I threw my arms around each of my parents, loving the feel of their hugs back, before I took a deep breath and headed out the side door and down to Ehrwnmyr’s paddock.
Ehrwnmyr stood stock still inside his gate, blocking it. Only his tail moved, swishing in irritation. I knew it was swishing in irritation because I could literally feel his irritation and anger spiking into my brain as soon as I was within his line of sight.
I was still hurt and angry at his earlier comment about only caring about my family and me because it affected him. But I knew that I’d hurt him before by not telling him everything going on that could affect his well-being. I also knew that when someone said or did something to hurt me, even if it was unintentional, my first instinct was to hurt back, which wasn’t good. And I really would like to consider myself a good person.
So, I did what I hoped a good person who wanted to mend a relationship would do. As soon as I sensed him in my head, I thought of being apologetic, and as soon as I was close enough where I didn’t have to yell, I said what I was thinking. “I’m sorry about this morning…and last night. There was a lot of awful things going on, human things, that I didn’t think you’d understand or I didn’t know how to talk about…kind of like how I didn’t think of the faery dangers you brought up this morning. I’ll tell you everything I can now.”
He shifted his weight, but didn’t move. I am listening.
“Want to eat first?”
I am not hungry. It wasn’t in words, but I recognized his feelings; he wasn’t hungry because he was too upset.
I re-explained everything to and through hearing about Joe and his family trapped in Bahrain. Then I told him how I’d wondered if I could send him to save them since he could run so fast and carry so much weight. And I told him how we decided not to, because it was more dangerous to be unprotected if that Unseelie lord that even Ermie thought was cruel and horrible attacked us here.
When I reached that last part, about sending him to rescue Joe’s family, I felt another cold jolt of emotions through my brain, so hard that I staggered away from the gate. The kelpie stomped a front leg, turned on his back legs so he was almost rearing, and started jogging in a circle. A very angry and hurt circle.
“What?” I rubbed between my eyes, which was throbbing like a brain freeze. “What did I do wrong now? I told you everything! Even about Dad.”
All of a sudden, I realized the kelpie was not just angry and hurt, but furious and betrayed. When he formed the words in my head, it was like trying to hear someone over a rubbish cell connection. His “voice” was distorted over all his emotions. You…would have sent…me…into a human…war zone!
The piercing ache in my head fell into a lump of rock in my stomach when he put it that way.
“But…you’re fast. You’ve got powers and stuff…” My voice sounded weak.
I am not fast enough to dodge bullets. Nor do they “magickally” bounce from my skin.
“I…I didn’t know.”
He lunged, with a squealing growl that was such a weird mix between horse and dog sounds it grated in my ears. Swinging around, he hammered his hind legs upon the metal gate. The heavy wooden posts on either side cracked at the hinges and latch.
I jumped backward, wondering if there was a way he really could hurt me.
NO. I. CANNOT! And his voice in my head sounded enraged at that fact. He ran in a circle, bucking.
“I’m sorry!”
He threw his back legs in my direction with another buck, snorting a deep, growling groan. I took another step back, head spinning as he sent a lot of thoughts and feelings at me, like one of those machines that spits tennis balls at you for practice, but on super-high speed. I felt myself crouching and ducking, putting my hands over my face and head as if they would protect me.
What I heard and felt weren’t words, exactly, but they triggered things in my head. I’d told him I’d never let him get hurt, that I wanted to protect him. I promised I’d let no one hurt him, and even though he’d laughed, he’d listened, and it meant something to him. I would have sent him to his death! And I hadn’t even thought of that. I hadn’t thought of him at all. It was as if he was just a thing, like the way I kept telling my dad not to think of him. I’d treated him like a slave, a thing I owned.
I. Could. Have. Killed. Him.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I wasn’t thinking!” I shouted at him as hot, guilty tears ran down my face. “I was just worried for Joe and his family, and you’re like this huge magickal thing that even Lord Cadmus and Lady Fana are kind of afraid of, and they can kill people or make them slaves just by looking at them in the eye! I’m sorry! Please, forgive me?”
Ehrwnmyr slid to a stop, facing me. What?
“Forgive me? I’m so sorry. I never want to hurt you! I wasn’t thinking. I won’t do that again! Please?”
He stared at me, snorting once, twice. His body shook, and he looked more kelpie than horse—shark-like teeth, lanky body, and a writhing mass of fur, tail, and mane. His eyes glowed brighter. After an almost-painful pause, he lowered his head and chewed.
Turning away from me, he skipped into a trot, and I felt less anger from him.
“Would…would you like me to feed you now?”
You are not sending me to a strange war-filled land to rescue the human royals?
“No. But…but…we still need your help here. In case that Unseelie lord attacks…but I don’t want you to get hurt doing that either.” I bit my lip. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt.”
Blood and brine. He snorted again and shook his body, still trotting. If nothing else, you are painfully honest, even in your naivete and foolishness.
The insult seemed tempered with an unexpected gentleness. I swallowed. “Does that mean you don’t…at least you don’t… want to hurt me now?”
