Following on from yesterday...
"Ho Reynout! forward with your horn, we have a boar to chase,"
The hunt cried out, he turned about, no time was there to waste.
Yet still he paused, his mind confused, his future now unclear,
Now honour bound, his heart unbound, he feigned a hunter’s cheer.
And at the edge, once out of sight, he reined good Tusco in,
He raised the ring and held it high, to glimpse what lay within.
A sudden rush of beating wing, its shadow swift and thin,
A busant stooped with talon sharp, and plucked the ring from him,
And startled, Tusco turned and fled, into the Forest dark,
Cross trail untrod, a beech-bough lay,
and knocked him from his mount mauvais,
Into the trees, into de bomen, in ’t donker zo stark.
The horn’s call faltered in the air, the hunters broke their run,
For Reynout’s place lay empty now, his morning hunt undone,
They searched the briar and near-shadowed paths, they called with voice and horn
But found no trace of horse or man, their search it was forelorn
So back they rode to Aleidis, their voices low and grim,
And sorrow stirred within her breast, or was her act love's whim?
Days blurred vague ‘neath sombre woud, his zelf in stilte brakt,
Cold moss rose damp against his skin, lucht grew still and dun,
The woudwind caught and carried him, hurled him to its depths,
Cloistered in the leavenfall,
Into midworld he sank in dead leaf’s embrace
And Buzzard saw.