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Flights of Fantasy

DAW Book Collectors No. 1141 DAW Books are distributed by Penguin Putnam Inc.

INTRODUCTION

RAPTORS. Birds of prey. Everyone gets a differ-ent mental picture when they

think of birds of prey—birds who make their livings as predators, the top of

the food chain. Some immedi-ately picture the American bald eagle, the symbol

of the United States, without realizing that the bald eagle is more often a

fisher than a hunter, which is why they are most often found near large bodies

of water. Some think of babies being carried off (not in recorded history) or

savage golden eagles preying on lambs (unlikely—they are more likely to be

taking advantage of a lamb found already dead; birds of prey rarely attack

anything too big to carry off). Some imagine noble thoughts going on behind

those enormous, keen eyes; others, even in this day and age, see a "varmint,"

a creature that attacks a farmer's animals and competes for hunting resources,

and should be shot on sight.

Most are at least partly or completely wrong in what they imagine.

As a licensed raptor rehabber, I know birds of prey personally; sometimes very

personally, as a great horned owl puts her talon through my Kevlar-lined

welding glove and into my hand. . . .

There are no noble thoughts going on in those brains. Real raptors have

relatively small brains, most of which is composed of visual cortex with the

rest mostly hard-wired with hunting skills. That doesn't leave a lot of room

for social behavior. I once read a passage in a romance novel describing a

lady's falcon perched in a tree above her, watching protectively over her, and

nearly became hysterical with laughter. No falcon in my acquaintance is going

to perch in a tree, protectively or otherwise, if left to her own devices.

Turn your back on her, and she will be out of there without a backward

glance—which is why falconers in this day and age must fit their birds with

jesses and bracelets (the leg-restraints) that can be removed by the bird.

Nearly every falconer has sad tales of the ones that escaped, and no falconer

wishes to think of his bird hanging upside down, entangled in her jesses in a

tree, to die a slow and horrible death. As for being "varmints," most birds of

prey neither poach on farmers' livestock nor compete with hunters. The single

two most common raptors in the US—American kestrels and redtail hawks, which

can literally be found anywhere— prey, for the most part, on insects, mice,

and sparrows for the former, and field rats, squirrels,

and rabbits for the latter. Redtails rarely bother with flying prey—they are

built to hunt things that run. As such, they do farmers more service than

disservice.

Fascination with birds of prey seems to have been with us for as long as we've

walked upright. A recent T-shirt called "Evolution of a Falconer" suggests

that the hawk may have been adopted by early man almost as soon as the dog.

Certainly there is some justification for saying that there have been

falconers as long as there has been the written word. Falconers appear in

ancient Persian and Indian miniatures, on the walls of Egyptian tombs, and in

medieval manuscripts. There are falconers in every part of the world today,

even in places where laws make it incredibly difficult. There are falconers in

Japan, where ancient tradition favors the goshawk, and forbids commoners to

touch the bird with their bare hands. There are falconers in Mongolia, who

carry on their traditions of hunting wolves with golden eagles. There are

falconers in Af-rica, in South America, and in virtually every European

country. The tradition of falconry goes back so far in Saudi Arabia that the

Saudis cannot even recall its beginnings. And needless to say, there are

falconers spread all over North America.

There is, in fact, a falconer joke which tran-scends all boundaries and sends

falconers of every nation into snickers. "How can you tell a man who flies a

falcon? By the scratches on his

wrist where the bird decided to take a walk." (Falcons are smaller, by and

large, than hawks, and those who fly falcons use short gloves to protect their

hands from the talons.) "How can you tell a man who flies a hawk? By the

suntan that stops at his elbow." (Hawks tend to be larger, heavier, and grip

far more tightly with their feet; only a fool flies a hawk without a long

glove.) "How can you tell a man who flies an eagle? By the eyepatch."

(Self-explanatory.)

Kings and emperors have written volumes on falconry; hawks and falcons figure

prominently in myth. The Romans seem to have been of two minds about eagles;

they topped the standards of their legions with them, and identified those

standards with the great birds so closely that the standards themselves were

referred to as "The Eagles." On the other hand, it is from the Romans that we

get the myth of eagles carrying off babies. Zeus and Jupiter were both

identified with the eagle. The Arab world gave us the roc, a bird of prey so

large it carried off elephants.

