by Robert Brady
Shela clicked her tongue. “You’re no blushing virgin,” she said. “I don’t suppose you think that it will rub off?”
Raven laughed and Shela laughed with her.
“I want to ride!” Lee protested.
“I want to ride, too!” Vulpe joined her. He was already running toward his gelding, Marauder.
“You will not,” she informed them. “Nina!”
“Mind your sister, Lee,” Nina ordered the young girl. At her thirteenth spring, Lee, stiffened as if she meant to defy her nanny. Shela expected the girl to assert herself—she’d never be a proper sorceress if she couldn’t be her own woman. However Lee’s upbringing hadn’t made of her the equestrienne her mother was and one bucking stallion could start a whole herd.
“Ninaaaaaaa—” Lee whined.
“Ha ha!” her brother tormented her.
“You can’t ride either,” Lee shot back at him.
The boy bridled and Nina stiffened.
“There’s an Uman-Chi scrubbing dumpsters, young ruler,” Nina warned him. “She could use someone to help her.”
Vulpe’s eyes widened and Shela pressed her lips together to suppress a smile. Nina always came up with ways to discipline the children that would never have occurred to her. She turned her back on the group of them and went searching for Little Storm.
An entire section of the Imperial stables were reserved for Blizzard and his get. Another open-air corral outside of the city walls served for those they’d given up on. Right now there was a grey stallion belonging to young Hectaro Gelgeldin, a chestnut mare which Shela herself had hopes for, Blizzard and Little Storm.
Shela crossed the stables to that section. The horse she sought stood still as a statue in his paddock. All of these horses were over-large and had stalls and paddocks twice the size of other horses. All of them were steel-reinforced, and in each case it was pointless. Any of them could leap their paddock wall without trying hard.
“He’s such a magnificent animal,” Raven sighed, leading her mare by its halter. Nina followed behind with the children, Lee now carrying little Chawny.
“Mmmm,” Shela agreed, studying the stallion with the trained eye of an Andaran plainswoman.
She knew this horse. Where some saw a sullen animal, she’d always seen a coiled spring. When he’d dragged his first rider to death, Shela alone hadn’t been surprised. She’d wept for that man, a brother Andaran who left her own tribe to be a Wolf Soldier. She’d known him for a long time and he’d been a great rider.
Little Storm’s eye, black against his black coat and black hide, watched her. This animal seemed to know neither joy nor kinship. It waited for her to do whatever it was she planned to do.
She plucked the horse’s harness from a hook on the bare steel gate and she pulled open the latch.
“Keep the children back,” she ordered Nina absently.
“Behind me,” Nina ordered the children in turn. Raven backed her mare up.
Little Storm didn’t move at all as Shela approached him. It made her very wary. A horse should react to her; sniff her, step away from her. She reached up and took a handful of his thick, wild-cut black mane and pulled his head down to her. She slipped the harness over his head, behind his ears, and snapped the buckle under his jaw.
Still—nothing.
She clucked to him. “C’mon,” she said to him, pitching her voice softly.
Without a moment’s warning, the horse kicked out with both back feet and launched himself out of the paddock, Shela yanking her hand out from between the harness and the horse’s cheek before he dragged her. She clutched ineffectively for its mane as it shouldered past her and the freedom of the stables.
“Horse free!” she shouted automatically, Nina echoing her. Lee called out the same a moment later, back-pedaling to safety with her sister in her arms. Raven’s face turned from left to right, trying to figure out where to go, what to do in the chaos.
And like a lone tree on the plains, little Vulpe stood stock-still outside of the open paddock gate.
“Vulpe!” Shela shrieked.
The stallion barreled out of the gate right at the boy. Vulpe didn’t freeze, his eyes didn’t go wide. He simply drew himself up, so much like his father, and refused to give ground.
The mighty stallion reared before Vulpe, pawing the air with front hooves as hard as stone and larger than the child’s head. Still the prince didn’t move, his feet apart, his face set in the same scowl his mother had seen on his father’s face a dozen times.
