Graystreak spread his hands as his expression slid from greedy to innocent. “These young stallions give me no peace,” he whined. “I cast them from the herd. Some females were silly enough to follow them. They are no longer my problem.”
“You never thought they’d turn on us?” demanded the headman. “Centaur females leave males who can’t give them gifts. If you kicked young bucks out with nothing, how were they to get presents if they didn’t steal?”
Graystreak looked shocked. “I assumed their two-legger friends would warn Haresfield, since they live here. Had I known this would happen, of course I would have given warning. I prize the goodwill I have built up.” He looked at Kel again and sighed before turning to Raoul. “Since I know nothing more, I take myself off. I’m sure you will catch these brigands.” He shook his head woefully. “There will be no trade for us here for some time. I shall have to find another market.”
The headman cursed and snapped, “Fair-weather friend, aren’t you, Graystreak? When we can do business, you and your people are in and out all the time. When it looks like we’ll be months restoring what we’ve lost, you’re on your way!”
The centaur raised his brows. “My friend, I too have females. Without gifts, they attack males.” He offered his bare forearms for inspection: they were covered with old scars. “Our females can be”—he hesitated, looking at Kel once more—“overly spirited.”
She met his gaze levelly. I’ll show you how spirited human females are, you sideslipping sack of ooze, she thought.
Graystreak walked toward the gate, only to halt. Somehow Peachblossom and Raoul’s warhorse, Drum, had pulled free of their pickets. They stood between the centaur and the gate. Black Drum pawed idly at the ground, as casual as if he had stopped to graze in this bare spot. Peachblossom’s head was slightly lowered, his ears flat to his skull. He kept one eye on Graystreak.
The centaur reared to show the geldings his stallion parts, and hissed at them in his own language. Drum flicked one ear forward and the other back, all equine blandness. Peachblossom waited until Graystreak settled onto his fours, then struck, snakelike, his teeth coming together with an audible click as he missed. Graystreak scrambled to get out of range; he nearly fell.
But they’re geldings, Kel thought, flabbergasted. Geldings don’t face down stallions!
“Get these slaves out of my way,” snarled Graystreak.
“That’s the interesting thing about having the Wildmage about.” Raoul was relaxed and cheery. “Palace animals are changing. Soon most will work for us only if they want to. Some animals are further along, of course.”
More of the King’s Own mounts had freed themselves of the picket lines. They walked through the gate to stand behind Peachblossom and Drum, forming a barrier of horseflesh between Graystreak and escape.
“I told my lord the other day that horses in particular are showing a smart streak,” Flyndan added. “You’d best be careful, Chief Graystreak. Your own slaves might rebel.”
Graystreak glared at the humans, trembling with rage. “Tell them to move,” he said, his polite mask in tatters. “You’ve corrupted them! No gelding defies a stallion, not in the history of horsekind!”
“You don’t think history gets rewritten, sometimes?” Flyndan inquired mildly.
“I’ll ask them to step aside in a moment,” Lord Raoul told the centaur. “There is one thing. I know you weren’t trying to avoid the issue—I’m sure it just slipped your mind—but under your treaty, you’re required to supply a third of your people to help capture these rogues. I know you’d have remembered in a moment. Our horses just saved you the extra steps.”
Graystreak’s fists clenched. Then he smiled, his mask back in place. “Forgive me,” he said. “I was trying to decide who to send with you, and was preoccupied.”
The wagons from the palace arrived shortly before noon. Kel got to work ladling out soup in a mess tent. Raoul stood beside her to issue bread to the diners as they filed by. Only when everyone else had been served did they eat.
“You won’t get a traditional squire’s education with me,” he told her between mouthfuls of soup. “Serving refreshments in meetings, well, you’ll do that. It’s the best way for you to hear what’s said and who says it. I’ll want your impressions afterward, so be sharp. But waiting on me hand and foot is plain silly. So’s caring for my horses in the field. For one thing, I like to do it. For another, you’ll be too busy. Tend to your own mounts first.”