As for history, New Zealand was once home to a flightless bird of prey called

the moa that stood over eight feet tall! But more impressive yet, at one point

in prehistory, South America bred flighted raptors the size of small

airplanes, which certainly were capable of carrying off, not just babies, but

full-grown adult humans! Could these birds—or the dim memory of them—have

given rise to the Native American tales of the Thunderbird? Certainly they

would have been

the only birds strong enough to dare the deadly air-currents of tornadic

supercell-storms, so that their appearance in the sky would have been heralded

by the flash of lightning and the roar of thunder.

But—this anthology is not about real birds of prey. This is about the

intersection of fantasy and reality, where raptors and other meat-eating birds

are concerned. This is a wonderful collection full of surprises. For Diana

Paxton, the "theme" was bent slightly, including ravens (who are, after all,

carnivorous). From Mike Res-nick comes a little fable that mixes revenge with

reincarnation. From Nancy Asire, a spirit bird— From a dear friend, Dr. Sam

Conway, comes his first published story; I had warned him that I would be

ruthless with it, and if it did not match the standards of the

professionals, it wouldn't make the cut, but to the delight of both of us, it

more than qualified.

And my own contribution, which came out of one of those odd cases of

serendipity when a character demands more attention than the author is

immediately prepared to give her. When I was working on The Black Swan, my own

ver-sion of the tale told in the famous ballet Swan Lake, one of Prince

Siegfried's bridal candidates sudddenly took on a life and personality far

be-yond that of a mere spear-carrier. The falconer-Princess Honoria and her

birds absolutely de-manded to be center stage. Unfortunately, I had another

story to tell than hers. Fortunately, she

fit perfectly well into this venue, and I was happy to give her the spotlight

on a stage of her own, and a story that proves the adage that what is hell to

one may be heaven to another— or at least, an escape.

We all hope you enjoy these highly unusual birds, and their flights of

fantasy.

THE TALE OF HRAFN-BUI

by Diana L. Paxson

Diana L. Paxson's novels include her Chronicles of Westria series and her more

recent Wodan's Children series. Her short fiction can be found in the

anthologies Zodiac Fantastic, Grails: Quests of the Dazvn, Return to Avalon,

and The Book of Kings. Her Arthurian novel, Hallowed Isle, is appearing in

four volumes in the next two years, with book one, The Book of the Sword, in

stores now.

THERE was a man called Ketil Olvirson who look up land below Hrafnfjall in the

west part of Iceland. He had two sons, Arnor and Harek. Arnor, who was the

elder, liked best to go a-viking to England and Scotland and the isles, while

Harek stayed home on the farm. On one of his journeys Arnor took captive a

young woman called Groa. His parents were dead by that time, and though his

brother said that no good would come of marriage with a woman who had been a

thrall, he made her his wife.

She bore him a son whom they called Bui, but they had no other child.

About this time Harek also took a wife, named Hild. They all lived together in

this way for some years, until Bui was fourteen years old. It happened then

that an old shipmate asked Arnor to go on a trading voyage to Norway. At the

end of the summer, when they looked for his return, he did not come. It was

not until the next spring that they heard that the ship had gone down with all

hands off the Sudhreyar Isles.

When that news came, Harek sat down in his brother's high seat and Hild said

that as there were no witnesses to Groa's marriage, she was now their thrall.

When Bui tried to defend his mother, Harek told his men to beat the boy with

staves and drive him off the farm. They dragged him to the brook that comes

down from Hrafn-fjall, and there they left him.

But Bui did not die.

"Quo-oork!"

Bui opened one eye. Something black moved across his field of vision, paused,

quorked again. He raised his head, and it disappeared. In the next moment pain

speared through his skull, and he lost consciousness once more.

When he woke again, the light had dimmed. This time the pain was instantly

present, a dull, pounding ache localized above his left eye. That eye was

swollen shut, but the other was focus-

ing now and he could hear the trickle of water from somewhere nearby. Grass

waved gently in the forefront of his vision. Beyond it, he saw the sleek shape

of a raven. For a moment its glittering black gaze met his own.

