New Perspective

Her companions had rounded a clump of alders and disappeared behind a pile of boulders. Hurrying to catch up, Eilonwy tore around the rocks and found, too late, that they had halted. She plowed into Fflewddur, who caught her by the arm to keep her from toppling over. "Oof!" she huffed. "What on-"

The words died in her throat as she followed the collective gaze. A few paces ahead, within a bramble, a dark, ragged object was twisted: a mass of thin black feathers whose shape she could barely discern. In fact, she only realized what it was when Taran took a few cautious steps toward it. A large, awkward head stretched forward from the mass, opening a hooked beak to hiss at him.

A gwythaint. She'd heard the guards at Spiral Castle speak of them with dread, and Achren had occasionally commanded obedience by threatening to feed her to them. That was nonsense, no doubt...yes, of course it was. But she suppressed a shudder as she crept forward to examine the creature. It was a fledgling, the size of a large raven.

Fflewddur whistled. "It's a stroke of luck the parents aren't about. Those creatures will tear a man to shreds if their young are in danger."

Eilonwy glanced at him and back at the misshapen bird, feeling a twinge of sympathy. If that were true, it made them good parents at least, which was more than one might expect. The gwythaint's yellow eye, rimmed with cracked, pebbly red skin, stared them down with unmistakable animosity. The expression was faintly familiar.

"It reminds me of Achren," she said, "especially around the eyes, on days when she was in a bad temper."

They all turned at the creak of leather, and saw that Doli had drawn his axe. Taran made a startled, defensive motion toward him. "What are you going to do?"

The dwarf snorted, his usual glare magnified tenfold. "Going to do? Do you have any more stupid questions? You can't imagine I'd let it just sit there. I'm going to chop off its head."

Eilonwy grimaced, the twinge of sympathy battling with a sense of guilty relief. But Taran grabbed Doli's arm. "No!" he exclaimed. "It's badly hurt."

"Be glad of that," Doli retorted, "If it weren't, neither you nor I nor any of us would be standing here."

Taran stood up straight, towering over the diminutive dwarf, and threw his head back. "I will not have it killed," he declared, chin jutting forward. "It's in pain and it needs help."

Eilonwy stared at him in amazement. Had he gone mad? Compassion was one thing and caution another; and putting this creature quickly out of its misery satisfied both. She opened her mouth to say so, but Taran looked so...so...oh, what, exactly? Standing there, defiant, his eyes blazing, face flushed with righteous indignation. Stubborn, perhaps, but no, that wasn't quite it. This wasn't like all his other displays of hardheadedness; it wasn't all about him, for one thing. She wavered, torn between revulsion toward the creature and some faint, warm emotion she couldn't quite put her finger on.

The gwythaint squawked weakly, a pitiful sound from so infamous a creature, and strained against the brambles. For a moment it looked no more dangerous than any large bird, wounded and frightened, and Eilonwy's heart smote her.

"Taran's right," she declared, surprising herself. "It doesn't look comfortable at all. For the matter of that, it looks even worse than Achren."

The boy threw her a grateful glance, but Doli slammed his axe to the ground in disgust. "I can't make myself invisible, but at least I'm no fool. Go ahead! Pick up the vicious little thing. Give it a drink and pat its head. You'll see what happens." He made a jagged motion across his own neck. "As soon as it's got strength enough it'll slice you to bits, and then fly straight to Arawn. Then we'll be in a fine stew."

"It's true," Fflewddur put in, his voice troubled. "I myself don't enjoy chopping things up - and that bird is interesting, in a disagreeable sort of way." His long nose wrinkled. "But we've been lucky so far, with no trouble from gwythaints at least. I don't see the use of bringing one of Arawn's spies right into our bosom, as you might say. A Fflam is always kindhearted, but it seems to me this is overdoing it."

Eilonwy sighed, for this was the sensible response, but...but...well, it didn't matter. Taran was resolute. "Medwyn would not say so. In the hills, he spoke of kindness for all creatures, and he told me much about the gwythaints. I think it's important to bring this one to Caer Dathyl. No one has ever captured a live gwythaint, as far as I know. Who can tell what value it may have?"

"Well, yes, I suppose if it's any use at all, it would be better alive than dead," Fflewddur admitted. "But the proposition is risky, no matter what."

