Books of Bayern Series Bundle

by Shannon Hale

  It was not long before she heard slow thuds behind her and felt a warm, clover-sticky huff of breath on her neck.

  She turned slowly and into a rather heavy exhale that made her blink, first from the powerful smell and then again for the reminder of Falada, and she found her eyes were too wet to see straight until she could blink them dry. She put the flat of her hand on the bay’s forehead and rubbed it. He rested his nose in her other hand and sniffed ponderously.

  “Hello there, horse friend,” she said. “Can you smell your speech on me? I knew the speech of one horse. Though I can’t hear your thoughts, your touch is nearly as comforting. It’s kind of you to let me touch you. It’s good to be reminded how much I miss him.” She spoke to him soothingly as she rubbed his neck and sides and legs, all down his right side, and then passed under his neck and rubbed his left side.

  He stiffened as she approached his mounting side, so she made nickering noises, soothing things mares murmured to their foals. The bay responded with deep sounds from his throat that were not words, akin to hums and laughter, noises that carried emotion or the basis of connection.

  She continued to stroke him until her hands reached his shoulder where the knotted reins hung over one side. Holding the ends of the reins, Ani placed a boot in a stirrup and hopped onto his back. The horse rearranged his stance, but his muscles did not freeze up. Ani’s skirt slid up as she mounted, but it was wide and dropped over her boot tops once arranged. She felt comfortable on a horse again, like finding a favorite childhood spot in the garden. She looked at her flock, busy and peaceful around the pond a ways down the slope, and across the stream where the trees were thicker she thought she could make out Conrad’s orange cap.

  “Very nice,” said the rider. He had approached and was watching with an unclear expression.

  She turned away and let her heels dig in. The bay sprang into a canter.

  The pasture was a violent green, smoothed of shadows and imperfections by sheer speed, just one color united. The gray of the wall was constant to her right, the shimmer of the stream to her left, and she let her heart be lifted by the wind that seemed so thick as to blow through her body and make her light as itself. The horse felt glad to run, and the pressure from her legs bade him go faster, and faster. The wind fought her hat brim and filled up her ears, speaking words that she thought she could almost hear, and she rode faster, wanting to get closer to the source, to get inside the wind and see what it saw. They neared the northern hedge, and Ani crouched low to the horse’s neck and gripped his sides with her knees, feeling herself become part of the thundering of hoofbeats, and then the tremendous escape from earth as he leaped. Her body lifted skyward and free.

  Ani rode a short ways before, prodded by guilt, she turned the bay around and jumped the hedge again, to find the man running toward her. The wind died as the horse slowed, and she felt its words leave her skin unspoken. She stopped by the man’s side and dismounted.

  “What do you mean, riding away on my horse?” His breath came a little quicker from the run. “You can’t . . . can’t just do that.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have mounted him without your permission. I got carried away.” But she did not feel sorry. She felt herself grinning.

  The man straightened, trying to be serious in spite of her grin. “Yes, you shouldn’t, I mean, he’s my horse.”

  “That aside, I really couldn’t have been expected to stand by and watch without lending a hand. It wasn’t hard to see the mount didn’t trust the rider.”

  The man opened his mouth and tried to laugh, but he just shook his head. “I could’ve stayed at the grounds if I’d wanted this kind of pointed abuse. I know I’m not an expert horse breaker, but I’m doing what any stable-master would do.”

  I should stop harassing him, she thought, but her own boldness was intoxicating, and she continued.

  “Oh, come now, surely you can feel how uneasy he is when you mount. You can see him roll back his eyes as though he’d like to be everywhere he can see but here with you. He’s an untrained, wild animal, and half-crazy with fright that you’re leading him to predators and all kinds of uncomfortable situations. You’ve got to get him to commit to you before you can gallop over hedges and up and down strange pastures.”

  “Look now, you’ve overstepped yourself here, and I find this a bit of an uncomfortable situation myself and am itching to roll my own eyes, if you’d know.”

