Hawkmistress!

  "Mallina, go and wash the ink from your fingers. Romilly, bring your embroidery-work, and you may as well bring Mallina's too," said the governess, bending over Rael's desk. Romilly, frowning, went to the cupboard and pulled out her workbasket and her sister's. She was quick enough with her pen, but, she thought angrily, put a needle in my hand and I might as well have a hoof instead of fingers!

  "I will show you one more time how to do the knot-stitch neatly," said Calinda, taking the grubby, wrinkled linen in her own hands, trying to smooth it, while Romilly pricked her finger threading the needle and yelped like a puppy. "This is a disgrace, Romilly; why, Rael could do better if he tried, I do believe!"

  "Then why not let Rael do it?" Romilly scowled.

  "For shame, a big girl, almost fifteen, old enough to be married," Calinda said, glancing over Rael's shoulder. "Why, what have you written here?"

  Startled by the tone in the woman's voice, Romilly looked over her small brother's shoulder. In uneven printing, he had lettered I wish my brother Ruyven come home.

  "Well, I do," said Rael, blinking his eyes hard and digging his fists into them.

  "Tear it up, quickly," said Calinda, taking the paper and suiting the action to the word. "If your father saw it - you know he has ordered that your brother's name is not to be mentioned in this house!"

  "I didn't mention it, I only printed it," said Rael angrily, "and he's my brother and I'll talk about him if I want to! Ruyven, Ruyven, Ruyven - so there!"

  "Hush, hush, Rael," said Calinda, "We all-" she broke off, thinking better of what she had begun to say, but Romilly heard it with her new senses, as clearly as if Calinda had said, We all miss Ruyven. More gently, Calinda said, "Put your book away, and run along to your riding-lesson, Rael."

  Rael slammed his primer into his desk and raced for the door. Romilly watched her brother enviously, scowling at the wrinkled stitchery in her hand. After a minute Calinda sighed and said, "It is hard for a child to understand. Your brother Darren will be home at Midsummer, and I am glad - Rael needs his brother, I think. Here, Romilly, watch my fingers - wrap the thread so, three times around the needle, and pull it through - see, you can do it neatly enough when you try."

  "A knot-stitch is easy," said Mallina complacently, looking up from her smooth panel of bleached linen, where a brilliant flower bloomed under her needle.

  "Aren't you ashamed, Romilly? Why, Mallina has already embroidered a dozen cushion-covers for her marriage-chest, and now she is working on her wedding sheets."

  "Well," said Romilly, driven to the wall, "What do I need of embroidered cushion-covers? A cushion is to sit on, not to show fancy stitching. And I hope, if I have a husband, he will be looking at me, and not the embroidered flowers on our wedding sheets!"

  Mallina giggled and blushed, and Calinda said, "Oh, hush, Romilly, what a thing to say!" But she was smiling. "When you have your own house, you will be proud to have beautiful things to adorn it."

  I doubt that very much, Romilly thought, but she picked up the stitchery-piece with resignation and thrust the needle through it. Mallina bent over the quilt she was making, delicately appliqued with white starflowers on blue, and began to set tiny stitches into the frame.

  Yes, it was pretty, Romilly thought, but why did it matter so much? A plain one would keep her just as warm at night, and so would a saddle-blanket! She would not have minded, if she could have made something sensible, like a riding-cloak, or a hood for a hawk, but this stupid flower-pattern, designed to show off the fancy stitching she hated! Grimly she bent over her work, needle clutched awkwardly in her fist, as the governess looked over the paper of sums she had done that morning.

  "You have gone past my teaching in this, Romilly," the governess said at last, "I will speak to Dom Mikhail, and ask if the steward can give you lessons in keeping account-books and ciphering. It would be a pity to waste an intelligence as keen as yours."

  "Lessons from the steward?" said a voice from the doorway. "Nonsense, mestra; Romilly is too old to have lessons from a man, it would be scandalous. And what need has a lady, to keep account-books?" Romilly raised her head from the tangle of threads, to see her stepmother Luciella corning into the room.

  "If I could keep my own accounts, foster-mother," Romilly said, "I need never be afraid I would be cheated by a dishonest steward."