Taran answered nothing, but gestured to them to stand back, pulled off his cloak, and wrapped it around one arm. Eilonwy held her breath as he stepped toward the bush; the gwythaint writhed frantically, hissing until its throat rattled, a horrible sound that made her want to cover her ears. It slashed at Taran's outstretched hands; she choked back a squeak of terror and noticed, half resentfully, that he had not flinched. The defensive attack had taken the last of the bird's strength. It hung limp as the boy drew it from the thorny canes.

It looked larger in his arms, weak and listless as it was; a heap of straggly black feathers and grey, blood-flecked skin. Eilonwy, curious, stepped closer, and Taran looked up. "It's heavier than it looks," he said. "I need somewhere to put it down safely."

She looked around at their companions, all of whom maintained a discreet distance. No help from that quarter. "I'll make a nest for it," she offered. "I hope it's not too particular. But then I don't suppose Arawn beds them down on velvet cushions." She crouched to the ground and raked armfuls of dead leaves into a round, hollow heap, conscious of an unpleasant waft of air as Taran lowered the bird. "Ugh. It stinks."

"All carrion birds do," Taran said, straightening up, "but Gwydion said gwythaints are hunters. It might be that its wounds are festering." He looked around thoughtfully. "If I can find the right herbs, I'll make a poultice, but I'll need hot water to steep them. Stay with it, won't you?"

He walked away before she could answer, but as they certainly weren't going anywhere at the moment, it hardly mattered.

Eilonwy sat back on her heels and stared at the gwythaint. Were it not for the erratic rise and fall of its ribcage, she would have thought it already dead. Its yellow eye was dull; she wondered whether it could see or hear anything, and if so, what it thought of them.

I wonder...she shut her eyes, and bent her thought toward the bird. It took a long time to find it, a spark so faint it was almost imperceptible. There was no self-awareness there, just pain and exhaustion, and a strange sense of wrongness, like a key jammed into a lock it didn't fit, an unnatural, forced misshape that made her recoil in discomfort. When she opened her eyes to look at the creature again, it was with pity.

Taran had gone off in search of herbs and taken Hen Wen with him; Gurgi was building a fire; Fflewddur had taken the opportunity to throw himself down and snore beneath a tree; and Doli was sitting near him, sulking and holding his breath. They were all too far away to talk to, so Eilonwy presently found herself talking to the gwythaint.

"You know, you might be quite pretty if not for all your foul reputation," she mused. "Your feathers aren't exactly black at all. They're all full of green and copper and purple when the light catches them. Of course, yours aren't in the best condition. I'm sure they're quite lovely when they're..." she paused doubtfully, squinting. "Well, I'm sure the colors are lovely anyway. But then, I've never seen a grown gwythaint up close."

The wrinkled eyelid blinked laboriously, but she couldn't tell what it signified, if anything. "It's your eyes, really, that make you so vicious-looking. They just pop out like bared teeth. Perhaps you can't help it. If I had yellow eyes I suppose I'd look like I was glaring, too. One of Medwyn's wolves had yellow eyes, come to think of it. Only I thought of them as golden, and they were very handsome in his face. Perhaps if we could think of yours as golden, it would make you seem more handsome."

She watched the lid blink again over that bleary yellow eye, and tried hard to apply the word "golden" in her mind. Was it her imagination, or had the bird's erratic breathing calmed somewhat? "But maybe you don't want to be handsome. Maybe you'd rather be terrifying and hideous. I can't think it's a very pleasant way to live; everything fearing you. For one thing, it puts you in the position of having your head nearly chopped off when you happen to be the one in trouble. You ought to be quite grateful to Taran, you know."

The gwythaint twitched, and Eilonwy frowned. "'I'm not so sure about this, if you want to know the truth. Maybe we ought to have chopped your head off, and with the state you're in you'd probably have been grateful for it. And now we're losing time again, all so we can drag along something that's likely to murder us at the first opportunity. It's ludicrous, really. But," she sighed, shaking her head, "it's the right thing to do, I suppose. And he was so marvelous when he was defending you. I just couldn't-"

She coughed suddenly, and looked around, face reddening, but all her companions were still out of earshot. Thank Belin. What had made her say that?

Marvelous, indeed. How could any Assistant Pig-Keeper be...

