Alric steps out first onto the broad ledge around the top of the building and advises his guests on where to stand to stay safe. “This type of falcon generally builds nests on cliff edges. This is the closest I’ve got to that.” There are two mounds of twigs out on the roof here. One of the nests is empty, but the other contains two small bundles of fluffy white feathers.
“How old are they?” Heppa asks as usual.
“About two weeks,” Alric tells her. “This is Buk and Olk. Their parents Kilkk and Nar are both out now, probably hunting for something to bring back to the kids.”
“What do they eat?”
“Well, in town here…” Alric interrupts himself with a snort of amusement, given last night’s activities. “Rats. But also they might catch pigeons or doves or other small birds. Magpies are larger than what they would normally go for,” he assures Tric. “It’s more a matter of harassment.” In both directions, certainly. Turning back to Heppa, he tells her that when the parents come back, they will have already eaten the food and they will regurgitate it into the chick’s mouths. She asks how early he starts training the young birds, and he explains that there is not much to do with them before they can fly, other than for them to get comfortable with him.
Tric congratulates Alric on his growing flock, while Heppa asks questions about how often there are new falcon offspring. Alric leaves that entirely up to the birds. It depends on the season and also on how active the birds themselves have been. Kilkk and Nar often run the western route, but Alric has not sent them on any message deliveries that way in a while. Thus they have had more time to relax at their home, and they decided to have a couple eggs this year. Heppa realizes she has so far heard about five falcons here, and Alric points out that Aderyn is the sixth, but she is off flying around right now. Kilkk and Nar are younger birds and so more likely to reproduce, whereas Aderyn, at ten years, is middle-aged for a falcon.
“So you just have them run messages?” Heppa asks. “Is that part of your business?”
“It certainly supplements income from the tavern. It was a profession in and of itself back among the Dunefolk, but there are not that many others in Wesnoth. Probably back where our people are from you could sustain yourself with a career of just being a falcon messenger… service…” Alric picks his words carefully, trying to describe what this role actually is in a culture that he only has second-hand experience of, as well as negotiating around some of the issues his family has faced with it. “Here, while we do service people with transporting messages, it is a side business and… and it can be problematic in the wrong… environment. Falconry is different among the people of Wesnoth than it is among the Dunefolk, and… I’ll leave it at that for now.”
That just makes Heppa more curious. “Is there a fear of falcons among humans?” Aderyn was certainly scary last night.
“No. It’s a class issue.”
“You gotta wear the fancy pants if you wanna have the bird,” Tric observes.
Alric nods. He had intended to avoid this topic, but if they are going to ask, he will answer. “Falconry is a common hobby among wealthy nobility. To raise them, to hunt with them… To have them. Among Wesnoth nobles, it is a sport to hunt with falcons. There’s prestige associated with owning them.”
“So some people disapprove of you having any falcons?” Tric asks. “But somebody’s got to raise the falcons for the nobility, right? A noble person is not going to run an aviary for themselves, will they?”
“No, a noble might have a retainer on their staff who handles the birds for them,” Alric replies. “Nobody in this town gives me any problems related to it, but it is an issue my mother had to deal with in Weldyn.”
“Ah,” Tric says. “I take it then you would never sell one of these birds. Like if a noble saw one of your birds and—”
“No,” Alric states flatly. “These birds are part of my family.” Tric nods in understanding. “That also is a concept that many people in Weldyn did not understand.” This makes sense to the elves. The market is not a strong force in their society. Currency is rarely seen in the forest, and no one would ever try to buy a pony.
“Come to think of it, I don’t know where our ponies came from,” Heppa says. “We’ve just always had them.” Things have gotten very somber for some reason that Heppa is not entirely sure of and wondering about that chases away a number of questions that she was intending to ask.
Alric looks up at the sky, recognizing Kilkk and Nar where the elves just see dark specs. He whistles a descending pattern, similar to what they have heard before. Heppa asks if the whistles mean different things, and he tells her that this one means to come. Sure enough, two brown falcons with buff chests descend rapidly around them. Alric holds out his left arm, and the two birds jockey for position, finally settling on which one can land first. He introduces them to Kilkk, and Heppa tries to whistle a greeting again, still not quite getting it. Alric heaves his arm up to launch Kilkk, and then Nar comes in. She is similar in coloration to Kilkk but with a broader stripe of dark feathers on the underwing, much as Aderyn has. They repeat the introductions. Heppa tries again, whistling in earnest. She is meeting Alric’s family, so she wants to make a good impression. “I hope they like me better than Damal,” she comments.
“Better than Damal likes you, or better than they like Damal?” Alric asks with a laugh.
“Better than Damal likes me. What do they think of Damal?” she replies.
“There’s a reason that Alric’s taking care of the falcons,” Tric observes.
“I think Damal was happy to be able to devote his attention to other pursuits,” Alric says. “He would certainly never shirk from anything that he felt he had a duty to do, but I believe he was relieved when they took to me.”
“So there are six now with the chicks… How many falcons were there when Damal had them?” Heppa asks. “You have one from your mother…”
Alric explains that there were a few more falcons when he took them over from his uncle, but some of them have since died. Aderyn is the only falcon that Alric brought with him, and others have been born since, such as Nar, who is only four years old.
