by Alisha Basso
Lauren sipped her tea, grateful for the steam, hoping it hid her confusion. “Battle scar?”
The young woman traced a line along her belly.
Lauren went hot all over. Just how thoroughly had these women inspected her? Had they reported their findings to the Supreme Guardian? Had he been there? A wave of lightheadedness swept through her at the thought.
“Appendectomy,” she said, explaining the surgery. Battle scar, indeed. Life in this place would be…bigger.
Artepa nodded but looked dubious. “New boots for you, Lady Horsecaller.”
She held out a pair of dark-brown, suede boots with deep cuffs at the top. Gracing the outside edge of each cuff a small horse’s head had been carved.
Lauren pulled them on. They fit perfectly. “These are beautiful, but, how?”
“When the Supreme Guardian orders something, it is done,” Artepa said.
“Remind me to express my undying gratitude to his Supreme Guardianship,” Lauren muttered.
From a shadow in the doorway came his deep voice, a voice that expected obedience. “Readying yourself and your horse quickly will be thanks enough, Lady Horsecaller.”
Yes, she needed to get ready. Good, now she could get going. Surely they would take her back to the portal now they had figured out—must have figured out—this was all a mistake.
Oh, but why did she feel such a disappointed tug inside? And such warmth when Leinos spoke to her? She put down her mug and looked for her tack, finding it neatly stacked along with her clothes, but took a moment to check on Pindar instead of immediately readying him.
He munched hay and paused to prod her sides for treats when she went into the stall with him. She ran her hands all over his body, but he was fine, thank goodness. Her brother would be relieved when she returned the valuable stallion to his stable.
Other than a dull ache, her legs felt fine, too. She didn’t remember much about the night before, but she knew a bird-man’s claws has slashed her boots open, and there’d been a lot of blood—hers—but Vraz had done something to heal the wounds. She supposed she should thank him…
Leinos looked at her over the stall door. “We must go.”
“You’re taking me to that portal-thing, right?”
“No, not the Ravery. To Lerom, our capital,” he answered. “The Queen.”
“Am I a prisoner?”
“Not at all, my lady,” Vraz said too quickly.
“An honored guest,” Leinos added.
“Well, thank you for your hospitality, but I have to go back where I belong.”
She tried to look firm without causing offense. One night in this strange place was enough. She had to go home. Because…this was not her home.
Fear wallowed in Lauren’s gut. Not only fear of this place, although the attack by the bird-men the day before still cast a dark shadow. There was something else—alongside the fear crouched a deep longing for—what?
Staying? How could she be afraid to go and afraid to stay all at the same time? Or long to go and long to stay all at once? It didn’t make sense. She leaned on the wall as a wave of dizziness swept over her. Conflicting emotions robbed her self control. She prided herself in her control. In her ability to keep things small. This was all too big. And it was getting bigger every moment.
The Guardian joined her in the stall and put a steadying hand on her arm. “Do you need help?”
She shook her head and stepped away from him, breathing deep to regain her composure. He didn't release her. The layers of borrowed clothes became the sheerest silk. His warm hand trapped her arm, his touch a caress that sent shivers of awareness along every inch of her skin.
A young boy squeezed past Leinos into the stall. “Take me with you,” he said.
Leinos turned the boy around and gently pushed him out. “No.”
“Malek,” Ramela said to the boy, shaking her head. “We already discussed this. The Supreme Guardian said no.”
The boy peered through the door at them. His tousled blond curls framed earnest blue-green eyes. “Please.”
Lauren exhaled hard through her nose before speaking. Some things were the same everywhere. Nobody got to have everything they wanted when they wanted it. “I think he’s right about this. You should stay here with your family.”
From close behind her ear, Leinos whispered, “Thank you for that hearty vote of confidence, Lady Horsecaller.”
His breath fanned her inflamed skin, but did nothing to cool it. What on earth was happening to her? Oh, right, she wasn’t on Earth.
Ramela shooed the the boy out of the stall. She produced a large folded garment from behind her back, then shook it out and draped it over Lauren’s shoulders. A long, fur-lined cloak swept the ground.
“I made this quickly,” she said. “But it will keep you warm. The mountains are cold this season.”
Soft fur tickled Lauren’s cheek. Around the edges, tooled horses danced and played. The young woman might have made it quickly, but the artistry was exquisite, and it certainly would be warm. Clearly these people didn’t know how to take “no” for an answer.
“I can’t accept this,” she said. What mountains? she wondered.
Through the thick leather, Leinos touched her arm and leaned near again. “You insult her if you refuse.”
She swatted his hand and he moved away, but a teasing smile played at one corner of his mouth. It made her stomach tilt and left her off-balance, as if the ground had shifted. She grasped Pindar’s mane to steady herself.
Belatedly, she remembered her manners. “Thank you,” she called as Ramela bowed and left the barn, towing a reluctant Malek behind her. The boy kept his eyes on the horse until he and his mother disappeared around a corner. Lauren knew that feeling. She never wanted to leave the stable, either.