"Kru-uk? Ru-uk-uk?"

The inquiry was answered from above. With a groan, Bui rolled over, and the

first raven flapped upward to join its mate in the stunted birch tree. For a

moment of distorted vision he saw them as valkyries, waiting to choose the

doom-fated men they would carry to Odin's hall.

"I'm not dead, curse you!" he whispered. "You'll have to wait for your meal!"

He closed his eye again in a vain attempt to shut out the images flickering in

memory— Harek and Hild in his father's high seat—the malice in the face of the

thralls as they closed in. Did the nithings believe they had left him for

dead, or did they account a beardless boy of so little worth they did not

care?

The movement had awakened the rest of Bui's body to a host of new agonies. He

had the woozy, sick feeling that comes from blood loss, but no wet warmth to

warn of reopening wounds. He had been hurt badly, but he had spoken truth to

the ravens; he was not going to die for a while yet. For a moment, he found

himself as disappointed as they.

Beyond the birch tree the fells rose stark against the dimming sky. He

set his teeth

against the pain and set about the business of learning to live again.

Before Bui lost consciousness he had managed to stagger a fair way up the

brook toward the fell. The upper part of the vale was a good refuge, far

enough from the farm to keep him from a chance discovery, but sheltered from

the winds. For some days he had just enough strength to crawl from the bank to

the waterside where the vivid purple fireweed grew. There he quenched his

thirst and bathed his wounds.

It was high summer, and the weather held mild, with only a few showers of

rain. Once Bui began to move about, the ravens lost interest in him, though he

often saw them cruising over-head in search of food. They were clearly a mated

pair; he took to calling them Harek and Hild, and threw stones to drive them

away.

Three days of nothing but water and the tender inner bark of the birch left

him as hungry as the birds. Weak as he was, Bui managed to trap a fish in a

circle of stones, which he then filled with more rocks until the water ran out

and the fish flopped helplessly. As he tore at the sweet flesh, he could feel

strength pouring back

into his body.

That night, as he lay curled in a nest of soft grass beneath the trees, he

dreamed.

An old man came walking over the fells, wrapped in a dark cloak with a broad

hat drawn down over his eyes. As he trudged forward,

leaning on his staff, a wind came up, bending the grass and lifting the edges

of his mantle so that it billowed like dark wings. And then suddenly it was

wings, as the cloak separated into a host of ravens that swirled across the

sky.

The old man turned, and his figure grew until he towered into the heavens. But

now he wore mail and a helmet, and he had only one eye. His staff had become a

spear, pointing back toward the farm.

"Look to the ravens. They will be your guides. . . ."

From that time, Bui recovered rapidly, being young and hardened by work on the

farm. He followed the vale upstream to the edge of the

earth had formed a small cave which could be unproved with stones and turves

until it kept out the rain. He twisted twigs of dwarf willow into a weir to

trap fish, and fashioned a sling with which he could bring down birds that

came to the lake on the fell. With a fire drill and a great deal of patience

he was able to make a fee which he kept smoldering in the cave.

For the moment, Bui was surviving. The reasonable thing would be to make his

way to some other farm and take service there before winter came. But he

dreamed sometimes that he heard his mother weeping, and could not bring

himself to leave Hrafnfjall.

When he had been on the fell for a moon, he had the fortune to find a strayed

ewe caught

among the stones. Swiftly he slit its throat with his belt knife and began to

butcher it, saving every part of the animal he might be able to use. It was a

messy job, and as he finished, it occurred to him that anyone who came

searching for the animal would find the remains and him, as well.

A familiar "whoosh" of wings overhead brought his head up. Swearing, he looked

for a stone, then paused, frowning, for this raven was a stranger, smaller and

scruffier than the territorial pair, with a distinctive white spot upon its

tail. It hopped forward and then back again, avid and wary at the same time.

Ravens, thought Bui, could pick the sheep's carcass so clean no one would be

able to tell how it had died. He sawed off a hunk of fat and tossed it toward

the bird.

The raven exploded into the air in a flurry of black wings, circled once, then

flew away westward over the fell, emitting a peculiar cry rather like a yell.