  “I guess I have overstepped myself, and you’ve every right to be angry at me, if you’re angry, of which I’m not entirely certain, since you seem to be laughing at the same time, but you don’t need to pretend to be innocent here. I mean, if you’re as good a horse breaker as any, why did you seek out the seeming privacy of the goose pasture instead of working him on the palace grounds? You live at the palace, don’t you?”

  The man lifted his brows at her and nodded. He’s surprised I know that, thought Ani, though any fool can see the horse wears the palace insignia on his saddle blanket. She could see he was not a nobleman’s son, lacking the softness and self-assurance she remembered from her boy cousins, so the horse was probably not his. He had work-hardened hands that were broad and strong and shoulders fit for lifting. Ani decided that most likely he was a palace guard or watchman.

  The man looked at the dirt on his boot tip. The pasture was suddenly quiet, and she noticed the distance-muted calls of Jok, who said, Come back, come back.

  She looked closer at the man. He was older than she, though not by many years. He had thick black hair, cut just longer than his shoulders, that he tied back in a low pony’s tail, and the kind of prominent jaw and chin that would stay prominent for all his life. His shoulders were broad, and it was not just a trick of a well-cut tunic, as his was a thin cotton, roughly made. She was thinking of how she had ordered him and insulted him and mounted his horse to ride down the pasture like a crazed thief. The anonymity of her goose girl costume and name gave leash to a freedom that she had never dared exhibit when she had been the crown princess shivering in her mother’s shadow. Her throat felt dry. She coughed, and realized that she was mortified.

  “So, you see, that’s what I saw,” said Ani. And coughed again.

  The man shook his head, and then she saw that he was indeed laughing.

  “Here I stand,” he said, “glum as a plum because I couldn’t do it by myself, and you’re right, I’d run away from those blasted, overpopulated training fields to break in this beast away from the stable-master and his horde who have been laughing at my fatuous attempts all week. And to come here, for privacy, and get schooled in horse mastery by a girl.”

  Ani gave a vexed laugh.

  “Oh, I mean,” he said quickly, “not that you can’t know more about horses than a man. I’m botching all from my hair to my shoes today. What I want to say is, you’re better with this bay than I can ever learn to be, and you seem to enjoy riding him. When you’re his mistress, he doesn’t look to need any breaking at all. I can’t give him to you outright as, actually, he’s not mine, but I don’t see why you couldn’t take him to your home for as long as you like, or until I get the word that he’s needed. So, yes, truly, why don’t you take him so the poor beast can be ridden properly, all right?”

  Ani’s face flamed instantly, and she looked down and waited for him to realize his error. She shuffled her feet, wishing for a tree to lean against or behind.

  “Don’t be shy about it. May I remind you, lady, that you haven’t been shy so far? Go on, he’s yours.”

  Ani felt humiliation deep as her bones, and she shook her head.

  “Oh, you might think that I’m trying to pawn off my job of breaking him onto you. I can pay you. I think. I’m unfamiliar with this kind of business. How much would be fair?” Ani covered her face with one hand, and the man groaned and muttered angrily at himself. “Blast, I’ve done something again. You don’t offer to pay ladies. You’ve insulted her again, you daft, clumsy brute.”

  “No
, you’re very kind. You don’t understand. It’s just, I’ve no place to keep him.”

  The man seemed to see her dress for the first time, and his gaze fell behind her, where the gaggle waddled about and honked at the sun that was slipping into the west. It was his turn to blush.

  “You’re not . . . I’m sorry. I’d thought you were, you were just picnicking out here. I was thoughtless. Forgive me.”

  Ani laughed. “A goose girl should feel honored to be mistaken for a lady with land to put a horse on, sir.”

  “You didn’t say ‘sir’ when you stole my horse. Geric. My name’s Geric.”

  He stood expectantly after that, perhaps waiting for her name; but, her boldness spent, she just nodded and walked away. Conrad was fording the stream, and it was nearly time to herd the geese home. When she turned back, the man and his horse had gone. Ani felt disappointment slide into her body where the wind had blown her free. She shook her head at herself and tried to trick it away with forced detachment.