"Well, he's never done anything like that before, has he?" she whispered fiercely to the comatose bird. "Just stumbled along being foolish and stubborn. Most of the time, I mean. He has his moments... just enough, you know, to keep him from being insufferable. And I keep thinking I've figured him out, but..." But now here he'd gone and done something noble and selfless and completely out of character. For a befuddling, annoyed moment she wanted to smack him just for being so inconsistent.

"I think maybe I'm the one going mad," she murmured presently. "I can't make up my mind how to feel about anything from one minute to the next. I keep wanting to cry for any reason or no reason at all, and I can't decide whether that infuriating Assistant Pig-Keeper really is marvelous or just a blithering idiot. When we get to Caer Dathyl-" But she stopped there, and sighed, because she almost had begun to doubt they'd ever get there, and she wasn't even sure, now, what she would do if they did.

There were rustlings in the brush near the trees, and Taran stepped out, his hands full of herbs, Hen Wen at his heels. He trotted over briskly and knelt next to the gwythaint. "How is it?"

Eilonwy scooted aside to give him room. "It's alive, barely. That's all I can tell." She watched as he laid out the herbs, deftly sorting through greens, roots, and flowers. Renewed astonishment at his familiarity with them, and an incompetent sense of her own ignorance of anything helpful, made her scowl at Hen Wen, who sat on her haunches behind him and grinned so broadly that no one needed magic to know the pig thought he was the most marvelous creature on earth.

Taran dressed the bird's wounds and fed it with a gentleness so uncharacteristic that Eilonwy was surprised into silence, though a hundred questions were wrestling in her mind. They were both so engrossed in the process that neither noticed that Doli had come up to watch as well, and she jumped and squeaked when the dwarf suddenly humphed near her left ear.

"That's all very well," he grumbled. "But how do you imagine you'll carry the nasty thing-perched on your shoulder?"

Taran shrugged. "I don't know. I thought perhaps I could wrap it in my cloak."

Doli snorted. "That's the trouble with you great clodhoppers. You don't see beyond your noses."

"We've been a bit busy attending to the needs of the moment," Eilonwy snapped, "with very little help, I might add. Do you actually have a suggestion, or did you just come over to criticize?"

The dwarf crossed his arms. "Well, if you expect me to build a cage for you, you're mistaken."

"A cage!" Taran brightened. "That would be just the thing. Of course, I wouldn't want to bother you with that. I'll try to make one myself."

Eilonwy helped him cut a dozen saplings, and watched doubtfully as he bent them in various ways, obviously at a loss. Acutely aware of Doli's contemptuous stare, she was about to lose her temper with him again, when he leapt forward and shoved Taran aside. "Oh, stop it! I can't stand botched work. Here, get out of the way."

The dwarf's small hands, armed with naught but a pocketknife, seemed to fly of their own accord. He sent them running to the trees for thin supple vines, braided them, and lashed the saplings into sturdy arcs, woven one into another. With an expertise that made them all gape, he was finished in minutes, and Taran picked up the cage, exclaiming over it.

"Now that is Fair Folk magic," Eilonwy breathed, animosity toward Doli forgotten in her admiration. "Certainly more practical than making yourself invisible."

The dwarf scowled at her, his shock of red hair bristling.

The march resumed, this time encumbered with the gwythaint secured in its cage, hoisted onto Taran's back, since Melyngar would have nothing to do with it. Doli, his sympathy for them at an all-time low, pushed forward with almost manic speed, never pausing to see whether the rest were keeping up. By the third halt, Eilonwy, winded and exhausted from trying to help Taran bear his load, loudly expressed a desire that the dwarf would achieve permanent invisibility, which he steadfastly ignored.

The gwythaint, meanwhile, was visibly improving. It raised its head and hissed at every bump and jar of its cage, but was quiet during the halts when Taran took it out to change the poultice and feed it. Its demeanor, however, did not encourage friendly overtures. When Fflewddur poked his finger gingerly through the cage bars, he barely pulled it out again in time to escape a vicious slash from the hooked beak, and they all had to listen to Doli's dire predictions until Eilonwy wanted to shove a pine cone into his mouth.