Kel nodded. After she swallowed a mouthful, she asked, “Why Rider Groups, my lord? Aren’t there enough of us?” He had led all one hundred warriors of Third Company into the forest that morning, not counting the servingmen.
“A different tool for a different job,” explained Raoul. Flyndan, seated across from them, made a face and nodded. “We’re conspicuous, in our blues with the pretty silver mail and all,” Raoul continued. “Our horses are big—good for open ground, slow over broken terrain and forest. Third Company does the main sweep, talking to other villages and making noise. The Rider Groups scout on our left and right flanks—our sides. Their little ponies will cover rocky terrain, marshes, and so on. The enemy will be on the move. Once we know where they are, we’ll send half the company around to their rear, to set up a trap. Then we drive ’em into it.”
“We’ve done it before,” Dom told Kel. He sat with Flyndan, polishing his empty bowl with a crust of bread. The smile he directed at Kel made her heart turn over, just as Neal’s smile did. “We clank around, make a lot of fuss, let the bandits think they’ll always be two steps ahead. Then we close the net and haul them off to royal justice.”
“They’ll have to sing a sweet song to get out of a hanging,” Raoul said grimly, picking up his empty dishes.
Kel shuddered: she hated hangings. No matter what the crime was, she saw no malice in those hooded and bound silhouettes dangling against the sky. Worse, to her mind, was the thought that the condemned knew they were to die, that a day and time had been set, that strangers planned each step of their killing.
Flyndan misunderstood her shudder. “That’s right. It’s not glamour and glory. It’s hard, mud-slogging work. If you wanted it easy, you should have taken a desk knight.”
“Stop it, Flyn,” Raoul said, his voice firm. “See her in action before you judge.”
“I know, she rallied those lads while we handled the spidren nest. You’d think she’d be over this warrior thing by now.” Flyndan carried his dishes away.
“Kel?” Raoul asked.
Kel was buttering a roll. She knew what he wanted. “I’ve heard it before, my lord.”
Raoul patted her shoulder and took his dishes to the scrubbers.
“He’s not the easiest second in command, but he’s good at it.” Kel looked up to meet Dom’s very blue eyes. “You need someone a bit stiff to offset my lord. He’s too easygoing, sometimes. Flyn will let up, once he sees this isn’t a hobby for you.”
Kel shrugged. “I don’t need to be liked, Dom. I just need to work.”
When she rose with her dishes, he did as well. “And you’ve a knack for it. I heard what you did with the spidrens, your first year. And then with the hill bandits, your second summer.”
Kel glanced up at Dom, startled. “How did you know about that?” She handed her bowl, plate, and cup to the dishwashers. One of them was Qasim. He smiled at Kel and Dom, and meekly bore a scolding from the village woman beside him, who said it took more than a swipe with a cloth to get a bowl clean.
“How did I know?” Dom asked, and chuckled. “My cousin the Meathead, remember? He wrote about both in great detail. I feel sorry for him these days, though.”
“But he’s got the Lioness for knight-master!” protested Kel.
Dom grinned down at her. “You think that’s fun? Maybe we’re not talking about the same Lioness. The one I know rides with us a lot—my lord’s one of her best friends. She’s the one with the temper. And if Neal’s learned to keep his opinions to himself, it’ll be more than any
of us were ever able to teach him.”
Kel started to argue, and changed her mind. Dom was certainly right about Neal.
“Trust me,” Dom said, resting a hand on Kel’s shoulder, “I bet he wishes right now you had his place!” He went to help some men carry a heavy beam down the street.
Kel resisted the temptation to rub the spot where Dom’s hand had rested. She needed to find work. Was she some kind of fickle monster, that Dom’s smile and touch could make her giddier than Neal’s had? Was she one of those females who always had to moon over a man? Did other girls’ emotions flop every which way? Lalasa had never mentioned it, if hers did, and she was quite good at explaining such things.
“That’s my doll.”
Kel looked down. A small girl stared up at her with accusing brown eyes. She was streaked with mud and soot; there were charred places on her skirt, but there was nothing afraid or weary in those eyes.
