Hunting Hawks

Chapter Three

Within moments, he'd left the prairie behind and journeyed out over mountainous scrub. The earth was grassless here, hard and brown and mostly flat, save for towering cliffs and high-rising, strangely-shaped rock formations. There were trees and shrubs, so it wasn't exactly a desert, but it was terrain that Dawn had never seen before. He'd never thought that there could be places where there wasn't grass to eat or water to drink. What streams he saw were tiny and brown, probably more mud than anything else.

Because of the lack of trees, the hawk was easy to find — he caught up with surprising ease, in fact. When he spotted the dark shape of the raptor, he noticed that the bird was now slow and unhurried — clearly, it thought all the danger past. We'll see about that.

Working his legs hard, Dawn rose, until he was a ways above the bird, in a position for another downward blow. When to strike, though? He was close enough, but he didn't feel ready yet. For a moment, he regretted running off on his own — if Hawk had been there, she would have given him a reliable cue. Now, he had to figure this thing out on his own.

Maybe I need to get closer...?

Beneath him, the raptor landed: a craggy peak stretching up above an expanse of rocky ruins, one with a great, wide shadow plunging into the middle. The perch was just big enough to fit between its clawed feet. It began to preen, and Dawn recognized this perfect opportunity. He dove, the wind whistling past his ears...and then pulled up, thinking.

My shadow, he thought. If he sees it, he'll run again. The sun was behind him, thrusting it across the cliffs like a giant black stripe. He needed to go higher, circle around, and come at his prey from the other direction. Hopefully he's patient enough to wait for me!

Dawn angled his wings up and away, widening the berth between him and his quarry until he had made a wide pass around the wrinkly cliffs. The land's naked backside lay against a huge chasm, plunging down into a verdant green valley that was bifurcated by a river. Dawn dove out across this giant canyon, his heart hammering in his chest as he felt the great depth of space below him, felt the electrifying and irresistible pull of the plunge. His muscles and bones wanted to angle his wings, to succumb to the world's natural downward pull and slip into a reckless fall. 

Then he shook his head, snapping out of it. Maybe another day. He was far enough away from the group as it was — Thunder and Midnight would have choice words for him if it got back to them that he'd gone skydiving on his own.

Refocusing, he completed his circle, his legs churning and his wings beating hard as he made it back around to the barren buttes and scraggly towers of rock. The hawk was still there, preening its feathers, seemingly unaware. Dawn's heart pounded faster, and his wings cast off loose black feathers as he slowly rose, higher and higher, until he was far above the raptor, his shadow hidden far behind him.

Now, he thought. Too much further, and he would overshoot his prey. His wings dropped, and he plunged, and the bluster of the wind tearing past his ears nearly deafened him. He was yards away from his prey when he realized that he hadn't decided how to deliver the death blow. Hooves? My horn? Hooves — if he aimed with his horn he wouldn't be able to see, and would be as likely to hit the bird as another slope of rock two feet away and break his neck.

He brought his two front hooves together and came down on the bird like a falling boulder. And yet, something tipped the bird off two breaths before he landed — it turned suddenly, squawking in alarm, and spread its wings as it sprung up from its perch. The two crashed together, so suddenly and forcefully that Dawn almost forgot to beat his wings to slow his fall. He did, but a hair too late, and when his hooves hit the ground, he buckled, lurching down the slope of the rock face.