  Luciella smiled kindly. She was a small plump woman, her hair carefully curled, as meticulously dressed as if she were about to entertain the Queen at a garden-party. She said, "I think we can find you a husband good enough that he will see to all that for you, foster-daughter." She bent to kiss Mallina on the cheek, patted Romilly's head. "Has Rael gone already to his riding-lesson? I hope the sun will not be too strong for him, he is still not entirely recovered." She frowned at the tangled threads and drunken line of colored stitching. "Oh, dear, dear, this will never do! Give me the needle, child, you hold it as if it were a currycomb! Look, hold it like this. See? Now the knot is neat - isn't that easier, when you hold it so?"

  Grudgingly, Romilly nodded. Domna Luciella had never been anything but kind to her; it was only that she could not imagine why Romilly was not exactly like Mallina, only more so, being older.

  "Let me see you make another one, as I showed you," Luciella said. "See, that is much better, my dear. I knew you could do it, you are clever enough with your fingers - your handwriting is much neater than Mallina's, only you will not try. Calinda, I came to ask you to give the children a holiday - Rael has already run off to the stables? Well enough - I only need the girls, I want them to come and be fitted for then - new riding-habits; they must be ready when the guests come at Midsummer."

  Predictably, Mallina squealed.

  "Am I to have a new riding-habit, foster-mother? What color is it? Is it made of velvet like a lady's?"

  "No, my dear, yours is made of gabardine, for hard wear and more growing," said Luciella, and Mallina grumbled.

  "I am tired of wearing dresses all clumsy in the seams so they can be let out when I grow half a dozen times, and all faded so everyone can see where they have been let out and the hem let down-"

  "You must just hurry and finish growing, then," said Luciella kindly, "There is no sense making a dress to your measure when you will have outgrown it in six months wear, and you have not even a younger sister to pass it on to. You are lucky you are to have a new habit at all, you know," she added smiling, "You should wear Romilly's old ones, but we all know that Romilly gives her riding-clothes such hard wear that after half a year there is nothing at all left of them - they are hardly fit to pass on to the dairy-woman."

  "Well, I ride a horse," Romilly said, "I don't sit on its back and simper at the stableboy!"

  "Bitch," said Mallina, giving her a surreptitious kick on the ankle, "You would, fast enough, if he'd look at you, but nobody ever will - you're like a broom-handle dressed up in a gown!"

  "And you're a fat pig," retorted Romilly, "You couldn't wear my cast-off gowns anyway, because you're so fat from all the honey-cakes you gobble whenever you can sneak into the kitchen!"

  "Girls! Girls!" Luciella entreated, "Must you always squabble like this? I came to ask a holiday for you - do you want to sit all day in the schoolroom and hem dishtowels instead?"

  "No, indeed, foster-mother, forgive me," said Romilly quickly, and Mallina said sullenly, "Am I supposed to let her insult me?"

  "No, nor should you insult her in turn," said Luciella, sighing. "Come, come, the sewing-women are waiting for you."

  "Do you need me, vai domna?" Calinda asked.

  "No, go and rest, mestra -I am sure you need it, after a morning with my brood. Send the groom first to look for Rael, he must have his new jacket fitted today, but I can wait till he has finished his riding-lesson."

  Romilly had been apprehensive, as she followed her stepmother into the room where the sewing-women worked, light and airy with broad windows and green growing plants in the sunny light; not flowers, for Luciella was a practical woman, but gro
wing pots of kitchen herbs and medicinals which smelled sweet in the sun through the glass. Luciella's taste ran heavily to ruffles and flounces, and, from some battles when she was a young girl, Romilly feared that if Luciella had ordered her riding-clothes they would be some disgustingly frilly style. But when she saw the dark-green velvet, cut deftly to accentuate her slenderness, but plainly, with no trim but a single white band at her throat, the whole dress of a green which caught the color of her green eyes and made her coppery hair shine, she flushed with pleasure.

  "It is beautiful, foster-mother," she said, standing as still as she could while the sewing-women fitted it with pins to her body, "It is almost too fine for me!"

  "Well, you will need a good one, for hawking and hunting when the people from High Crags come for the Midsummer feasting and parties," said Luciella, "It is well to show off what a fine horse-woman you are, though I think you need a horse better suited to a lady than old Windracer. I have spoken to Mikhail about a good horse for you - was there not one you trained yourself?"