He slowed to a stop and regarded me. I sensed amusement in his stare. For the moment, no, I do not wish you harm. Certainly not whilst you feed me. He tossed his head and started trotting in the other direction.
I sighed, headed into the stable, and pulled out the buckets of feeder fish, still swimming lethargically in the cold water.
I approached the gate carefully. As if he sensed my hesitation, he waited on the other side of the pen by his pond while I poured the stinky fish buckets into his trough. He went to eat after I closed the gate.
As he ate, he looked more horse-like, and I sensed the rest of his anger giving way to the contentment of a full belly. I took a few deep breaths, trying to stop my hands from shaking. Leaning my head on the cool metal of the gate, I realized how hot my whole face felt. I didn’t leave, though; maybe I could start mending things if we tried working together again. Maybe, at least, if I tried to groom him.
If I could get the courage up to let him out of his pen.
Listening to the chomping, crackling of tiny bones, and slurping, so different from the soft crunching of regular horses eating grain, I closed my eyes and focused on my breathing, letting my mind wander to what else I should tell him if I were going to be truly honest.
I must have dozed or something, because I jumped at his soft whicker, and I didn’t remember hearing him stop eating. Blinking, I looked up as he faced me. No words passed between us, but that was okay. I could feel he was willing to communicate.
“Do…do you want me to brush you and clean your hooves? And, maybe, we can just ask each other questions? About, like, anything?”
He lowered his head a little, chewing in thought.
“And we both get to say ‘I don’t want to answer that,’ and we both respect that?”
That sounds fair. He nodded his head in an equine shrug, but I could feel he was more interested than his words said.
I let him out of his pen and started cleaning his hooves, doing my best not to gag at the smell again. “You can go first.”
I finished two hooves before his question came to my mind. What do you want of me?
I stopped, holding up one of his back hooves, t
hinking. “What do you mean?”
He let out a sigh of his own. You wish me to protect your family if you fall under attack, and you would wish me not to harm myself in doing so, which I understand now, and appreciate. But that is an immediate thing. What then? You do not use your animals to plough or to work. They are… pets. I do not…I am not like them. What do you want of me?
That was still an awfully big question, and not one I had a good answer to. “I haven’t really thought about it. I just…I just don’t want you to go killing anyone. I…I would wish, I guess, for you to, I don’t know, maybe become good, and not want to kill people. And, if you didn’t want to kill people anymore, maybe we could go around and help people. You’ve got your powers and all, and maybe we could, like, rescue people who were in danger or something…does that make any sense at all?”
It makes sense when I remember you are still a child.
I scowled and dropped his hoof.
I meant no offense. You are a child. And innocent. And you think you can change what I am.
“Doesn’t it matter that you have a soul now?”
Ermie stomped his farther-away hoof. Without words, I knew it did…just that he was not happy about it.
Was that your question for me?
“Um…”
I felt and heard his actual chuckle. While it sounded rather creepy, I kind of liked hearing it. He had been teasing me. When I realized that, I couldn’t keep myself from sticking out my tongue and going pththt, which made him chuckle even more.
While I tried to gather my thoughts about what I did want to ask him, which was a million or so things, he picked his head up and looked back over his shoulder through the main door.
“What?” I asked. After a moment, I heard boots on dirt, and Mum walked into the stable.
“Hey, sweetie. Our last student is all settled in and hanging in the common room with everyone else. His mother’s on her way back to Edinburgh already, so I came to see how you’re doing.”
“Ermie is not Superman and was not happy I just assumed he could dodge or repel bullets in a war zone, but since we’re not sending him to go get Joe and his family, we moved past that and are just, kinda, talking.”
Your daughter holds out hope that my forgiveness of such callous oversight suggests that she may change me into some kind, benevolent creature who does not take joy in killing and eating humans.
You know when people say sarcasm drips from someone’s voice? Yeah, I could almost feel the sour honey dripping in my brain from the tone of his words.
Mum smirked. “So, being benevolent and dodging bullets, out of your ability range. What can you do?”
“Can that be my question, if it’s still my turn?”
I don’t know if regular horses can physically roll their eyes like humans, but kelpies definitely can.
I suppose. If I may direct my next question to your mother.
I shrugged. “Fine with me. She knows way more than I do, anyway.”
May I turn around?
I backed away, and he faced Mum, tail swishing.
I can run approximately seven leagues in the time a human can steep, but not for very long and not with extensive accuracy. With accuracy, I can run nearly ten times faster than one of your equine beasts. I can travel atop or under water at approximately half that speed. I can allow someone riding me to breathe underwater as I do. I can also carry or pull about ten times what one of your mortal equines can. And, to clarify what you were told, nearly all magick does not work upon me. Save for soul magic. He tossed his bridle-bound head. And even that must be extremely powerful to affect me.
“And you can talk in our heads, like telepathy, and sometimes with your mouth,” I added. “And your fur holds people like Velcro.”
I figured you must have realized that already, but if you require redundancy, I also can bite through human flesh and bone, I can smell blood for miles, and I can adjust how others perceive my appearance. You may have missed that, too. He tossed his head, nose wrinkled, revealing his kelpie teeth pointing towards the ceiling.
