But that was not the only thing that happened next day. For when the
people came back from the funeral, they all went into the house to
gossip, and only Lavender and Primrose remained outside, because they
still fancied that their mother would yet somehow come back to them.
Suddenly a huge Eagle pounced down upon them from the sky, knocked
Lavender down, caught her by the Girdle with his talons, and carried her
off into the clouds.
The Eagle flew away with Lavender to his eyrie, high up on Mount Kitesh.
It did not hurt Lavender at all to fly along like that, hanging by her
Gold Girdle. She was only sorry at being parted from her only brother,
and kept on thinking: “Why didn’t the Eagle take Primrose too!”
So they flew over Mount Kitesh, and there, all of a sudden, Lavender saw
what neither she nor anyone else of the inhabitants of the valley had
ever seen; for everyone avoided the grisly mountains, and of those who
had happened to stray into them not one had ever returned. What Lavender
saw was this: all the seven Votaress Fairies who waited upon the Fiery
Dragon assembled together upon a rock. They called themselves
_Votaresses_ because they had vowed, as the last of the fairy kin, to
take vengeance upon the human race.
The Fairies looked up, and there was the eagle carrying a little girl.
Now the Fairies and the Eagles had made a bargain between them that each
should bring his prey to that rock, and there hold a prizecourt upon the
rock to settle what was to be done with the prey and who was to have it.
And for that reason the rock was called _Share-spoil_.
So the Fairies called out to the Eagle:
“Ho, brother Klickoon! come and alight on Share-spoil!”
But luckily the bargain was no sounder than the parties to it.
The Eagle Klickoon had taken a fancy to Lavender, so he did not keep to
the bargain, nor would he alight on Share-spoil, but carried Lavender on
to his eyrie for his eaglets to play with.
But he had to fly right across the summit of the Mountain, because his
eyrie was on the far side.
Now, on the top of the Mountain there was a lake, and in the lake there
was an island, and on the island there was a little old chapel. Around
the lake was a tiny meadow, and all round the meadow ran a furrow
ploughed in days of old. Across this furrow neither the Dragon, nor the
Fairies, nor any monster of the Mountain could pass. About the lake
bloomed flowers, and spread their perfume; there doves took refuge, and
nightingales, and all gentle creatures from the mountains.
[Illustration]
Neither clouds nor mist hung over the holy furrow-surrounded Lake; but
evermore the sun and moon in turn shed their light upon it.
As Klickoon flew over the Lake with Lavender, she caught sight of the
chapel. And as she caught sight of the chapel, she remembered her
mother; and as she remembered her mother, she pressed her hand to her
heart; and as she pressed her hand to her heart, her mother’s trust, the
Golden Girdle, came undone upon Lavender.
The Girdle came undone; Lavender dropped from the Eagle’s talons
straight into the Lake, and the Girdle after her. Lavender caught hold
of the Golden Girdle and stepped over the reeds, and the water-lilies,
and the water-weeds, and the rushes to the island. There she sat down on
a stone outside the chapel. But Klickoon flew on like a whirlwind in a
rage, because he could not come near the Holy Lake.
Lavender was safe enough now, for nothing evil could reach her across
the furrow. But what was the good of that, when the poor little child
was all alone on the top of the grisly Mount Kitesh, and none could come
to her, and she could not get away?