Pheeso and Artepa stood in front of Pindar’s stall. Each leaned on a long staff, had a small crossbow hanging from their belt, a pack slung over one shoulder and a quiver of blue-fletched arrows over the other. Their leather cloaks were travel worn and undecorated. Pheeso handed Lauren a second staff he held.
“You will need your own. I made a strap for you to carry it as you ride. When we have time, I will train you to use it.”
The smooth staff had substance without weight. Maybe she could learn to use the fighting stick when she got home. That would bring a little spice to her dull existence.
She put down the stick and fetched her tack. While she readied Pindar, Leinos took up his things. The crone was not with them, but Vraz stood near, his cloak glowing softly in the cold morning air. She sensed their eagerness to go. Like Steven’s dog, Jack, who whined softly whenever a horse was being tacked up, hoping someone would take him on a trail ride.
Could she dart past them? They wouldn’t hurt her but would try to stop her. And if she did get by them? Then what? Could she find her way to the Ravery? What if those flying bird-men were there?
She had to chance it.
“Why the rush?” She tried to sound offhand but fumbled the saddle billets three times before getting the girth buckled.
Leinos settled his cloak before answering. “You must call the horses before it is too late.”
“I can’t do that.” She gritted her teeth, yanked the girth, and Pindar nipped her side. With a soothing murmur to the horse, she insisted, “I’m not your Horsecaller, whatever that is. Why don’t you call them yourself?”
“You are the Horsecaller,” Vraz said.
The sage. She couldn’t trust him as far as she could throw him. He had tricked her into coming here with some sort of mind control. He wasn’t using it now, she was fairly certain. She’d gone into a fog the day before after mounting Pindar. The rest was a little fuzzy until they’d landed here. She would recognize that foggy feeling if he tried it again. He would be the toughest one to get around. Could she distract them?
“Our country has been under the subjugation of a king of Tinnis since the conquest,” Leinos said. “We need our horses to right th
e balance of power.”
Lauren slipped Pindar’s bridle onto his head.
“You want the horses so you can go to war?”
Pindar seemed to follow the conversation, looking from her to the others with his ears pricked. He mouthed the bit, making the hardware clink with soothing familiarity.
The Supreme Guardian stared at her, the force of his will buffeting her like a gust of wind.
“We need them. To live.” He paused as if fearing he’d said too much. When he spoke again, his words came slowly, almost a whisper. “We need you, Lauren, if we are to survive. If you leave—”
“It won’t come to war if you call them soon,” Vraz said, sounding impatient. “Call the horses. You can leave when next the Ravery opens.”
Leinos stared at the sage for a long moment, then turned a bleak look to her. There was nothing of the lightness or teasing from before. If she were staying, she’d work to bring that smile to light more often. She pushed all that aside and focused on getting away.
The heavy stall door creaked loudly when she pushed it open. The two men made room and argued over whether she could stay or go. But she already knew the answer to that question. She double-checked the girth as she cleared the barn door, clucked to Pindar as she put her foot in the stirrup, and they were already trotting as she swung into the saddle. She pointed him in what she hoped was the right direction, and booted him into canter.
There were shouts, but she didn’t slow. They clattered down a stone-paved street, through an arch, and over a bridge spanning a deep gorge. Finally, dirt—good for galloping. They took off. The others wouldn’t catch her.
For a few minutes she savored the feel of the magnificent horse rolling beneath her and settled into it, melding with him as if they were one.
At the top of a rise, she reined him in, remembering when she and the Supreme Guardian had stopped here the night before, when she had seen two moons rising, when he had asked to touch the horse. To touch a horse for the very first time. The wonder in his face when he had put his hand against Pindar’s warm neck had sent her back to her childhood, when she had felt that very same way each time she was around the gentle creatures.
What did Leinos mean, they needed the horses—and her—to live? To survive. Why had he looked so desolate? Yesterday, before bringing her here, Vraz had said his life would not be too high a price to pay for a horse. But what could she do to help them? It didn’t matter. She had a life somewhere else, and people who depended on her there.
Not much of life, and not many people, but…
She heard boots pounding the ground, coming faster than she’d thought they would.
Her heart hammered her ribs and a cold sweat lifted the fine hairs on the back of her neck, a feeling she got when she realized she was making a huge mistake. The thought of leaving made her ill. No, it was the idea of staying.
She urged Pindar forward, but for the first time in his life, he refused her. No, the second time. He’d resisted the day before when she’d tried to pull him through the Ravery. The shock of it took her breath.
She snatched up the reins and kicked him. “C’mon!”
Pindar took a step, stopped.
“I’ll leave you here you vile beast,” she whispered, knowing she couldn’t. She kicked him again, and again, panic closing her throat, bringing hot tears to her eyes. “Please!”
They were nearly upon her. She vaulted off, put all her weight against the reins, then let go and started running.
Leinos tackled her, knocking the wind from her and banging her forehead against the ground. She fought him, knowing she wouldn’t win. In a moment, he had them righted, had her cradled in his arms and was stroking the hair from her face and asking if she was hurt.
“Please,” she sobbed when she caught her breath, hearing the hysteria in her voice and not caring. “It’s too dangerous.” A hoarse, unconvincing rasp. “I have to go.”
