Once upon a time long, long ago, a unicorn longed for a child. There were many fine stallions in her herd, proud-necked unicorns and nimble pegasi, but though she accepted many, no child was born.
One day she left the herd and walked until she saw a hawk with red barring her great wings circling above the plain. The mare called to her:
"Oh mighty hawk with soaring sweep,
I wish a little one to keep!"
But the hawk cried back, "That's none to me; away with you!" And she rose on the currents until she was no more than a black dot in the sky.
So the mare continued on, walking through the deep woods until she saw a wise-eyed owl watching her from a branch. So she called to her:
"Oh owl wise, whom all extol,
I wish, I wish a little foal!"
But the owl haughtily turned her head away, replying:
"That's none to me; away with you!"
So the mare kept walking until she saw a crow taking a dust bath, her wings swirling like black fans. The mare watched her for a minute, then sat down a little ways away and sang a little song to herself.
"The hawk who soars and stares the sun
Would not give me a little one."
The crow paused to tilt her head and preen her plumage, studying the mare as she did so, for hawks are no friends to crows. The pony continued singing, just as if no one else was there.
"The owl, wise beyond all years,
Would not give me a child to rear."
The crow was gazing on her openly now, black head turned sideways to examine her with one dark, liquid eye.
The unicorn pretended to notice her all of a sudden, singing to the black bird.
"Corby, crow, rook so wild
All I wish for is a child."
The crow opened her beak and clacked it shut once or twice. Finally, she said, "What price?"
"As much meat as you can carry," the mare promised.
"All my clan."
The unicorn paused only a moment before agreeing. "Enough meat for all your flock."
The crow clacked her beak once or twice in skepticism, for although ponies would defend themselves when attacked, they were certainly not hunters. But she cawed in agreement and arranged to meet the mare at the same spot the next day.
The unicorn walked back along the river, humming to herself. Before long, she came to the owl, who still sat on her branch, half-snoozing.
The mare sang in a murmur that was soft (but not too soft), "Owl, ancient and half-blind, steals scraplets left behind."
The owl's golden eyes opened with a jerk and she hooted angrily. "Hwhat, hwhat, hhhh-whaaat did you say?"
"Oh, I'm very sorry," the pony said. "It's just a little something the hawk told me."
"The hawk! What does that fool know about it, never getting a close look at anything but clouds?" the owl said indignantly.
"I apologize, friend owl. But she is such a fine hunter herself, diving from the sun for rabbits and mice, that I thought she must know what she was talking about."
"She knows nothing," the owl replied, ruffling her feathers. "But she will learn a lesson by the time I am through with her!"
"I saw her upriver, if you want to talk with her," the pony said helpfully, although not quite truthfully. After watching the owl fly away in a silent huff, the pony continued on her way. Soon she came upon the hawk, who was resting on a branch overlooking the river. The pony sat on the bank and sang softly to herself,
"Hawks do scavenge, hawks do thieve if the owl can be believed."
The hawk's head immediately jerked up. "What? What now? Thieve? Aiiii, aiiii, I make my own kills!" And she spread her wide wings and hissed fiercely through her sharply curved beak.
"I'm sorry, hawk, I did not mean to offend," the mare said hastily. "I was just repeating what I heard the owl say!"
"I, steal! Unlike that squat mop of a bird, my eyes are sharp enough to pick out my own prey!"
"I apologize," the pony repeated. "But everyone knows how wise the owl is . . . and she's such a fine hunter besides, gliding under the moonlight."
"Ha!" the hawk said quite loudly. "A fine idiot is more like it!"
At that moment, the owl arrived. "Who, who, whoooo do you think you are, spreading such lies?"
"I am the hawk, the far-seer, and a mightier hunter than you shall ever be, bone-spitter!" the hawk sneered.
"You're a fool, fool, fooool, thinking you know the world because you flutter above it," the owl hooted, "thinking you're a fine hunter because you see the creatures stupid enough to blunder around in the day!"
"And you, you wait in the shadows like a coward for your trembling prey!"
Before they strike at each other, the unicorn said, "You hunt differently, it's true, and so it's hard to judge who hunts more skillfully. If only there were some way to compare . . . "
"Yes!" the hawk said immediately. "We'll hunt all day and then we'll see who is better . . . when I have a fine pile of mice and rabbits and she has naught!"
"We'll hunt all day AND night," the owl countered, "and you will see that a sharp wit is better than a sharp beak!"
And with this agreed, they both flew off to hunt. The hawk soared high, staring down from her great height and stooping in a rush whenever she saw the twitch of a rabbit or incautious squirrel far below. She did not pause to gorge, but dropped each kill in a pile near the river. The owl, meanwhile, had gotten off to a slow start but once night fell her round eyes caught every grey glimmer of light and she swooped down on every twitch of movement, every creature she saw skittering through the moonlit leaves.
By morning each bird had a huge and macabre pile of corpses, and each made her claim.
"I am obviously the greater hunter!" said the hawk, stifling a yawn.
"That is untrue," replied the owl, trying to keep her eyes open. "I have caught more; it's just the fluff around the squirrels' tails that makes your stack seem higher. And, anyway, mine is wider."
Exhausted though they were, both of them jerked awake, wide-eyed, as a black storm of crows suddenly descended on the clearing. The cloud of black birds cleaved as half dove for the hawk and half went after the owl, cursing and pecking and driving them away. The hawk soared up, up, up until she was beyond the clouds and the owl fled deep, deep, deep into the forest and only then did the crows fall upon the meat, each bird scooping up a squirrel or a few mice or two or three crows carrying away a rabbit.
Finally only one crow remained, the crow that the unicorn had first spoken to. But the creatures the hawk and owl had so diligently caught were all gone; not a single mouse or shrew remained.
"As much meat as all my clan can carry," was all the crow said.
The unicorn hesitated a moment, then walked over to a walnut tree and kicked it until the nuts rattled down. She rolled a few over to the crow, who watched with a cocked head as the mare crushed the walnuts with her hard hoof.
"Here is your meat, then," the pony said, tapping the nut lying surrounded by crushed bits of shell. "And should you require more than that, I shall get it for you. As much as you can carry."
The crow blinked tilted her head carefully towards the meat of the nuts, then towards the unicorn, and she broke into a loud, raucous laugh. "When spring grain springs from the fields, a crow-black colt your womb shall yield!" And the bird scooped up a beakful of walnuts and flew away.
The unicorn returned to her herd and grazed and wandered with them and as summer drew on and chilled into winter she became heavy with foal. Whether a union with one of the herd stallions had at last taken hold or whether it was crow-magic no one knew, but some said the latter, for the child she bore in early spring was like none other in the herd . . . coal black, with neither horn nor wing.
And so she named him Jackdaw.