“Stop!” the horse had neighed, but in the language horses learned with men, not their own wild language.
The princess stopped, but did not turn back. There was something in the way that she held her head and spine that Fierce recognized as rebellion. She was not used to being commanded, and especially not by a horse.
But this was the horse she had traveled for years to find, and come from many thousands of miles away to search for. He was obviously dear to her.
Fierce could see concentration on her face, and anger.
But the horse was persistent, and neighed at her again, as before.
“I am a princess. I will do what I please. I have always done what I please, with or without you,” said the princess, still with her back to the horse. But her head had turned slightly to the side, as if to peek at him.
The horse answered by trying to raise itself despite its broken foreleg. It made a terrible sound of pain as it thrust its hind legs back to give it the power to surge forward.
The princess turned. Her face was as naked as Fierce had ever seen it. Her eyes blazed and her mouth was very red. Her dark skin shone with sweat. “Don’t!” she said, putting out a hand.
The horse slowed, but continued to limp forward. It showed pain only in the way it held its body, muscles quivering, tail held high as the princess’s neck had been. There was no fear on its face at all, and Fierce knew fear well because it was on the face of all the others there.
No one else hoped to stop the princess with her wild magic. But the horse did.
“There is something wrong with that horse,” said Red in a whisper. He had come back to Fierce now that the immediate danger to Sanna seemed to be past.
“Its leg is broken,” said Fierce.
“Yes,” said Red, sighing. “But there is something else wrong with it.”
“It has lived too long with humans,” said Fierce. “First with the princess and then with Lord Ahran.”
“That could be,” said Red. But he did not sound convinced.
The horse neighed softly. “Come back,” it said.
The princess did not, though she held herself still and did not move forward.
It was not enough for the horse. The sound of its dragging foreleg came again to Fierce’s ears and she wanted to look away, but she could not.
“You will tear your leg off!” the princess cried out.
There was blood seeping from the wound again and Fierce thought that if the princess wanted to heal the horse’s leg, she surely could. If she could change an animal into a human, she could surely mend a broken leg. But she had chosen not to. To keep the horse broken, and her own.
“I won’t let you go away from me again,” said the princess. “And I won’t let you die.”
The horse took another horrible, lurching step forward.
The princess ran to him, threw her arms around his neck and pressed magic into him. But still she did not heal him completely. “Mine,” she murmured.
The horse turned its head away from her and Fierce thought of how much the princess was like Cruel.
“The worms,” said Red at Fierce’s side. “We must ask her what she knows of them, and how to stop them.”
“Yes,” said Fierce. The princess knew something about the Xaon. She must be made to tell them, and to see that her wild magic was helping it, somehow.
Chapter Ten:
The princess left the horse where he was and stood up to stare at Fierce. “You have returned, as well,” she said. Then she turned to Red. “I do not know you. Yet here you are with me and mine.”
He shook his head. “I am not yours,” he said.
“Shall I make you mine, then?” she said in a threatening tone. “What shape would you like best? You could be anything. A heron. A boar. A mink. Even a hound.”
Fierce went stiff with fear. She could not allow the princess to use her wild magic on Red. But how could she stop her?
The princess bent closer to Red and sniffed him. “You smell like a hound,” she said. She turned to Fierce and smiled. “Would you not like to see him as a hound? I think he would like it very much. A hound’s body is far superior to a human when it comes to hunting, and I think he would like to be a great hunter.” She held out a hand.
“No,” Fierce choked out.
“I think I should ask him what he wants. You. Boy. Man. Whatever it is you think you are. Would you like to be a hound? I think you would make a very fine one. A hound with red hair is a rare and beautiful thing here. Like a fox, but larger and more powerful. Think of all the burdens that would be gone if you gave up that human cloak.”
The horse made a noise behind the princess.
“I said I would ask him first,” she called back. Then to Red she said, “You are like me, do you know that? I see it in your eyes, the same loneliness. You have no parents, do you? No loved ones who hold you back?”
Red looked at Fierce. “Leave me be,” he said.
The princess let out a long breath and Fierce was suddenly sure that Red would come to no harm from her, not today.
She said softly but with more emotion than Fierce had ever heard from her before, “My mother died at my birth. My father died when I was a child. And all those who knew me in my home—they are all gone by now. It has been so long since I went home. I think I am more animal than human myself now, and that is why I keep so many animals at my side and spend so much time in the forests.”
“What you have lost, you can regain,” said Red gently. “If you wish it.”
The princess’s eyes flashed for a moment, then she shook her head and smiled. “You are young enough to believe that still. But I have lived too long.”
“Your horse. You have it back,” said Red. “Is that not proof that there is always hope?”
The princess looked to the horse. “He hates me now.”
“You are wrong,” said Red.
