#wanted to post a bit of this for no particular reason - here's perkins and teresa just sort of hanging out.

[chiropteracupola]

wip wednesday

why not a snippet of sharpe ladyhawke au on this fine rainy Wednesday?

“What do you think’s become of Captain Sharpe and the lads?” asked Perkins, staring out into the darkness as if he could see their traces somewhere in the depths of the hills. Moonset was long past, and the little balcony was lit only by a pair of lanterns. Teresa leaned on the railing beside him, and hummed softly to herself, not gracing the young rifleman with a response.

“Well?” Perkins took it upon himself to speak again, hoping for an answer, though he knew that Teresa had only the smallest bit more information than he himself did.

“He’ll take care of himself — he always has before.” Teresa stared over the edge of the balcony into the first threads of dawn, and Perkins stared after her. He opened his mouth to speak, to say isn’t it you and Harper that take care of him, but when Teresa turned to look at him, her eyes flashed gold-black in the lingering dimness of the day’s first light, and then she was gone in a flutter of wings.

“Oh, be careful, Miss!” cried Perkins, for he remembered the way his stomach had dropped when he had seen her shot out of the sky, and it was a terrible long way down for such a brittle-boned creature. But Teresa had been right in deeming herself well enough to take to the air again, and did not fall, but soared. She made a graceful circle down into the valley, the gentlest flicks of her wing-feathers allowing her to turn midair.

Perkins laughed aloud at the wonder of it, the small silhouette of Teresa in her kestrel-shape a scrap of shadow against the sunrise. For a moment, he wondered if it was truly quite so terrible to be half a bird, and to know the sky as Teresa did. Leaning out over the edge of the balcony, he felt almost a bird himself, and whooped as Teresa tried her paces properly for the first time since her injury. But all too soon she faltered, her turns growing less precise and her new-mended wing already weak with exhaustion.

She stooped, diving in a near-vertical path back down to the balcony and the lad waiting there, and made the neatest of landings on the railing, dipping down her head like a performer taking a bow. Perkins held out a hand, and Teresa stepped onto it, her talons cold and hard against his wrist. Sharp, too — she could have torn him open with one twitch, but she wouldn’t do so. She was heavier than he recalled, all the compact strength of the partisan bound down into the little hunting-bird.

“Shall we go inside, then, and see if Sarge can find us some breakfast?” said Perkins, his head still buzzing with the wonder of watching Teresa in her flight. He smiled at her little churr of approval, and turned, still holding her steady on his arm.