The stallion took a step back and began to descend, crashing back to earth directly into the same space Vulpe occupied.
Raven swept from the child’s right, abandoning her mare. Tackling young Vulpe, she took the boy to her breast with her left hand and raised her right above her, rolling onto her back, warding off the stallion as he righted himself.
The giant hooves changed direction in mid-air, sliding along an invisible wall to its left. It was a tiny change, the great beast didn’t stumble. As the stallion stepped back and bobbed his head, Shela sprinted to his side, to take hold of the halter and drag him back into the paddock before he could strike again.
The stallion launched itself again, kicking out with both back hooves and leaving a giant divot in the ground behind him as he shot past Raven and Vulpe into the open aisle between the stalls within the stable.
Three Uman stablemen in the white and brown livery of the horsemen appeared before the stallion. The beast reared again, pawing for them, terrified and angry as only a stallion could be. One held a head tie and the other a crop. The third, the senior man, called out to Little Storm by name, trying to quiet him.
Shela knelt down by her son’s side, reaching for him. She didn’t miss the ozone stink that hung in the air after a spell of protection.
She took Vulpe to her breast, her fingers in his short, brown hair. Her eyes finding Raven’s as the girl pushed herself off of the ground and ran fingers through her dusty tresses.
“Mamaaaaaa,” Vulpe complained.
“Shush, you,” she warned him. She wanted to whip him but she couldn’t. The boy had stood his ground. This was second only to taking first blood among Andaran men. In her home tribe he would already have been pulled from her and his name shouted in triumph for such courage.
Or buried, of course, another dead warrior. The boy struggled and finally subsided, taking his mother in his arms.
Shela saw the stallion was letting the stablemen connect the head tie to his harness. They would take the horse to their arena and work him to stumbling now. Pointless to beat a horse for being a horse, however as her father had told her growing up, ground work is everything and no horse ever suffered from a firm, fair hand.
Nina took hold of the mare’s reins, watching Raven as if expecting her to leap off of the ground and bite them. She must have smelled what Shela had.
It wasn’t Nina of the Aschire whose magic had warded Vulpe and Raven; who had created a shield wall between their bodies and Little Storm’s hooves.
There was work to be done in learning of these new comers.
* * *
Bill, who was still having trouble thinking of himself as ‘the Mountain,’ walked the passageways through the palace of Galnesh Eldador with his hands in his pockets, trying to think of something to do.
Lupus was conducting court. That was pretty boring, and done in Uman, which wasn’t a language he could follow easily. Melissa—Raven now—was off riding with Shela. He’d have liked to go with them but he wasn’t invited and he didn’t want to horn in. He also suspected Shela wanted a crack at Little Storm and he didn’t think he should be there for that.
Karel of Stone was kind of an interesting character but he was in and out and hard to keep up with. He wasn’t overtly friendly and Bill didn’t want to press his luck there. It might be interesting to hang out with that senior Wolf Soldier guy, J’her, but again, that guy seemed pretty busy, and Bill didn’t want to impose.
In his
life, he’d never felt more useless.
“Mountain!” he heard from behind him.
He turned on his heel in a darkened passageway with steel-banded doors to either side and a single torch burning in a wall sconce next to him and found himself almost face-to-face with Nina of the Aschire, Lee and Chawny with her.
A smile cracked his face. Lee ran to him and leapt up into his arms, her arms around his neck and her face in his beard. Nina held Chawny, who gurgled and shook her fists at him.
“Grandfather!” she said in the language of Men.
“He isn’t your grandfather,” Nina admonished her, the Aschire’s lips set in their usual thin line, something close to a scowl on her surprised-looking face. Her long, purple hair had a strip of birch bark braided into it on the left. The young woman moved somewhat stiffly, her body unnaturally straight compared to the lithe, dancer’s movements he’d seen in her. Whatever Melissa—Raven—had done to her must have had lasting effects.
“My Lady,” Bill said, and dipped his head.