  Romilly's delighted gasp made her stepmother smile. She had been allowed to help her father in training three of the fine blacks from the Lanart estates, and they were all among the finest horses to grace the stables at Falconsward. If her father agreed that she might have one of those horses - she thought with delight and pleasure of racing over the hills on one of the spirited blacks, with Preciosa on her arm, and gave Luciella a spontaneous hug that startled the older woman. "Oh, thank you, thank you, stepmother!"

  "It is a pleasure to see you looking so much like a lady," Luciella said, smiling at the pretty picture Romilly made in the green habit. 'Take it off now, my dear, so it can be stitched. No, Dara," she added to the sewing-woman who was fitting Mallina's habit over her full young breasts, "Not so tight in the tunic there, it is unseemly for so young a girl."

  Mallina sulked, "Why must all my dresses be cut like a child's tunic? I have already more of a woman's figure than Romilly!"

  "You certainly have," Romilly said, "If you grow much more in the tits, you can hire out for a wet-nurse." She looked critically at Mallina's swelling body, and the younger girl snarled, "A woman's habit is wasted on you, you could wear a pair of Darren's old britches! You'd rather run around looking like a stableboy, in a man's old leathers, like one of the Sisterhood of the Sword-"

  "Come, come," said Luciella peacefully, "Don't make fun of your sister's figure, Romilly, she is growing faster than you, that is all. And you be quiet too, Mallina; Romilly is grown, now, and your father has given strict orders that she is not to ride astride in boots and breeches any more, but is to have a proper lady's habit and a lady's saddle for Midsummer, when the people from High Crags will be coming here for hawking and hunting, and perhaps Aldaran of Scathfell with his sons and daughters, and some of the people from Storn Heights."

  Mallina squealed with pleasure - the twin daughters of Scathfell were her closest friends, and during the winter, heavy snowfalls had separated Falconsward from Scathfell or from High Crags. Romilly felt no such pleasure - Jessamy and Jeralda were about her own age, but they were like Mallina, plump and soft, an insult to any horse that carried them, much more concerned with the fit of their riding-habits and the ornaments of saddle and reins than in the well-being of the horses they rode, or their own riding-skill. The oldest son at High Crags was about Ruyven's age and had been his dearest friend; he treated Romilly and even Darren as silly children. And the folk from Storn were all grown, and most of them married some with children.

  Well, perhaps she would have a chance to ride with her father, and with Darren who would be home from Nevarsin, and to fly Preciosa; it would not be too bad, even if, while there were guests, she must wear a lady's riding-habit and use a lady's saddle instead of the boots and breeches more suitable for hunting; the guests would only be here for a few days and then she could go back to her sensible boy's clothes for riding; she was willing to dress up properly to meet her parents' guests. She had learned, as a matter of course, to manage proper riding-skirts and a lady's saddle when there were guests, and to please her stepmother.

  She was humming when she returned to her room to change her dress for riding; perhaps she would take Rael with her when she went to exercise Preciosa to the lure, the long line whirled around her head with scraps of meat and feathers to train and exercise a hawk. But when she searched behind her door for the old boots and breeches she always wore for riding - they were an ancient pair of Ruyven's - they could not be found.

  She clapped her hands to summon the maid who waited on the children, but it was old Gwennis who came.

  "What is this, Nurse? Where are my riding-breeches?"

  "Your father has given strict orders," Gwennis said, "Lady Luciella made me throw them out - they're hardly fit for the hawkmaster's boy now, those old things. Your new habit's being made, and you can wear your old one till it's ready, my pet" She pointed to the riding-skirt and tunic laid out on Romilly's bed. "Here, my lamb, I'll help you lace it up."

  "You threw them out?" Romilly exploded, "How dared you?"

  "Oh, come, don't talk like that, my little love, we all have to do what Lady Luciella says, don't we? That habit still fits you fine, even if it's a little tight at the waist - see, I let it out for you yesterday, when Lady Luciella told me."

  "I can't ride Windracer in this!" Romilly wadded up the offending skirts and flung them across the room. "He's not used to a lady's saddle, and I hate it, and there aren't guests or anything like that! Get me some riding breeches," she stormed, but Gwennis shook her head sternly.