Bui watched it go in disappointment, then finished bundling the meat into the

sheepskin, shouldered it, and made his way back to the cave. He fashioned a

rack in the back of the cavern to smoke the meat, and that night-he ate cooked

mutton for the first time in over a moon.

The next day Bui went back to the carcass, dropping to hands and knees as he

approached and taking care to remain unseen. It had occurred to him that the

raven he had seen might be a young one, without the insolent confidence

of the territorial pair, and he did not want to frighten it away.

He need not have bothered. There were no birds to be seen. Then he looked

again and grinned. Raven tracks showed everywhere, and the carcass had been

picked clean. On the ground before him lay a black feather. Bui picked it up

and stood for a long time, stroking the smooth vane.

Bui realized that he had decided to stay on the fell the day he found the body

of the man. It had been there a long time, and there was little to be

scavenged from the clothes. The shaft of the spear had rotted away, but the

point, though rusted, was still whole, as was the head of the ax that had been

thrust through the man's

belt. A disintegrating leather sheath had pro-ted the sword. The metal

framework for a leather-covered helmet still shielded the skull. Bui might

tell himself that the spear was for the seals that winter would bring to the

shore, but the only use for the sword and helm was when went to kill men.

The Althing had not judged him outlaw, but Bui had heard stories enough to

know how to live like one. He turned from the fell, with the pale menace of

the glacier on its horizon, to the long dun slopes that stretched toward the

sea. The air was so clear he could glimpse the green

of the vale. Inner vision supplied the long, turf-roofed shape of the farm,

his farm, where his mother labored, a thrall once more.

"Odin, hear me! Show me how to take back my land!" He raised the sword to the

sky.

As if the action had invoked them, black specks appeared in the sky. One, two,

three— Heart pounding, Bui counted as nine ravens plummeted earthward, rolling

in the air and pulling up in a long swoop, only to spiral downward, wings half

folded once more. Breathless, he watched the aerial display until on some

silent signal they all circled above him, and then flapped away across the

fell.

"Hrafna-guth, Raven-god," Bui whispered, remembering his dream, "Let your

birds show me the way, and they shall never lack for an offering."

As the nights grew longer, the air became clamorous with the cries of

migrating waterfowl. Bui spent most of the daylight hours beside the lake,

using nets and his sling to bring down ducks of all kinds and geese as well:

He built a second structure of turf to smoke the meat, and cured the skins of

the eider-duck with the feathers on to serve as bedding.

His activities very quickly attracted the ravens, and he and they began to

learn each other's ways. Now, when he set out for a day's hunting a black

speck would soon appear, checking at regular intervals until he made a

kill. Usually it was one of the pair that "owned" Hrafnfjall that came first.

When there was a carcass, one bird would summon the other. Necks stretched

upward, feathers fluffed aggressively and standing up like two ears on either

side of the head, they strutted around the meat, and any younger birds that

might be present would back away, bowing and bobbing, and waiting patiently

to pick over whatever "Harek" and "Hild" might leave.

"Why don't you stick up for yourselves, you stupid birds?" Bui swore at the

others. "They don't deserve to get it all."

But it was only when a young raven arrived before its elders, and even then,

only if its yelling succeeded in summoning an overwhelming number of its

fellows, that it would feed. At such times, Bui would watch in satisfaction as

the older pair, coming late to the feast, were forced to take their turn with

the rest. He took to hiding carcasses under piles of stones until he saw one

of the wanderers, and soon he found that although the mated pair made their

patrols no more often than before, wherever he went, one of the young birds

always seemed to be near. With time, he was able to distinguish some

from among them—one had a bent foot, another was large, with a rough head, and

then there was his friend, the bold bird with the white spot on its tail.

The weather grew cooler, and sometimes sleet came mixed with the frequent

rains. The migra-

tory flocks departed, and Bui decided that he would have to risk a journey to

the shore. He had fashioned a net of sinew for fishing, and with a great deal

of luck, he might even get a seal.

He traveled cautiously, moving mostly in the early mornings and hiding during

the brightest hours of the day. When he lived on the farm, they had always

gone eastward up the coast for fishing, so he made his way to the west. Moving

along the edge of the cliffs one morning, he heard a distant barking, and

looking down, he saw a scattering of brown-furred bodies basking upon the

sands of a small cove.