He turned to face the young girl in his arms. “My Ladies,” he said, putting her back on her feet.
Lee, dressed in a blue palace dress with a white sash that tied up in a bow on the side, dipped a curtsy to him. “My Lord,” she said, and smiled.
Nina didn’t stop scowling.
“Your horse tried to trample the prince,” she informed him. “The stablemen are working him now.”
“Whu—what?” Bill stammered in English, then caught himself. “Kak etot?” he responded in the language of Men. What is this?
“It was scary,” Lee informed him, taking his forearm in her left hand. “Mama was going to ride Little Storm, and he broke free, and she couldn’t hold him, and he started runnin’, and there was Vulpe, and he didn’t move, and Little Storm reared up, and then boom! Raven tackled him out of the way!”
Bill needed that repeated to him a couple of time, but by then they were all moving back to the stables, Bill in the lead and Lee beside him.
He found Raven and Empress Shela leaning on the fence alongside of a covered arena where the stallion was running on a long rope, called a lead-line, an Uman holding a lunging whip cracking the air behind him.
Bill knew what they were doing. The stallion had done something they don’t like, and they were going to exercise it out of him. Lots of people did that.
They were wrong.
“Hey!” he shouted, and found himself angrier than he’d have thought. “Hey, you there! Bring me my horse.”
Melissa jumped, the Empress turned on her heel with her eyebrows knit in curiosity, tossing her thick black hair over her shoulder. Bill could see dirt smudges on Melissa’s blouse and the thigh of her pants. When they moved, he could see Vulpe was standing in the arena, a few feet past them.
“Mountain,” Shela addressed him, straightening. “I sent Nina to find you—I assume she’s told you—”
Bill waved his hand and cut her off. The surprise on her face was plain for anyone to see. He was probably pushing his luck here but his temper already had the better of him.
Americans don’t have nobility, and it was hard to keep telling himself that so-called ‘royals’ could to a lot of things to him for mouthing off.
He looked past the two women to the Uman, one of them watching him with the lead line in his hand, and shouted, “I said, ‘Stop!’”
The Uman shook the lead line and the stallion trotted, then slowed down to a walk, cooling off.
“I know what you’re doing,” he informed Shela. “Don’t do that to my horse.”
She straightened. He heard Lee gasp behind him. Vulpe was already climbing the fence and Melissa’s look of actual fear was unmistakable.
“My Lord,” she said, her voice icy, “you have that horse for my husband’s good graces, and you have your freedom for the same reason.”
“And I know you can take back both,” Bill said, stopping a foot from the dark-haired Empress. “But until you do, your Imperial Majesty, that is still my horse and I don’t want him treated that way.”
“Your horse struck out at my son,” Shela informed him.
“And you think you’re going to work it out of him,” Bill challenged her. “But the problem is that he’s a horse, and he doesn’t even remember what he did with Vulpe, and he has no idea what you’re trying to teach him now.”
“My people almost live on their horses,” Shela answered. The anger on her face was clear now. “This is how you handle a stallion who strikes out.”
“Oh, I’m not saying it won’t work,” Bill said. “You do this enough times, and he’ll be jaded, and he won’t act up. He’ll be about worthless, too. Let me show you how to do this right.”
Shela’s eyes widened, then narrowed with rage. Bill knew right then he’d gone too far. Lupus had reminded him there was nothing more important to an Andaran than horses, and Shela was no exception.
“Buh—Mountain,” Raven whispered.
“No,” Shela took a step back where she could see the both of them. “No, Raven—let us learn from this old man. Teach me, please, the ways of horse flesh, Mountain of Another Land.”
Bill stepped away from her while he still could. Now there were a dozen people gathering around them at the stable. It must not be every day that some stranger challenges the woman who called herself The Bitch of Eldador.
A sack of carrots, their green stems protruding from the bag, hung from several walls and from the railing along the arena. Bill grabbed one up and put a hand on the upper railing to the arena. He leaned back and then pulled himself up over the fence, the bag in his free hand.