  "I can't do that, lovey, your father's given orders, you're not to ride in breeches any more, and it's about time, you'll be fifteen ten days before Midsummer, and we must think now about getting you married, and what man will want to marry a hoyden who races around hi breeches like some camp-follower, or one of those scandalous women of the Sisterhood, with sword and ears pierced? Really, Romy, you should be ashamed. A big girl like you, running off to the hawk-house and staying out all night like that - it's time you were tamed down into a lady! Now put on your riding-skirts, if you want to ride, and let's not have any more of this nonsense."

  Romilly stared in horror at her nurse. So this was to be her father's punishment Worse, far worse than a beating, and she knew that from her father's orders there would be no appeal.

  I wish he had beaten me. At least he would have been dealing with me, directly, with Romilly, with a person. But to turn me over to Luciella, to let her make me into her image of a lady....

  "It's an insult to a decent horse," Romilly stormed, "I won't do it!"

  She aimed a savage kick at the offending habit on the floor.

  "Well, then, lovey, you can just stay inside the house like a lady, you don't need to ride," said Gwennis complacently, "You spend too much time in the stables as it is, it's time you stayed more in the house, and left the hawks and horses to your brothers as you should."

  Appalled, Romilly swallowed down a lump in her throat, looking from the habit on the floor to her beaming nurse. "I expected this of Luciella," she said, "she hates me, doesn't she? It's the sort of spiteful thing Mallina might do, just because she can't ride a decent horse. But I didn't think you'd join with them against me, Nurse!"

  "Come, you mustn't talk like that," Gwennis said, clucking ruefully, "How can you say that about your kind stepmother? I tell you, not many stepmothers with grown daughters are as good to them as Lady Luciella is to you and Mallina, dressing them up in beautiful things when you're both prettier than she is, knowing Darren's to be Lord here and her own son only a younger son, not much better than a nedestro! Why, your own mother would have had you out of breeches three years ago, she'd never have let you run around all these years like a hoyden! How can you say that she hates you?"

  Romilly looked at the floor, her eyes stinging. It was true; no one could have been kinder to her than Luciella. It would have been easier if Luciella had ever showed her the slightest unkindness. I could
fight against her, if she was cruel to me. What can I do now?

  And Preciosa would be waiting for her; did Gwennis really think she would leave her own hawk to the hawkmaster's boy, or even to Davin himself? Her hands shook with fury as she pulled on the detested habit, threadbare blue gabardine and in spite of Gwennis's alterations, still too tight in the waist, so that the lacings gaped wide over her undertunic. Better to ride in skirts than not to ride at all, she supposed, but if they thought they had beaten her this easily, they could think again!

  Will she even know me in this stupid girl's outfit?

  Fuming, she strode toward the stables and hawk-house, tripping once or twice over the annoying skirts, slowing her step perforce to a proper ladylike pace. So Luciella would bribe her with a pretty habit, to soften the blow? Just like a woman, that silly devious trick, not even telling her outright that she must put aside her riding-breeches!

  Inside the hawk-house, she went directly to the block, slipping on her old gauntlet and taking Preciosa up on her arm. With her free hand she stroked the hawk's breast with the feather kept for that purpose - the touch of a hand on the hawk's feathers would take the coating from the feathers and damage them. Preciosa sensed her agitation and moved uneasily on her wrist, and Romilly made an effort to calm herself, taking down the hanging lure of feathers and signalling to the boy Ker.

  "Have you fresh meat for Preciosa?"

  "Yes, damisela, I had a pigeon just killed for the table and I kept all the innards for her, they haven't been out of the bird more than ten minutes," Ker said, and she sniffed suspiciously at the fresh meat, then threaded it on to the lure. Preciosa smelled the fresh food and jerked uneasily and fluttered; Romilly spoke soothingly to her, and walked on, kicking the skirt out of her way. She went into the stableyard and loosed the jesses, whirling the lure high over her head; Preciosa flung herself upward, the recoil thrusting Romilly's hand down, and wheeled high into the sky over the stableyard, stooping down swiftly on the lure, striking almost before it hit the ground. Romilly let her feed in peace for a moment before calling her with the little falconer's whistle, which the bird must learn to associate with her food, and slipping the hood over her head again. She handed the lure to Ker and said, "You whirl it; I want to watch her fly."