He stared at the rumble of rock where part of the cliff had slid away,

wondering if he could get down. Then a call from overhead brought his gaze

upward to the circling black shape in the sky.

"Are you telling me I can make it, or do you just hope for more food?" Despite

their companionship, he did not suppose the ravens would care whether they

feasted on the carcass of a seal or his own. Nonetheless, he chose to take the

bird's arrival as an omen, and with spear strapped to his back, he began the

difficult descent to the shore.

By the time he reached the moraine at the bottom of the cliff, Bui was

scratched in a dozen places. As he sat down on a rock to catch his breath, he

heard a familiar "swoosh" of wings.

The raven braked, banked, and settled on an outcrop of basalt, where it sat

preening its wings and surveying Bui with a distinctly humorous gleam in its

black eyes. He saw without surprise that it was the young bird with the white

spot on its tail.

In the first days of his exile, Bui had wondered if isolation would lead to

madness. It was the ravens that had saved him from it, unless he was crazy to

think their response to him the act of an intelligent will. The ravens

belonged to Odin; the god was watching over him through their eyes, and he

could reassure himself that when he talked to them, he was speak-

ing to the god.

"Are you laughing at this clumsy human?" he asked, inspecting his bruises.

"You're right. It would be a lot easier to get down here if I were a bird. But

you can't kill a seal!"

Bui wondered if he could. Seals were accustomed to human hunters, and wary,

but perhaps he no longer smelled like a man after three moons spent in the

wild. Nonetheless, he stayed hidden for a day, observing, before he made his

move, clambering down to hide among the rocks while the beasts were at

sea, and waiting until they had settled down to bask in the autumn sunlight

before rising with poised spear.

The seal Bui had selected was young, without a thick a layer of fat to get

through. He focused on the spot between the shoulderblades and drove downward

with all his strength, knowing, even as the honed blade struck, that his aim

was

true. Feeling its death, the seal reared up beneath him. Bui hung on with all

his strength, knowing he must not allow the wounded animal to reach the sea,

and even with the boy's weight to anchor it, the seal managed to reach the

edge of the water before it died.

It was fortunate, reflected Bui as the world stopped spinning around him, that

it was just past high tide, for he knew he did not have the strength to haul

the carcass back up the beach. He slit the animal's throat, and as the blood

drained into the sea, the raven spiraled upward, its exultant yelling

interspersed by ear-splitting trills.

By the time Bui had the belly open, the rocks behind him were covered with

black birds. Cursing, the ravens drove off the yammering guillemots and gulls,

then dropped back to their perches, watching his progress with critical gaze.

As the boy pulled open the slit flesh, the steaming guts spilled out onto the

sand and the entire flock rose in a fluttering mass, calling excitedly.

"Very well—here's your share!" Bui exclaimed. "Now leave me in peace while I

get mine!" He scooped up as much of the slippery mass as he could and pulled

it to one side, and as he finished extracting it, the ravens swooped down and

began to feed.

The gods were kind, and gave him three days of fair weather before the clouds

closed in once more. By that time Bui had carved most of the nuscle meat away

from the bones, sliced it into thin strips and hung them to dry. The ravens

picked clean what remained and took to harryring the gulls and stealing their

food. The hide he pegged out, scraped clean and scoured with

brine. But when the first drops of rain began to fall, he bundled it all into

the shelter of the cliff.

He had lived his life mostly inland, and was not prepared for the fury of the

storm. When the waves were driven almost to his refuge he was terrified, but

better he should die now than abandon the food that might get him through the

winter. And presently the waters began to calm. It was when boxes and bundles

and the timbers of a wrecked ship began to wash ashore

that he realized that the sea had more bounty to bestow.

With them came the corpses of men.

Bui dragged the bodies ashore, swallowing his revulsion at the feel of clammy

flesh for the sake of the garments that covered them. Sea-stained though they

were, they were better than his own rags. It was a race between him and the

ravens, who did not understand why he would not share this windfall as he had

always shared his prey with them before.