Vulpe leapt right up next to him.
They both launched over the fence together. Shela called her son back but the boy didn’t react.
“How old are you, boy?” Bill asked him.
“I’ll be twelve,” Vulpe informed him, his face upturned.
Bill nodded. “You know your mother’s not going to like you coming out here.”
“I want to learn this,” he answered.
Good enough.
The Uman who held Little Storm’s lunge line offered him the end, but Bill grabbed the whip out of his hand instead. He handed the bag of carrots to Vulpe and said, “Wait here,” walking the length of the line.
“We’ve barely worked him an hour,” the Uman warned him.
An hour, Bill thought. This horse had been going too long already.
Little Storm stood stock still as Bill approached him. He had to wonder how many times he’d been through this, how many times these people had run the poor horse to exhaustion for no reason.
He reached up and rubbed the stallion’s nose. The horse lowered his head and he rubbed the flat space between its eyes. He dropped the whip and unbuckled the line from the halter, dropping it on the ground. Without turning, he said, “Coil that line up and leave here with it.”
“My Lord,” the Uman said. Bill didn’t know if it was an affirmation or a question. He did know better than to take his eyes off of a stallion in his care.
“Just do it, Elleck,” he heard Vulpe say. The rope dragged away behind him. Shela called for her son again.
The stallion took a step away from Bill. Bill put himself back in its path. The horse stopped, bobbed its head and tried to take a step past Bill to the other side. Bill moved again.
Now I have your attention, Bill thought.
He squatted down and picked up the whip. Using the butt end of that, he kept the stallion face to face with him. The huge animal, as much as seven times Bill’s weight, started to become frustrated. It wanted to wander away from Bill and he couldn’t.
“Bring me the carrots,” Bill commanded Vulpe.
He heard the boy approach from behind him. He held his left hand out toward Vulpe and felt him shove the carrot bag into it. All the time he kept his eyes focused just past the stallion, not making eye contact.
He waved the carrot bag under the stallion’s nose. Little Storm lunged for the c
arrots and Bill pulled them away. He did this two more times, and then he actually put his hand on the bridge of the stallion’s nose and pushed the huge animal back.
“These are my carrots,” he informed Little Storm, more for himself and his audience.
The stallion pawed the ground. Bill tossed the bag into the arena sand behind him.
Now the stallion saw that all he had to do was move the man and he could have the carrots. He tried to shoulder past Bill but Bill put his hand on the stallion’s jaw and turned him. He backed up, bobbed his head, pawed the ground and snorted in frustration.
Bill held his ground.
“That’s what I was doing,” Vulpe informed him.
“Just watch,” Bill said.
The horse started pacing to either side of the Bill. He ran around the carrots in a circle, Bill standing next to them with the lunging whip. He snorted, he reared, he pawed the air and called out his challenge.
Bill kept his eyes just to the right of the stallion’s head, or focused on his legs. He didn’t give any ground and he didn’t take any.
Finally the stallion broke away, trotted about thirty feet from Bill, wheeled on his back legs and came at him at a dead run.
This is it, Bill told himself. Make or break.
Bill held his ground. Melissa called out to him from the fence. He heard the Empress say something but he couldn’t be sure what.
All focused on the charging stallion.
Little Storm stopped dead in front of him. He batted him with his forehead. Bill chuckled and rubbed his ears.
He took a step back, bent down, and pulled a carrot from the bag. He held it out and Little Storm reached for it. He pulled it away. Little Storm stopped. He held it out again and when the stallion reached for it again, he pulled it away again.
When the stallion stopped reaching for it, Bill held the carrot under Little Storm’s nose and let him have it.
Some of the stablemen actually applauded. Vulpe stepped up next to him.
“Mama’s smiling,” he said.
“Your attention should be on the horse,” Bill admonished him. “You want to train a stallion, you have to keep your focus on him. Your mama has a lot of smiles for you, but a stallion only needs to hit you once.”