“I looked and looked and looked. I thought Gavan stole it because he knew I would cry. She’s my favorite.”
Kel had forgotten the doll she had cleaned and thrust into her belt. Now she gave it to its owner, who informed Kel that “Mama needs help lifting.”
“Take me to your mother, then,” Kel said.
The girl’s home was a shambles. Soot streaked the walls above the windows. Men and boys were on the roof, tearing off burned thatch as they searched for hidden fires. A figure the size of an infant lay in front of the house, covered with a cloth square.
“That’s my brother,” the girl said, her face stony. “We were running across the street. The house was on fire, and men were shooting arrows, and one hit him. He died.”
She led Kel into the house. A woman whose eyes were red and puffy from weeping struggled to right an overturned table. A toddler clutched her skirt. Kel got to work with the table while her guide took charge of the toddler. The young mother was happy for the assistance, and asked nothing of Kel past her name.
They had set the room in order and put the beds out to air when Kel heard someone yell for her. She apologized to the family and ran out, to find Lerant in the street.
“What have you been doing, rolling in muck?” he demanded scornfully, looking down his short nose at her. “Well, never mind. The Rider Groups are here, and the centaurs, the ones who are going to help search. They’re in a tent outside the main gate. My lord wants you to wait on them. The wine service is in the bags with the blue rawhide ties, with the packhorses. There’s two small kegs of wine in general supplies.” He trotted away, not giving Kel time to reply.
She drew a bucket of water from a nearby well and poured it over her head to rinse off most of the dirt. Then she went to find the supplies outside the stockade.
The packs lay on the ground. Raoul’s personal ones had his crest pressed into the leather. Those with blue rawhide ties lay beside them. She had gone through one and was opening the second when a man shouted, “Hey! You! What are you after, grubbing in the captain’s things? Get out of there!”
A servingman ran over to grab Kel’s arm. “You think you can steal whatever you like, is that it? Well—”
“Hold it, Noack,” someone interrupted. It was the burly Sergeant Osbern. “What’s this noise? They can hear you at the council tent.”
“He was in Captain Flyndan’s bags, and I’m not to squawk?” the man Noack demanded.
“Squire Keladry?” Osbern inquired. Kel nodded.
“Squire?” cried the testy Noack. “Squire or no—”
Osbern raised his eyebrows. Noack went silent and let go of Kel.
“I was told my lord’s wine service was here, and that I should bring it and the wine to the council tent,” Kel said evenly. “I didn’t know those were Captain Flyndan’s bags.”
“Who told you?” the sergeant inquired.
Obviously Lerant was having fun at her expense, but she would keep that to herself. “One of the men, Sergeant,” she replied. “I don’t know the names yet.”
Osbern pursed his lips. “Too bad, because I would have a thing or two to say to that man,” he told Kel, his voice dry. “It isn’t just the captain’s bags, Squire Keladry. My lord doesn’t drink spirits, and he doesn’t serve them. He says he had a problem as a young man, so he doesn’t care to have liquor about. Captain Flyndan likes a glass or two. He serves it in his tent, but only when my lord isn’t there. A water service will do today.”
Kel nodded and found the pitcher, tray, and cups in Raoul’s general supplies. The company mages had declared the town’s wells to be clean, with no sickness in them. Kel used the well nearest the gate to fill her cups and pitcher, then carefully took the whole into the council tent.
Its sides were raised to accommodate five centaurs, who stood with the humans around a large table on which maps had been placed. These were younger than Graystreak, and looked to be in their twenties and thirties, though with centaurs it was hard to tell. Their youth lasted for two centuries; like other immortals, they never aged past mature adulthood. Unless an immortal was killed by accident or in a fight, she or he might live forever.
There were four human newcomers in plain white shirts, brown tunics and trousers, and riding boots. They wore the emblem of the Queen’s Riders, a crimson horse rearing on a bronze-colored field, circled by a ring. One Rider wore a crimson ring around his badge, the sign of a Rider Group commander. Two wore a crimson ring with a thin black stripe in the middle: they were second in command. The Riders had a looser command structure and did not follow traditional military rankings.