He finished piling stones over the body of a man whose wool tunic had been

clasped with gold, and started toward the next two bodies, which were lying

tangled in the seaweed just

above the tide. The white-spotted raven had landed on the head of the nearest,

but before

Bui could wave it off, it hopped aside with a screech of exasperation and then

flapped away. As the boy reached down to grab the neckband of the man's tunic

he felt a faint pulse. His own pulse leaped as the other body stirred, and he

realized that these two still lived!

They were barely conscious, and the tide was coming in. Trembling, Bui dragged

them over the stones to his shelter. It had been so long since he had spoken

to anyone he wondered if he could still master human words. He built up the

fire, and laid them as close as he dared to its flame, chafing chilled limbs,

and presently first one and then the other began to cough and shiver and open

his eyes.

It was the next morning before they were able to tell him their story. They

were from Norway, nephews to the master of the foundered long-ship, come on

their first voyage to trade for wadmal cloth and walrus ivory and the skins of

seals. Hogni and Torstein were their names. Younger sons, they had intended to

make their way by trading, but all hope of that had drowned when their uncle's

ship went down. Did Bui know of a farm that needed laborers?

Bui felt his own features contorting in a twisted grin. "If you are willing to

live like thralls, no doubt they will take you on at the farm," he said

stiffly. "But if you have the courage to risk a winter in the wilds, you might

one day share it with me—" Swiftly he explained

how he had been banished by his uncle and aunt, and his plans for revenge.

"You would give us a share in your land?" asked Hogni, the elder of the two.

"I would, or the value of it once it is producing once more."

"And you have not been outlawed?" asked Torstein.

"They do not know what has become of me," Bui gave a mirthless laugh. "I do

not offer you safety, but the chance to do deeds that will be remembered. It

is up to you. I ask only this. If you do not join me, then say nothing of my

presence on the fell. I think you owe me that much for pulling you out of the

sea."

Torstein looked at his brother, and then grinned back at him. "It is clear

that Ran does not want us. Maybe we can earn a place in Odin's warband with

you!"

That seemed likely enough, thought Bui, but he took it as yet another sign

from the god.

With two additional pairs of hands and the scavengings from the boat, they

were able to take three more seals and a quantity of fish to carry back to

Bui's hideaway at the edge of the fell. Once more, the ravens followed. Hogni

and Torstein marveled at the birds, and took to calling their rescuer

Hrafn-Bui.

"You are laughing at me, but I will claim in earnest the name you give in

jest," answered Bui. "The ravens are our allies—you will see."

As the days diminished, the weather worsened, but the warm current that flows

past Iceland's shores kept the temperatures on the south coast relatively

mild, and the hot springs warmed the fugitives when they did begin to suffer

from the chill. They were always hungry, but they never starved, and for this,

they thanked Bui's ravens.

As once the birds had followed him, now Bui and his companions followed the

ravens to food. In those days, folk used to leave their herds to winter in the

woods, for there were no predators large enough to trouble a grown animal, and

sometimes the exiles would find a cow or pony that had wandered off in search

of the dry grasses that grew on the fell. They preyed on wintering waterbirds

and, between the frequent gales, on seals. And leading or following, the

ravens hunted with them, just as they did with the polar bears.

During the long hours of darkness the three young men huddled in the light of

the seal-fat lamp and told tales,

"I'll help you for a time on the farm," said Hogni, "but the sea is all I ever

dreamed of."

"My father loved the sea more than he loved my mother and me," answered Bui,

"and it killed him."

Torstein sighed. "You can die anywhere. Our father took a scratch that went

bad. His arm swelled up, and he burned with fever until he died. What glory

was there in that?"

In his voice was a note that Bui recognized.

Both of them, he thought then, had been abandoned by the fathers who should

have protected them.

"Is that what you want? Glory?" he asked.

"Of course. Don't you?"

Bui shook his head. "All I want is my home. . . ."

"Do you really think that the three of us can drive your uncle out?" Torstein

asked then.

"I have dreamed that Odin and the ravens will show me the way."

Torstein exchanged glances with his brother, but neither replied.

Either they will keep faith with me, or they will not, thought Bui. He pulled

on the rough cape he had cobbled together from sealskin and went outside.

