Page 74 of The Hawk Laird
The goshawk spread his wings and fluttered upward, kakking, only to be brought up short when James pulled on the jesses. Gawain flapped down to his fist and fixed him with a glare, turning the same cocked-brow look on Isobel.
“Naughty lad,” James told the bird. “Isobel, let me see your hand.”
She sat beside him, drew off the glove, and held out her finger, which was bruised and beginning to swell. He took her hand gently. “Can you move your finger?” When she wiggled it, he nodded. “Good. A hawk can break a bone like kindling even through a glove. The only way to break a talon’s hold is to cast them off and let them think they are free. You were lucky, lass.”
“Why did he do it?” she asked. “I thought he was growing more tame.”
“He will never be tame.” He held her fingers in his, warm and soothing. “He is wild, and manning a bird will never change that. So we handled them gently with patience, respect, and caution. I know you did that,” he added. “But goshawks are hot-tempered creatures. And there is always some danger in keeping a short-winged hawk.”
She nodded. “Naughty lad,” she repeated to the bird. James chuckled, still cradling her fingers.
“He will always be a rogue, this gos.” He let her go and stood, going to hearth to fetch a bowl and ladle, then scooped water from one of the kettles, bringing it to her. “Soak your hand. The water is still cold from the well.”
With a sigh of relief, she dipped her fingers into the cool water while James moved around the makeshift kitchen, the hawk on his fist as he went through Alice’s sack of food, andbegan to dump handfuls of oats, an onion, and the cooked chicken. He tore off a bit of chicken and fed it to Gawain.
“I can cook the meal,” Isobel offered.
“I have cooked for myself and the lads for years. With a hawk on my fist, I think I did well.” He took a stick from a stone shelf to stir the pot, then went toward a pile of stones stacked in a corner of the room. He carried several, back and forth, to the hearth.
“What are you doing?” she asked, soaking her fingers as she watched him.
“When the stones are hot, I will take them to the spring so you can have a warm bath.”
The feeling that flowed through her at his care and thoughtfulness had naught to do with hearth fires. “Thank you,” she murmured.
He peered into the kettle hanging on a hook over the fire. “Can you help me with this?”
“What do you want me to do?” She stood.
“Cook a naughty gos,” he said, laughing when her jaw dropped. “Of course not. We need to straighten his crooked tail feathers.”
He ladled boiling water into another wooden bowl and carried it to set it on the stone slab. She sat again as he did. Then he shifted the recalcitrant hawk closer to him, smoothing his free hand over Gawain’s back plumage gently as he murmured softly to the hawk.
“Look at his tail,” he told Isobel. “The deck feathers in the middle are twisted. A quick dip in boiling water will straighten them out.”
“That sounds risky!”
“We can manage together. When I move him toward the bowl, grasp his tail and dip it quickly.”
Isobel grimaced, then nodded, holding out a hand, ready to help despite her aching arm and now the bruised finger. But she would do whatever the man asked, and whatever his bird needed.
He lowered the hawk, murmuring and soothing and distracting him until the goshawk spread his tail in a wide fan. “Six bars out,” he said then. “See the gray bars across his tail feathers? That tells his age. He will have seven bars when he’s full grown. Aye, you gos, you’re a young lad still. A bratling.”
“He does act like a bairn who does not get his way,” Isobel said.
James huffed agreement and lowered the bird’s tail toward the water. She took hold of the tail feathers carefully and dipped.
Shrieks, footing, a wildly flapping wing, and the ordeal was over. James pulled the bird up on his fist, reached into the pouch at his waist, and fed him a bit of raw meat quickly—Isobel recognized a segment of the rabbit that Patrick and Quentin had provided for the hawk.
“What a fine tail you have now,” James said. “Soon you will soar out there where you belong. Soon, lad.Ky-ri-e e-lei-son...” He sang the melodic phrase while the bird devoured the food clenched in his talons.
Isobel leaned against the stone wall and listened to his mellow, serene, rich voice, the sound soothing through her and the bird as well. Its peace eased her fears, her sadness. She never wanted to leave this place, this man, this outlaw and his naughty gos. Never.
Drawing drew a breath, she sang with him, her voice blending with his, filling the air with sweet power. His voice vibrated through her in a glorious thrum.
Then he stopped. “Isobel. My porridge is burning.”
Chapter Twenty-One