But just then the momentary peace of the forest was broken by the sound of hounds racing nearby. Fierce saw a flash of fur, and then looked up to see a light-colored doe. The hounds were chasing her, directly into the path of the princess, and toward the horse.
The doe slipped past the horse, but the princess looked up to see the hounds barreling toward her horse. The princess raised her hands.
Then Fierce recognized the wolf-hound and the two golden hound, racing at the princess. Fierce opened her mouth so shout a warning, but it was too late.
The princess had transformed the hounds to protect the horse.
A woman and two men, naked, fell to the ground, staring about them in astonishment.
To Fierce it was as if she had been transformed herself a second time. She could see it all more clearly now, from the outside. The surprise, the realization, the fear. She felt as if she were falling from a great height, and did not know when she would hit bottom.
“Steady,” said Red at her side.
It was enough to keep her upright. And to make her wonder how she could help these new humans who had been hounds.
The female was thin and tall, as tall as the princess herself, but with golden skin and golden hair that flowed down her back from the top of her head. She turned around quickly and opened her mouth. She caught sight of Fierce and seemed ready to bark, but the sound came out stifled and wrong. Human.
The male was a mirror image of her, but for the scar that ran from his scalp down his chin and across his breast. It had been much less visible as a hound.
The former wolf-hound was shorter than the other two, but he was more muscular and he had dark black hair all over his body. He looked down at his own arms and flexed them. Then he ran immediately at the princess.
He might have strangled her if the horse had not stopped him. Though this did not take much effort, since the new human was not easy with his new body. The horse simply moved to the side and the bulk of its body caused the former wolf-hound to stumble.
Then the horse looked directly into the face of the new human and growled. I
t was a strange sound, Fierce thought, coming from a horse. And the intense look of anger was more like the face of a bear suddenly. The horse’s mouth spread to show its teeth and it made a low sound in its throat that had nothing to do with the language of horses. Then the horse nipped at the human’s backside.
The former wolf-hound yelped and retreated toward Fierce and the other two newly made humans.
The princess put her hand to the horse’s head. “Thank you,” she said, smiling gently.
The horse threw its head back and snarled at her nearly as badly as it had at the human, but it did not bite her.
“Look,” said Red urgently, and pointed to the ground where the hounds had been transformed.
Growing wider as moments passed was a crack in the earth, and Fierce had no doubt that there would soon be tiny worms crawling out of it. She could feel the Xaon nearby here, dark and empty and threatening. Did the princess not feel it? Did she not realize this had happened twice before? What would Fierce have to do to prove it to her?
It was near dark then, and the princess declared it time to prepare for the night. They camped just away from the fissure, and Fierce watched it carefully, wondering when the worms would come out and if the princess would then begin to think of ways to close the fissure. Fierce had not had a chance to see how large this one was, but she did not think it was smaller than the other.
Fierce found a blanket that the princess had in one of her packs. She tore it into pieces and divided it between the three new humans. It was not much, but it was all she had to offer them now that they had lost their fur. Fierce could hear them shivering and whimpering through the night, while she tried to keep herself warm by curling next to a hollowed out tree.
Red slept apart from them, and she could see him rise in the night several times, as well, disturbed by the sounds of the animals he had brought with him, knowingly exposing them to the princess’s wild magic. Fierce could see the weight of something on his shoulders. She searched for the right human word, and could only think that it must be guilt. He felt that it was his fault this had happened, though it was the princess’s wild magic that had done it. Fierce did not understand it, but she could see it was true, and she pondered it.
In the morning, the princess roused the former wolf hound with a kick to the side before Red started awake and stood. The princess commanded the wolf hound to start a fire and strode away.
“I will help you with it,” offered Red.
But the former wolf hound snarled at Red, too stubborn to admit that he did not know how to do it. In the end, he burned himself almost exactly as Fierce had done, her first day as a human, touching the burning coals with his bare hands.
“Oh!” said Fierce. She hurried to his side and pulled him to a nearby pond, ignoring his complaints. The water was brackish, but cool. She pushed his hands into the water and when he tried to fight her, she slapped his face.
“Do as I say,” she said in the language of hounds. She held his face in hers until he looked away, cowed.
In a few minutes, she took his hands out again. There were blisters all down the fingers to the palm.
Fierce licked at the burns to cleanse them.
The former wolf-hound tried to howl in pain, but it was a pitiful imitation.
Fierce did not know what else to do to help him, however. If he would not take care of himself, he would get dirt in his wounds and that would be his death.
“He needs moss,” said Red, behind her.
“Moss?” said Fierce, turning.
“I think I saw some in the pond. I will fetch it and bring it back. Just hold him still for a few minutes, if you will.” Without hesitation, Red dived into the water and paddled toward the center of the pond. He dove under the surface and came back up.
Fierce thought how different his face looked when his hair had been slicked back and turned dark with water and pond scum. His eyes shone out of his face and his skin looked scarred rather than freckled. He looked older and more dangerous, with his intent expression.
