Ratha and Thistle-Chaser (The Third Book of the Named) by Clare Bell Read Free Book Online Page B

might try to take a seafoal. At first she didn’t look up from her early morning prowling when the raptor’s shadow crossed her path. She often saw sea eagles among the birds overhead, but they had never proved a threat.
    The whistling of air through feathers made her stare skyward as a huge black-and-white-crested sea eagle dived at the seamare. It dropped swiftly toward Splayfoot’s surviving seafoal, Guzzler, who was sleeping apart from his mother in a sun-warmed hollow of rock. A feeling of guardianship and responsibility as well as the urge to defend her territory sent Newt sprinting to meet the diving bird. The power of her hindquarters drove her so hard and fast that her good foreleg nearly collapsed under the strain.
    She charged straight into the mass of feathers and flapping pinions that filled her vision. Talons struck down at Guzzler, but Newt hit first. Leaping high with her good foreleg stiffly extended, she punched the big bird out of the air. The crested eagle flopped to one side, beating its great wings and screaming its wrath. It righted itself on its curved talons and mantled its wings at Newt, turning its head quickly from side to side as if assessing this new threat.
    With a defiant scream, it hopped toward the squirming seafoal. Newt dug her nose under Guzzler, shoved him up and over a lip of rock to get him quickly out of the way.
    Lowering her head and hunching her shoulders, she stalked toward the raptor, feeling her frustrations bubble up into a gleeful rage.
    With a flap that sounded like a crack, the sea eagle spread its huge, white-tipped wings, startling Newt. Behind her, Splayfoot trumpeted indignantly, but the noise faltered, as if the seamare were having second thoughts about tackling such an unfamiliar enemy as this. Newt couldn’t spare a glance at the seamare; the bird flattened its feathered crest and hopped at her, beak open and hissing.
    Without a free forepaw to clout the bird, Newt was at a disadvantage. As if it sensed this, the eagle sidled toward its foe. Newt remembered how she had knocked it from the air, centered her weight on her rear legs, and launched herself. Again she hit the big bird, raking loose a cluster of black feathers from its breast. Its beak sliced down, grazing the side of Newt’s head. Dancing on her hind legs, Newt made a wide slap with her good paw that connected with the sea eagle’s neck. It returned a bruising blow with one wing, then lurched around and tumbled into a flopping, flapping run that finally lifted it off the beach. Gaining altitude over the heads of the seamares, the beaten raptor made one last overhead circle, raining excrement on Newt.
    She shook herself, snarled at the retreating bird, then turned, panting, to face Splayfoot. There was a certain spark in the seamare’s eyes that made Newt fear the seamare’s protective anger over the threat to Guzzler might spill over onto her. She saw Splayfoot make a sudden movement, as if she were about to charge, but something in her eyes changed, and she only grunted and tilted her head to one side, uncertain. Then she swung around and left with Guzzler.
    So intent was Newt on Splayfoot that she neither saw nor smelled the stranger who had crept up on the bluff above and crouched, watching.
     
     

 
    Chapter Four
     
     
    Thakur’s way of reckoning direction by the sun held true and brought him to the shore he’d seen only from a distant peak. Taking Aree on the journey slowed him down, but he wasn’t going to part with his treeling, even for this. Although he had eaten enough at the clan kill to sustain him for several days, he made stops to hone his hunting skills, long left unused by his life in the clan. He also halted to sleep, relieve himself, or let Aree forage for berries and beetles.
    They reached the sea coast just before sunset several days after departing from the sunning rock. Thakur had begun to think he had gone astray, for the way led him through a forest of great pines whose