The nights were beginning to grow shorter at last, and though clouds billowed

on the horizon, the sleet and snow had ceased. A soft half-light lay over the

fell and glittered on the branches of birch and willow where the buds were

beginning to swell. Bui let out his breath in a long sigh.

They had survived the worst of the winter. It was colder up here at the head

of the vale than

it had been at the farm, but there was shelter from the worst of the wind, and

the coast took the brunt of the storms. The land here might not be as rich as

it was farther down the valley, but the fell provided good grazing. It

occurred to him suddenly that if they had been able to live

in his crude shelter, in a properly built dwelling one might do quite well.

A whoosh of wings overhead broke his train of thought, and he saw the young

raven with the white spot circle and alight upon a stone.

"Have you been hunting through the night, or are you just rising?" Bui asked.

Ravens, despite their color, were birds of the daylight. Could they carry

enough fat to sleep through the long winter darkness, or like men, were they

able to hunt the night when need compelled?

In another moment a second, smaller raven dropped down from the sky. The sleek

head turned and dipped as the bird half spread its wings, neck feathers

fluffing, and lifted its tail. The first raven watched for a moment, then

appeared to expand, rising to its full height, feathers bristling around its

head. This was the one, he remembered, that had always taken the lead in

calling the other young ones, and challenging the territorial pair for food.

Very imposing, thought Bui in amusement. Does she appreciate it? He was almost

certain that the smaller bird was a female now.

For a moment she watched the male, then repeated her bobs and bows, murmuring

love talk with coos and snaps. Bui was abruptly reminded of the way the

servant girls used to flick their aprons to tease the men in the hall.

If these birds were not yet a mated pair, they were certainly courting. Good

luck to you—Bui thought wistfully. Even if he were to win back

the farm, a kinslayer would be a poor marriage prospect for any man's

daughter. There was a girl called Asgerd, the daughter of Geiralf Bard-son who

had a farm over at Langdale, whom he had thought might make a good wife for

him when they were both grown. Suddenly her face came clearly to memory.

Since the day he was driven from the farm all Bui's energy had been focused on

survival, but in this moment poised between light and darkness while the

ravens danced, something long suppressed stirred and shaped itself into a

stave of poetry—

Mournful the man who must go mateless, Who lonely lies in the lee of the fell;

Even Odin's friend, the doom-fated raven, the bird of battle, a bride may win.

. . .

When the Outmonths had passed, the days began to lengthen swiftly, and the air

rang with the cries of returning birds. The green of new grass veiled the sere

slopes of the moorland, jeweled with daisy and dandelion and the more delicate

blossoms of pinks and saxifrage. The warming air thrummed with urgency, and as

the young ravens played upon the wind, Bui and the two Norwegians cut sticks

of willow and began to practice their swordplay.

As they sat by their fire on an evening halfway through the Milking Moon,

Hogni lifted one foot, wiggling his toes so they stuck out of the holes in his

shoe.

"We need to kill a cow."

"What?" The others looked at him.

"I need new shoes, and so do you, not to mention rawhide and sinew to repair

our weapons. And I am growing very tired of eating bird-flesh and dried seal."

Torstein laughed, but Bui grew thoughtful. Hogni had a good point, even

though, with the warming weather, the people of the farm would be more

inclined to come looking if one of their beasts disappeared. Still, he had

always known that he could not stay hidden here forever. Perhaps it was time

to make his move.

Nonetheless, he insisted on separating the heifer they chose from the herd and

driving her up onto the fell before they made the kill.

They had bled out the carcass and were hard at work on the hide when the first

raven arrived. Bui looked up, but it was not the white-spotted male he had

been expecting. This was a smaller, younger bird. It lit on a boulder, looking

around nervously, then extended its wings and flapped away.

"That's right," Bui laughed. "Go call the others. There will be more than

enough for all.

They heaved out the guts in a pile for the birds and continued the butchering.

Presently a bird quorked from overhead and another answered it. Bui looked up

and saw two ravens circling, discussing the carcass with harsh cries. He

stiffened, thinking the territorial pair he had encountered the previous year

were back, though

he would have thought this kill out of their territory. Then the male glided

down, emitting three slow "knocking" calls, and he saw the white spot on its

tail. After a moment the female followed him.