  “You’re not who you used to be,” she said. “You’re just a goose girl.”

  Chapter 10

  The next day was stormy rain. Ani lay awake in her bed to the euphony of heavy water on her thin roof. The pane was a stream of moving darkness, and she watched it lighten to silver. It was the first rainfall since she had come to the city. In the dizziness of early morning and little sleep, Ani wondered what she would find outside, if the night and the water had washed it all away, the pasture, the walls, the guards, the palace, and left her with her name again standing in mud and darkness.

  Soon Jok was awake, picking at the wrinkles in her wool blanket, mock grazing. Sometimes he would pull a balled bit of lint loose and let it hang from his bill. Ani greeted him, and he said, It is raining. It is raining, she repeated. He continued his dry graze. She asked the goose if it was morning, but he did not answer. She tried, Is there sun in the sky? But he still did not understand, unresponsive as though no sound had been made. Are you hungry? she asked. Yes, said the goose.

  “That’s no help,” Ani said. “You’re always hungry.”

  Unsure if it was night, dawn, or day, Ani dressed, steadied the bird on one shoulder, and dashed to the workers’ hall.

  Several workers were gathered there, and not one seemed sure of the exact time. Ideca’s girls had laid out bowls of an informal breakfast, and the workers snacked casually, lounging on the benches and on the floor, talking, as though rain had scrubbed away all the work.

  Ani found Conrad in a group playing at pick-up-sticks, and she asked him if they were to go to the fields.

  “Maybe,” he said.

  “Thank you so much, Sir Helpful One,” said Enna. “Isi, you’ll see how it goes soon enough. The mistress only has a few rain cloaks, so we take turns seeing to our animals. We stay here, mostly, and wait for the storm to clear.”

  “Raindays’re almost as good as marketdays,” said Razo.

  When two of the pig-keepers returned, Conrad and Ani took their oiled cloaks and went to the pens. Jok followed, splashing through the puddles, squawking about speed and no food, but otherwise undeterred by the rain. They brought wet clover from the animal garden and dry corn from the feed barrels, taking armloads into the clamorous stall and pulling enough water from the well to last the day. Ani left Jok there, and she and Conrad hurried back to allow others a turn at the cloaks.

  The rain did not stop. The day never dawned more than the brightness of lightning shocks or the dim grayness that came from neither east nor west. Ani sat apart, gazing at the night-day, wishing to lie down on the pavement and let the water soak her, then beat down on her, through her, work her away until all that was left was her core. She wondered what that would be.

  The next day would be marketday. She marveled that she had been in the city one month and she was still the goose girl. Yesterday she had been as bold as a queen with that rider, that Geric, yet she could not be bold with herself.

  At the idea of Geric, her thoughts slipped to an image of his hands as he held the knotted reins, the straps seeming thin in their bigness. And the three lines that marked the corners of his eyes when he smiled. And the moment when she climbed onto his horse, when her skirt slipped up over her knee. Before she pulled it down, he must have seen her shift, or perhaps, perhaps her leg.

  Ani stood to shake off the chill of embarrassment. The light of outside was wet and dull, but the hall was aflame with candles. Most of the workers were present, playing games and laughing, their holiday voices shadowed by the tenacious rainfall pounding the roof. The oiled cloaks hung on the wall, out of demand. Ani was tempted to take one and go check the geese, converse with them in their friendly, cryptic language, chattering at spiders and complaining of closeness. Or she could run back to her room, lie on her cot, and watch the rain blur the world of her window.

  And hide, she realized. Always she wanted to hide. No more. To approach the king again, she would need a horde of people by her side to guarantee she would not be the victim of a quick dagger in a dark corridor before ever telling her story. Where else could she meet people to help her but here? She took a breath and joined the throng.

