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thin and elegant as a paint brush, the blade snuggling against the small of his back, ready to repel any attack. Clarity breaks into her mind: he is waiting. All this time, even while entertaining this never-ending circus of visitors, he has been waiting. But for what? Hey! It is her mother, she has been discovered. Her mother's voice is barely above a whisper, but a chance breeze carries it out into the court- yard, and Old Hawk whirls on her, his hand leaping forward, the knife pointed at her neck, a wild strand of hair breaking away from the top of his head and tumbling over his eyes. He looks as if he is twenty years younger, a wild animal, and she cannot turn away from his gaze, even as his face puffs with confusion and he gasps, the sound an almost womanly shout of terror. The 
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knife has halted inches away from her, but she wants to throw her arms around him, even if it means she will be impaled, and spin him around, face him back towards the other end of the court- yard, those front gates from where the danger will arrive, and she will stand by him there, or even throw him aside with the gentlest of shoves, and face the oncoming threat herself, her eyes blood-red and her body inured against threat, harm, love. *** The would-be warrior is drowning, smothered in black. It is her hair, which she has allowed to fall over his face, and he huffs comically to no avail as the strands stick in his teeth, tickle the roof of his mouth, choke him. With a laugh, she clears  |
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