The fourth Rider was a woman with golden brown skin and straight black hair. She was five inches shorter than Kel, with a short nose, firm mouth, and level black eyes. She was stocky and muscular. Her hair, braided tightly back from her face, framed high cheekbones and a square chin. The ring around her Rider insignia was gold.
Kel blinked, surprised. As she set cups before the guests, she eyed the Commander of the Queen’s Riders. Buriram Tourakom—Buri, as she was known—was as famed as Lord Raoul or the Lioness. She’d been made full commander during the Immortals War, when Queen Thayet, the previous commander, had seen she was too busy as queen to serve the force she had created. Buri had been Thayet’s guard before she was queen; she had been co-commander since the Riders’ creation, and had done most of the everyday work in the company. She was a ferocious fighter, armed or unarmed. No one tangled with her, given a choice. When Kel placed a cup before her, Buri murmured her thanks.
Once everyone was served, Kel stood at ease behind Raoul and listened. These centaurs, three females and two males, were very different from Graystreak. They were eager for the hunt and the fight to come.
The meeting ended late. Kel fought yawns as she followed Raoul to the inn where he, Buri, and Flyndan had been given rooms. While the inn was largely intact, the scent of smoke filled it from cellar to garret. Kel didn’t care; neither did the others, she suspected. The men and Buri went to their rooms immediately. As Raoul’s squire Kel opened her bedroll in front of his door. The sparrows protested this odd way to sleep, but found places around Jump. Kel was pulling off her boots when someone down the hall whispered, “Pst!”
She looked up, squinting. The wall lamp was nearly out of oil; its flame barely cast any light.
“Pst!”
Kel unsheathed her sword and walked toward the noise, stockinged feet silent on the wooden boards. If she had to go out of sight of Raoul’s door, she would wake him. This could be an attempt to draw her off, an attempt on his life.
The attempt was only Lerant, standing at the top of the stairs. “What do you want?” Kel demanded, in no mood to be polite. She wanted to sleep.
He glared at her. Kel turned to go back to her bed. “No, wait!” he whispered.
She turned back as she considered smacking him with the flat of her sword to teach him respect. Such thoughts only told her how bone-tired she was. Normally the idea would never occur to her.
“Why didn’t you tell?” Lerant kept his voice
low.
“Tell what?” she asked, her own voice barely audible.
“Come on. I heard Osbern set you straight. You didn’t tell him who steered you to the packs, or he’d’ve had me up before Flyn.”
“You couldn’t ask in the morning?” she demanded, cross.
“I want to know now!”
Kel sighed. “I don’t tell on people,” she said. “Good night.” She walked back down the hall, sheathed her sword, and crawled into bed.
four
OWLSHOLLOW
If the Haresfield renegades were new to forest robbery, the centaurs and other humans with the band were not. Lord Wyldon had taught the pages much about tracking, but the next two weeks saw Kel’s education expand ferociously. Whenever the robbers could mask their trail by walking in streams and over rocks, they did. It reached the point where the hunters moaned at a glimpse of water or a patch of stone. The robbers often split into five or six groups to confuse their trackers.
The centaurs used magic to hide their passage and their appearance in scrying crystals. They buried or hid loot so it wouldn’t slow them down. The Riders found two caches; Dom’s squad found a third. Everyone knew more was hidden away, because the bandits attacked every village they could, no matter how slim the pickings. In one village they sold loot from other raids, taking it back with everything else of value when they struck that night.
Clean clothes became a delirium dream. Kel washed hers cold and wore them wet, thanking the gods she didn’t get sick easily. She learned why Raoul had said she would do few of the things that squires normally did for knights. She barely had the strength to care for their mounts and weapons. Waiting on him as he ate and putting out his clothes for the morning would be ridiculous.
On the ninth day they ran out of the lotion that repelled insects. Lord Raoul growled under his breath and sent a party to the palace for supplies, for Riders and centaurs as well as Third Company.
By and large Kel thought the centaurs who hunted with them were decent people. They worked hard and never complained.
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