  Enna was sitting near the fire, watching cheese melt on the bread she had placed on a hearthstone. A dollop of orange cheese dripped off the crust, and Enna caught it with her finger, licking it off before she could feel the heat.

  “Sit down,” she said when she saw Ani. She handed her a thick slice of bread and a block of cheese with a knife, then turned her eyes to the hearth.

  “Why aren’t you playing?” said Ani, gesturing to the many games of cards and sticks around the room.

  “Oh, the fire,” said Enna. Its orange fingers waved specters on the blacks of Enna’s eyes. “I get to looking and can’t look away. Don’t you ever feel like fire is a friendly thing? That it’s signaling to you with its flames, offering something?”

  Ani watched not the fire but the play of its light on Enna’s face and felt comfort that there were others who listened for language in what was supposed to be mute and who sought out meaning in what was only beautiful.

  “Enna, today’s free. Why doesn’t anyone go out into the city? Everyone huddles here as though there’s nowhere else in the world.”

  “You know, there’s not for us, all of us Forest folk. And not especially for the boys.”

  “Why not?”

  Enna looked at Ani quizzically.

  “This truly is the first time you’ve been out of the Forest, then? We don’t really belong here, you know, if you ask anyone in the city. We still belong to our families back home and just live here. We watch their animals. We’re almost, almost like animals to them.” Enna looked at Razo, who sat across the room, losing at sticks.

  “When these boys reach a man’s age, they don’t receive their rites and the javelin and shield from their chief and become a part of their community, not like the town boys. The fathers of our boys never received a javelin. There are no chiefs in the Forest, and the king doesn’t think twice about his Forest men. It doesn’t really matter, I guess, until poorer families like ours send their sons and daughters into a city for a little extra coin. I know my family hasn’t an idea of how we’re treated in the city.” Enna looked back at the fire. “We’re so ignorant out there in the trees, Isi. We’ve no idea the world’s bigger than the walk to a foothill pasture.”

  Ani nodded.

  “You belong to your family, you know, and if you marry a Forest man, you’ll belong to each other, but never to a community, never to this city. I feel like we creep around the borders, stepping in to live along the west wall like spiders while we’re young and unwed and then stepping out again, back into the shadow of the Forest. If you ask me, I’d rather be there. But some of these boys, they’d remove fingers to be given a javelin and belong to the city.”

  Ani glanced around the room. Conrad and Razo played at sticks opposite her, their boyish faces tense in the competition. But they’re nearly men, she thought. They shoul
d be visiting taverns and hunting and meeting daughters of butchers and tailors. Yet every night, in clear weather or foul, all the workers left their posts and returned to the safety of the hall.

  “It doesn’t seem quite fair.” Ani felt a moment of regret that she would not be queen of this country after all, would not have a chance to set this injustice right.

  “It never did to me,” said Enna. “But I don’t know much. I just see how things are. And they’ve been so for a long time, through tales and spells. Who’m I to question the law and the king?”

  “You’re Enna,” said Ani. “That’s somebody.”

  Enna smiled. “So’s Isi.”

  Is she? thought Ani. Then I’d like to be her. I’d like to be somebody.

  “She is, you are,” said Enna, as though she had heard Ani’s doubt. She touched Ani’s hand. “Thanks for not making fun of me about what I said about the fire. I know it was silly. Razo would’ve laughed.”

  “I do kind of the same thing, you know, but with the wind. Is that silly, then, too? I feel as if it’s always tugging at my ears and speaking at me kind of desperately, but I can’t hear.”

  “Yeah, that’s it,” said Enna, “that’s how I feel, too.”

  “There’s a story my aunt used to tell me that’s about, well, about a lot of things, but to me it was mostly about the wind.”

  Enna sat squarely in front of Ani and placed her hands in her lap. “You’d better tell it now, goose girl, or I’ll bother you about it till next marketday. Hey there, Bettin,” said Enna, getting the attention of another girl, “come closer. Isi’s telling a story.”

  Ani nearly blushed from the attention as the other girl joined them, but she lowered her eyes and thought about the words she would say.