He had a handful of the moss and then back to her, his head above the water most of the way, meeting her gaze and matching it. “Here it is,” he said, when he stood and the water came up to his shins. He slogged closer to her.
The water made his shirt and trousers cling to him so that Fierce could see every line of his muscles and bones. He was sparsely made, and he had not been pampered by his years with Lord Ahran. She had once seen a wolf who reminded her of Red. It had been from a distance, and he had only passed by and had not stopped. Wolves generally considered themselves above wild hounds and did not speak with them, though the language of wolves and the language of hounds were very similar.
“Put the moss on the burns,” said Red. “On his hands. They will heal faster and the moss will soothe the pain.”
Fierce did so, and wished that Red had been there with her, when her hands had been burned.
But the wolf-hound who was now a human sniffed disdainfully at the moss and seemed about to take it off.
“No,” said Red sharply in the language of the hounds.
Fierce took the hands tight in her own and pressed the moss into them. “This is a fight you will lose,” she said, her nose nearly touching his, her eyes unwavering. “You are not well. When you are strong again, then you may fight me. And him.” She nodded to Red. “If you wish it.”
The human lowered his head and the tension went out of his shoulders.
“You must have a name,” said Fierce. She had not asked before because he was not part of her pack and it seemed an improper demand to ask him to share such an intimate thing with her. But it was different now. If they were not pack, they were as close to pack as humans could be. And names among humans did not mean the same thing in any case.
“I am Feersha,” she said, using her human name. She turned her head to the side automatically, as a hound would have, to show her vulnerable side and to allow herself to be sniffed.
The wolf-hound did not seem to notice. “The Lord human called me King.”
“He called half his hounds that,” said Red.
“What is the name that you called yourself in the wild? Surely you remember that much,” Fierce coaxed him.
“I was once known as Hunter,” he said quietly, as if he was not quite sure.
“Hunter, then. That is a good name,” said Fierce.
“It is the name of a hound,” said Hunter sadly.
“You will be a hound again,” promised Fierce.
He looked up at her with sudden hope, then turned away with a sigh. “No. I will not. None of us will. We will be humans until we die.”
“If you are a hunter, then you must not give up,” said Fierce. She had not expected the wolf-hound, of all of them, to be so easily discouraged. But he was perhaps most disgusted by becoming human.
“We shall see,” he said. “But if there comes a time when I can kill her, you must know I will not hesitate.” He nodded toward the princess.
“She may turn you back with her wild magic,” said Fierce. “But only if you let her live.”
He shook his head. “She has done this. And she must pay for it. That is all that I know.”
It was a warning and Fierce took it seriously. Hunter might look human, but inside he had the heart of a wolf-hound still. The princess would do well not to forget that.
Chapter Eleven:
The princess pressed them to go further south, though the horse had to be nearly carried by humans and other animals. When they stopped for the night, all fell into a sound sleep.
The next day, just after the princess had come out of her tent to see to the horse, there was a strange rustling in the trees facing the north.
Fierce felt Red’s hand on hers. “Look, there.” He pointed to a place in the trees behind them, where the fissure was partially hidden by the dim morning light.
Then there was movement and Fierce took in a sudden breath at the sight of a white, shining shape, like a young buck wi
th just the beginnings of antlers on his head.
In one way, it was a beautiful thing. It moved with the grace of a real buck, and the shape was just right. But even if it were the right color, the expression of the face was dull and slack. Only the eyes showed life. They were not white, but red and there was a terrible menace in them. And its antlers were growing with every moment, a hundred times as fast as any real creature could.
Xaon, thought Fierce.
“It has come from the fissure,” said Red.
“Yes,” said Fierce. She watched the white buck closely to see what it would do. And what the princess would do against it, who had only just stepped out of her tent? She had the wild magic. She was surely the only one who could stop it.
The white buck lowered its antlers.
The princess had her back to it, and Fierce thought that she would be caught unaware. She opened her mouth to give a warning, but Hunter put his hand over her lips and held them tightly.
Red called out, however. “Danger!”
The princess turned and saw the buck. There was no hint of fear on her face. She flicked her wrist and something—some power—came out of her. Fierce could not see it, but she could see the result of it. The buck changed color, from white to the normal brownish-gold of a real buck.
Then the buck’s head fell, and it stopped. It took a few steps to the side, seeming ready to go back into the forest. Perhaps there was no need to attack it at all?
No.
There was a shimmering in the air and inch by inch, from its hind hooves to its hind quarters and then slowly up its back, it turned white and shining once more.
Whatever the princess had done, it was not enough.
The buck’s red eyes looked once toward Fierce, and then focused on the princess and it charged her too quickly for her to react a second time.
The Princess and the Horse (The Princess and the Hound) Page 7