“Shhh,” he soothed. “You cannot. It is dangerous for you to try to leave.”
“You can’t make me stay.” But he could. He would. His arms enclosed her like steel bands, but there was gentleness, too, and beneath it all his unflinching will. She had no weapon against any of that.
She’d had her eyes squeezed shut, but she opened them now, not caring how she looked, knowing her nose was red and running and her eyes were puffy, and why was she thinking about how she looked at a moment like this? His face was very close, and in his eyes she saw the hope, a great deal of hope, enough for an entire nation. With a great lurch in her chest, she realized he was the most dangerous element of this place for her.
“This isn’t my home.” A futile argument. A moot point. Repeating it changed nothing.
He nodded slightly, as if reading her thoughts. “It will be all right. I will protect you.”
“You can’t.”
He couldn’t protect her from her own heart, and she couldn’t put a name to what she feared. His scent still held that hint of pine, layered now with clean straw and soap. He’d bathed since the night before.
“This isn’t my home,” she persisted. Her beseeching prayer wouldn’t be answered, and she felt herself giving in, but she went on. “I don’t belong here.”
His coppery eyes searched hers for a long moment. “What if it is?” he asked. “What if you do?”
Chapter 8
QUEEN Naele of Cirq counted her steps. Fifteen paces from one side of her receiving room to the other. Repeating the exercise calmed her racing mind. If the news sent by Supreme Guardian Leinos were true—
The guards announced Chancellor Seyah. The woman glided in silently, bowing when she reached Naele. Seyah’s boots left wet prints across the stone floor from traversing the palace’s frozen bridges, and she bore the same pinched look she always did when it was dark and cold and wet. As it had been nothing but dark and cold and wet in Lerom for too many cycles of the seasons to remember, the wan and perpetually annoyed expression seemed to have become irreversible.
It had not always been so.
“Seyah,” the queen began with false cheeriness. “You wear the waiting season better than most.”
“Thank you, my Queen. I rest and reflect. Even in this season, the palace gardens offer tranquillity. Walking in them is most soothing.”
Naele smiled thinly at the banal lie. She had no expectation of honesty from anyone, least of all her scheming chancellor. Should she tell her the news she had received? If only there were someone to talk to. Once—was it really so long ago?—she could discuss anything with Seyah. There had been trust. There had been warmth. Some long-lost feeling threatened to catch in her throat.
Naele breathed past the lump, released it, and reached instead for the iron force at her core. She was queen. No one had said it would be one long fête.
No one had informed her it would be a sentence of solitary confinement, either.
And no one could have predicted the swiftness with which the decline of their country had occurred. The sages and crones had alluded, they had hinted, but never precisely warned.
She decided to skip the niceties.
“I have a message from the Supreme Guardian.”
Naele watched Seyah draw to attention. Leinos communicated via messenger only when…never. The potential gravity of the news was not lost on Seyah. The chancellor might be scheming, but not stupid.
“Will you share this news with your chancellor?”
Naele considered. There was a time when she would have let Seyah read the note herself and together they would have puzzled out its meaning over a pot of tea. Now, the weary queen realized she should not have mentioned it. She crumpled the tiny scrap of parchment in her fist and hid it in a fold of her tunic.
Disappointment and malevolence prowled the corners of the chancellor’s mouth before she arranged her features into bland indifference.
“I must be gone for…a short time,” Queen Naele said. She should not have said a word. Could not shake long habit. Should she stoop to
sneaking around in the dark? No. The end might be near, but she would stay in the light until then.
“Lerom is in your hands until I return,” she said.
Lust flickered in Seyah’s cool gray eyes. Would this be when she made her move? Naele embraced the thought. She welcomed a fight. Even if there was precious little left to fight for.
She waited for Seyah to leave, which her Chancellor did after a fleeting hesitation. Had she wanted to say something but thought better of it?
A memory darted through Naele’s mind. The two of them racing through the forest together, young, joyous, their feet barely touching the ground. Golden sunlight sifted by green leaves, the tang of the ocean pulling them down the bluffs to the beach.
She dropped the Guardian’s message into the small brazier in the center of the room. The greasy parchment caught, curled, and sent up a thin cylinder of yellow smoke.
There is a chance, it said. Send them.
Chapter 9
LAUREN sulked. She hated herself for it, but couldn’t help it. They’d been riding all day.
Well, she rode, they tirelessly walked, or jogged, Supreme Guardian Leinos out in front setting the pace, followed by her and Pindar, with Vraz the sage and the other two guardians, Pheeso and Artepa, bringing up the rear.
They glanced over their shoulders and scanned the sky too often for her liking, but no bird-men came. For that matter, there were no birds at all. The barrenness of the landscape matched the leaden sky, as bleak as the look the Supreme Guardian had given her back at Raver’s Keep when he said they needed the horses to live.
What did it mean? Leinos never once looked at her or anyone else. He drove relentlessly forward and up. Up into steep, rocky mountains. No one spoke. Saving their breath in the thinner and thinner air of high altitude. They’d barely stopped for lunch, and the meager rations of stale bread, hard cheese, and dried fruit had scarcely taken the edge off her hunger.