Now he could see the other birds, half a dozen tattered black shapes

fluttering across the sky. They swirled down in the wake of the first two, but

as they began to alight, the white-spotted male reared up, head feathers

bristling until they stood up on either side like two ears, and began to strut

back and forth, warning away the very birds whom the season before he had led

against the territorial pair.

For a moment Bui stared, gut twisting as if he himself had been betrayed. Then

he ran toward them, waving his arms and yelling until all the birds had risen

squawking away. Torstein and Hogni watched open-mouthed, but Bui did not

explain.

That night Bui dreamed. He was moving across the moor, and as he looked

down he real- ized that he was flying. A glance to either side showed him

black wings. The sensation was sufficiently novel that for some time he gave

himself up to the pleasure of exploring the capacities of this

body, soaring and diving, performing rolls and twists, dancing with the wind.

His play was so absorbing that it took some time to realize that he was not

flying alone. Two larger ravens flew with him, one to either side.

Their feathers shone like polished metal, but the light came from within. They

drew closer when they realized he had seen them.

"I am Huginn—" said the first raven. "To know thy way is to know thyself—"

"I am Munnin—" said the second. "Remember. . . ."

Then they soared ahead of him, movements matched until they seemed one being,

whose brightness merged, then blinded, so that he floated, without need or

volition, in the light. In that blind brilliance it seemed to him that he

heard another voice that spoke to him for some time. But when he opened his

eyes at last to the thin light of morning filtering into the cave, he could

not remember the words.

In the morning, Hogni, who had decided he wanted to make a drinking horn, went

back to the carcass for one of the heifer's horns while Torstein and Bui

stayed at the shelter to prepare the meat for smoking. But the young Norwegian

returned much more quickly than he had gone.

"Douse the fire!" he called, his face pale. "There are men on the moor!"

As they covered the fire and bundled their tools into the shelter, Hogni told

his tale. The farmfolk must have tracked the heifer. He had seen two men,

circling the carcass and gesturing. As always, the boys had brushed away their

tracks, but the carcass would still have shown the marks of their butchering.

Bui had fright-

ened the ravens, whose voracious beaks had always obliterated all other

evidence, away.

"They're thralls," said Bui when Hogni finished. "They will go back now to the

farm to report what they have seen."

"Then we have a little time—enough to get away." Torstein began to bundle up

his things.

Bui shook his head. This must be why he had dreamed. Images, half-understood

and half-remembered, surged in memory.

"But we can't stay!" exclaimed Hogni. "Now they know someone is up here, they

will be combing the fells for us by tomorrow!"

"That's so," answered Bui. "But they don't know that we've been warned—we must

attack the farm!"

He straightened, watching the color come and go in their faces, willing them

to agree now, before they had time to think about it too much and grow afraid;

before he himself lost his

nerve. They had all known this moment must come. No doubt they could survive

another year living like beasts on the fell, but at the end of it would their

hearts still be those of men?

Just when he thought the silence must become unendurable, Hogni gave a little

laugh.

"I'm tired of sleeping on a pile of moss and birdskins anyway. Whether I lie

tomorrow night in a farmhouse bed or in Odin's hall, it will be an

improvement over here."

Torstein grinned back at him. "No doubt Bui will want to carry that sword he's

been sharpen-

ing, and you're best with the ax, so I guess that leaves me the spear!"

Bui wondered if they could hear his heart pounding in his chest. Wordlessly,

he got up and went to the rock-built cupboard where he kept the sword. But

Torstein had been right—it was already sharp, fitted with a new hilt of

seal-bone and well oiled. With it he kept the framework of the helmet.

Thoughtfully, he considered it, then cut pieces from the still raw hide of the

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FlightsofFantasyCopyright©1999byMercedesLackeyandTeknoBooksAllRightsReservedCoverartbyRobertGiustiDAWBookCollectorsNo.1141DAWBooksaredistributedbyPenguinPutnamInc.Introduction©1999byMercedesLackeyTheTaleofHrafn-Bui©1999byDianaL.PaxsonAQuestionofFaith©1999byJosephaShermanTakingFreedom©1999byS.M.Stirl...

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Mercedes Lackey - Flights of Fantasy

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