I glanced at Mum and added, “He also, clearly, has extensive powers in sarcasm and being condescending.”
Ermie tilted his head at me and looked out the corner of his eye. More extensive than your precious human brain can comprehend. With another head toss, he said, My turn. Heather’s Mother, what do you expect and desire of my being soul-bound to your daughter?
Leaning on the doorframe, Mum folded her arms, considering. He leaned into me as I started working down his neck with the brush. The tips of his tentacle fur reached to brush my fingers, as if he wanted to return the pleasure of being groomed. I was surprised that I totally, definitely, did not feel squicked out.
Mum finally answered. “The most honest answer I can give is that I expect and desire exactly the opposite of what you seem to want. I hope her soul does change you for the better. And I believe Michael would feel the same.” She paused, then added, “And you may call me Aimee, not ‘Heather’s Mother.’”
Ermie snorted hard in my mother’s direction, stomping his back hoof several times. I stepped away from him as he stretched his neck and flared his nostrils and lips in distaste.
After another shake and snort, he lowered his head, and then glanced at me. In my mind, I felt his rebellion…but I also felt he wanted me to keep grooming. And that there was more to what he actually wanted that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, but which made me feel hopeful anyway.
Your turn. I was surprised at the thought, and Mum seemed so, too. It was directed at both of us.
Mum was quicker to ask than I was. “I don’t mean to be… redundant, but are there any other powers—or weaknesses— that you haven’t mentioned to us? You can’t manipulate people with your telepathy, can you?”
He scratched the strap of his bridle against his foreleg. With this, I am specifically bound from that. Not even with Heather’s permission could I entice another against their will. Without it, I am able to…charm. To a certain degree. It is no use against anything fey or against most adults. He paused, and I felt a catch in my mind as he thought of something. With a darker chuckle, he added.
Humans, that is. I could make any mortal mare break down a fence and come to me without a thought to anything else.
I grimaced and stepped away from him. “Gross! I so didn’t need to know that!”
It annoyed me that he was entertained by my reaction. Your mother wished to know the whole truth.
“I’m sure you could have said it more delicately.” Mum frowned at him.
I could also have said it more…
He looked at me with a smug grin, something I’ve totally seen on even a normal horse’s face.
…“grossly.”
“You will leave all the mares here alone and not exert that power.” Mum squared her shoulders and sharpened her glare at him. “That is an order. Absolutely no compelling any horse on this property o-or anywhere for any reason, in any way, whatsoever.”
He curled his lips and blew an angry snort at her again.
“Heather’s command is that you obey me as you must obey her.”
I. Know.
Sulky. There was one sentiment in his mind right now, and that was sulky. I almost wanted to commiserate with him, but really, ew! I knew what he was talking about; half the mares on our property were pregnant, not counting the one whose unborn foal he’d killed before we caught him. And I knew how getting pregnant worked. Ew! I wasn’t sure I wanted to continue brushing him.
“I guess that makes it your turn to ask one of us something?” Mum pressed.
He chuffed, but I sensed his mind changing and him thinking of other things. So I started brushing him again. Have you truly not contacted the lord and lady who share this property with you? And what plans have you if we fall under attack and have not their support?
“That was two questions,” I said.
“Yes, but they’re related.” Mum was clearly feeling generous. “No.
We don’t actually know how to contact them without Tom. I have a few ideas we could try, but if we mess those up, they could take offense. Even if we don’t… Well, they might already be offended. As for plans…” She sighed. “I’m open to advice.”
Ehrwnmyr shifted his weight so the rear hoof opposite where I was brushing rested, leaning him more into the brush. After a moment, he stretched out his neck and blew through his teeth, which made me shiver because he still wasn’t making them look like horse teeth. Were I not bound to Heather, my plan would be to simply relocate. For now, anyway. And avoid this mess. And I…would otherwise prefer to stay in this region.
Mum looked at him curiously, and I could tell she was weighing her questions carefully. “So, you wouldn’t join forces with the Unseelie?”
Shifting his weight again, he tilted his head, more like a dog, and regarded my mother. While I share most of the Unseelie’s sentiments about humans, I belong to no court and offer fealty to no court or family. Besides you, of course. Heather demands my fealty to you. He took a step closer to her, lowering his head so their eyes were more level. You do know that not all fey belong to courts, right? Many choose independence. Some will make temporary contracts to support a court if it suits them to do so. The selkie clan that lives here—he tossed his head in the direction of the ocean—made a contract with the lord and lady of this area because they wanted action taken against me. That was why I destroyed the harbor. Yes, I was angry I lost the child, but it was the selkies’ contract that moved me to act against them.
“One of the selkies was there at the meeting!” I stopped brushing him, remembering the mostly human-looking woman. “Lady Arooa, or something like that.”
Ermie nodded. I’m sure they are also interested in not having Calbraith here and would willingly pledge allegiance to avoid that, too. I got a distinct sense the kelpie didn’t think much of the selkie clan.
“If we do get in contact with Lord Cadmus and Lady Fana, would you suggest we pledge allegiance to them?”
The Earl's Childe Page 11
