I will warm some bread so we can treat the wing.” He turned to rummage in the sack of food that Alice had sent with Quentin and Patrick, who had left it in the broch for them.
The bird’s squawks echoed in the small cell. Broken stones were open to the sky, forming a wide window. Stacked stones served as a hearth and a kitchen area, James had explained earlier. The chamber was cozy with heat from the fire James had stoked that morning. He went there now to set an iron kettle on ahook, and placed Alice’s bread loaf inside for warming. Then he took it out, tore it in half, and handed it to Isobel.
“Hold it on his wing, if you can. I need to fetch water to help in straightening his tail feathers.”
“And fill another kettle, if you will,” she said. “I will make us some food—I think we have oats and onions, perhaps some of the cooked chicken Alice sent along.”
He nodded and left the chamber, while Isobel sat on a stone slab, glancing through the rubble that provided a window across the broch’s grassy courtyard. She carefully applied the warmed bread over the joint of the bird’s wing and shoulder, and Gawain tolerated it, perhaps welcomed its comfort. He sat quietly, but after a while grew restive, jerking about.
Drawing a breath, she began to sing thekyrie eleisonthat James used so often with the bird. She kept her voice low, soft, repetitive and calming. Gawain responded, recognizing the sounds. He grew motionless, watching her, piercing and keen. Remembering that hawks hated to be stared at, she glanced away, still singing.
Then she noticed James in the doorway, leaning a shoulder against the frame as he listened. She stopped singing, blushing, and he entered the chamber, setting two kettles by the hearth.
“Lovely,” he said. “Do not stop. It calms the bird.”
Still feeling heat in her cheeks, she resumed the song as James set a kettle of water over the fire and turned to pull on his falconer’s glove.
“Let me take him,” he said. “You could make us some supper if you like.” He smiled.
Her heart gave a curious lurch as he came toward her, lifted the bread away, and motioned for her to transfer the hawk. Gawain, startled somehow, shrieked and clenched his talons tightly on her finger. Isobel gasped, at the fierce grip and the pain. Panicking, she reached toward her gloved hand.
“Stop!” James hit her bare hand away. “Open your fingers and cast him off!” He slid the jesses off her fingers, and she opened her fingers, giving a tossing motion to release the bird.