Tric has taken on responsibility for a bird recently, but a very different one. Still, he feels Alric might have useful advice. He asks what sorts of things endanger the falcons. There are cats in the city, for example. Alric’s falcons are not really concerned about any ground-based threats. They are most vulnerable on the ground, so they spend as little time as possible there. “My birds are trained in defense. They do practice restraint, though; they’re not like wild falcons. They know that they operate in human spheres. And as you saw last night, they can understand instructions for when situations change,” Alric points out. “Your bird’s going to be a little bit different, particularly if he is spending time down around you, closer to the ground.”
“I’ll see what I can do about that,” Tric says. “So, keep him flying.”
“But also, if the magpie is going to have a roost in your backpack, you need to make sure that he can get out of it fast if he needs to. That way, if he feels threatened, he can flee into the air.” This all sounds reasonable, and Tric resolves to think that over. Heppa volunteers to help him modify his pack, and they consider options, such as a little cage-like section with a door that Mate can tie closed himself.
“Other than that…” Alric laughs in a self-deprecating manner, “I realize you met him here and he was certainly snacking on people’s food, but it is best for them not to eat cooked food. So, if you can encourage him to eat natural, raw foods…”
Tric lets out a long breath. Mate likes himself some snacks, he does. “Yeah, that’s going to be a hard one.”
“It might help his health,” Alric suggests. He is not a naturalist though; all his knowledge comes from experience with the falcons.
“Yeah, don’t want him to put on too much weight and not be able to fly,” Tric agrees. “You hear that?” he calls over his shoulder. “You’re going on a diet!” He does suspect that elvish trail rations might just be generally better for birds than human tavern food, though, and Alric agrees with him there.
“So… do you two want to try to catch one of them?” Alric asks.
“What?” Heppa blurts out. For once, she is not the one speaking in non sequiturs.
“On your arm, one of the falcons,” he clarifies.
“Oh!” Tric says. “I thought you meant to run around and try to grab one.”
“No, no, no!” Alric hastily replies. The roof is certainly no place for such antics. “No, I mean, if one were to come deliver a message to you, certainly they can land in a tree or something like that, but you will need to approach them to undo whatever message they’re carrying.”
“I would like that very much!” Heppa tells him, and Tric agrees, too. Alric takes them back inside the attic so that they can each tie on a leather arm guard like the one he wears. Heppa starts to feel a little afraid, as it reminds her of how torn up Alric’s arm was from catching Aderyn without one. These falcons have sharp claws!
Heppa asks Alric which arm she should use, and he suggests whichever is stronger. He senses her nervousness and says, “We can have you first just hold Arkut. I can have him step from me to you, and then you’ll get at least a feel for the weight of the bird.” Arkut is an old bird who just wants to relax, but he acknowledges Alric’s prompts, moving from the perch to the human’s arm, and then stepping to Tric first.
“Whoa, he is bigger in person,” Tric observes when he holds Arkut. The falcon weighs about twice as much as Mate does, and bearing that on an outstretched limb rather than a shoulder is quite a different experience.
When Alric transfers the old falcon to Heppa, she smiles at the bird and compliments him, “Oh, you’re a healthy boy, aren’t you!” She looks him over, trying to assess his health, and peppers Alric with questions. He tells her about some indicators of sickness, such as feathers losing their luster, getting gunked together, or coming out. Eye infections can also be a problem, so he tells her some signs of those.
Alric returns Arkut to his perch and leads the elves back over to the roof access so he can call Kilkk and Nar down to them. Before they step outside, though, he clips each of them into a safety line secured to the attic. He assures them this is just a precaution in case they get knocked over, so that they do not fall off the roof. Considering he saw her fall out of a tree last night, Heppa acknowledges that this is a good idea.
Catching the moving falcons is a more stressful but exciting experience. They come in with more velocity than Arkut had. This time there is also the buffetting of wind from the flapping, but the elves each manage to stand their ground. The falcons inspect the newcomers who have caught them. Heppa holds her shaking arm outstretched, looking nervously at Nar, but then smiling at Alric. “What did you have for breakfast?” she asks the falcon. “Was it a mouse? No, a squirrel, I think.”
Tric takes some satisfaction from out-staring Kilkk, though he is not sure whether the bird even has eyelids to blink. This bird is just too big, he thinks. Mate is the ideal size: able to hide in a backpack comfortably. The magpie can get into places this bird clearly cannot.
The chicks, sensing their parents nearby, begin making persistent and demanding croaking noises. Nar and Kilkk do not wait for the elves to dismiss them; they take off immediately to go feed their children.
“So that’s the aviary,” Alric says with a smile, clearly happy to have shown it off to them.
“That was fun!” Heppa says. “Wait, but who was there last night?”
“That was Aderyn.”
“Just Aderyn?” Heppa presses. “It seemed like a lot of birds… but I didn’t see much.” It was dark and raining, and she was on the ground for a decent chunk of time.
Alric points out the magpie was there as well, but as for falcons, only Aderyn. “All the falcons are important to me, but Aderyn and I have a very different relationship. I raised her from a chick…” He searches for words for a moment and settles on, “after my ‘accident.’ So, we bonded in such a way that I didn’t with the others. If I need backup in a dangerous situation, Aderyn is who I would want there.”
Heppa hesitates for a moment and then poses a question that she thinks might be considered personal. “Did you chew her food for her?”
Alric laughs. That is not a question he was expecting. “No, no I did not. Maybe mashed it some. But regurgitating food into a bird’s mouth? That would be a little much.” He does not comment further. It was a difficult time for him, recovering from his injury. There was a limit to what he could handle then, but he appreciates his mother giving him Aderyn to focus on instead of himself.
“I would have done it,” Heppa comments. “It seems quite efficient.”