By nightfall the bird seemed nearly recovered, huddling on its haunches at the bottom of the cage, its yellow eyes gleaming, its foul stench gone. When they parceled out the evening provisions, the smell of food roused it to raucous squawking, and it rattled its beak against the cage bars.

"Demanding sort of guest, isn't it?" Fflewddur remarked. "Let's hope none of its kin are around to hear that."

Gurgi whimpered in terror, rolling his eyes skyward. Taran hurriedly snatched up a handful of dried meat and went over to the cage, pulling the food into small bits that the gwythaint grabbed out of his hands almost before he could let go.

"It's so quick," Eilonwy observed. She had followed him over to watch it tear at the meat. There really was something handsome, or at least striking about it now; the keen sharp gaze and precise movements of a hunter. Its head, held high now on its long tufted neck, was a proud, sleek shape. She held out a hand for a strip of the meat. "Let me try."

Taran passed it to her with a raised eyebrow. "Make sure you keep your fingers out of the way."

The gwythaint cocked its head at her when she knelt before the cage; she felt its doubt, but its hunger was greater, and it did not hesitate when she dangled the meat before it. The hooked beak barely grazed her fingertips and she let out her breath all at once, without realizing she'd been holding it.

"Well done!" Fflewddur had approached, and he slapped his leg, impressed. "Perhaps we can tame it after all." But when he reached out, the bird flattened itself to the cage floor, hissing angrily.

"It knows perfectly well you'd have agreed to chop off its head," Eilonwy told him. "You can't blame it for being annoyed at you. If somebody wanted to chop off my head, then came around afterward and wanted to be sociable, I'd peck at him too."

Taran was shushing the bird, talking gently to it as Fflewddur backed away to the fire. The gwythaint raised itself up with dignity, eyes following every movement, and when Taran finally reached out a tentative finger to scratch at its head, it made no protest. Heart pounding, Eilonwy shut her eyes, and felt the bird's presence there - wild, fierce, fearful...but not, somehow, of them.

"Gwydion told me the birds are trained when young," said Taran. "I wish he were here. He would know best how to handle the creature. Perhaps it could be taught differently. But there's bound to be a good falconer at Caer Dathyl, and we'll see what he can do."

Eilonwy shook her head. "I don't think there's anyone could have done it better." Taran glanced at her in pleased surprise, and she felt her face warm, but it was dark, and no one knew the difference, and so what if he was marvelous.

"I daresay," she added, "that the only person more experienced with gwythaints than you, now, is Arawn himself." At the mention of its master's name, the creature looked sharply at her, its beak open in a hissing position, though no sound came out. She hesitated, curious at the mingled terror and anger she felt from it. "That's strange. It bears no love for him," she murmured.

"No," Taran said. "Medwyn said they serve him out of fear. That he tortures and enslaves them."

There was anger and disgust in his voice, and Eilonwy shivered. "Taran. How did you know? I mean...how to help it the way you did?"

He was quiet for a moment, emanating surprise, then chuckled. "I always forget you've lived in an old castle all your life. That's what you do on a farm, Eilonwy; take care of animals."

She was tempted, for an instant, to feel foolish and therefore irritated; but there was no condescension in his voice, just warmth and a little pride. It made her feel instead, somehow, isolated and small. "I...I wish..."

Taran's silence took on a distinct sense of tense expectation, so distracting that she stopped, confused. "Wish what?" he asked at last, hesitant.

"I wish I knew as much as you do," Eilonwy sighed. "About...about things that matter. Instead of a head full of spells that haven't done a single useful thing."

"Eilonwy." His tone was mildly exasperated. "How can you say that? You got us all out of Spiral Castle. And saved us in the Fair Folk realm, where we would never have gone in the first place if we'd listened to you." He laughed. "There, you see? I admit it. Knowing how to treat a sick bird is all well and good, but it's having companions smarter than I am that's kept me alive."

She glanced at him gratefully. "Still. I'd like to know how to heal things. Grow things. Magic doesn't do that, or at least nothing I've been taught."

"It's not as exciting as it sounds," Taran said. "And anyway, you can learn that, but no matter how much I studied, I'll never have a magic ball that lights up at my command, or...or be able to turn arrows into spiderwebs."

He grinned and Eilonwy giggled. "Well. I suppose we all have our strengths, then."

The gwythaint looked from one to the other of them, and squawked.