Toby Bishop - Horse Mistress 01

by Airs Beneath the Moon

  “Good morning,” Philippa said.

  Pamella looked up, wiping a drop of perspiration from her forehead with the back of her hand. She nodded to Philippa. Her mouth and throat worked with visible effort, but no words came, and after a moment, she shook her head apologetically and turned back to her churning, plunging the paddle into the heavy cream.

  “Can I help?” Philippa asked.

  Pamella shook her head and pointed to herself, then the half-churned butter.

  “Yes, I can see you’re good at this,” Philippa said. “I wouldn’t know where to begin.”

  Pamella gave her a brief nod without ceasing her work. Philippa said, “Larkyn and I are going to ride into the village. Can I bring you anything?”

  Without looking up, Pamella shook her head.

  “Perhaps something for Brandon?”

  Pamella’s eyes came to her then, and the expression in them startled Philippa with its fierceness. Pamella brought her forefinger to her lips, then she shook her head with deliberate meaning.

  At first Philippa couldn’t think what she was trying to tell her. She frowned, then said, “Ah! You’re asking me not to speak of him?”

  A nod.

  “But surely the villagers . . . they must know by now that you’re here, and that Brandon is, too.”

  Another nod, but Pamella pointed to her own breast and shook her head again.

  “I see. The village doesn’t know who you are or where you came from.”

  Vigorous nodding met this. Pamella’s throat worked, the muscles rippling down its length. Her brow furrowed as she struggled to speak, succeeding in producing one word through a spasm of lips and tongue. “Spy.”

  “Ah.” Philippa felt a rush of pity. “You mean William’s spy, don’t you?” A nod. “Oh, Pamella, I’m so sorry. I wish I could help you. I . . . I have my own troubles with your brother.”

  Another nod, slow, resigned.

  At that moment, Seraph whinnied from the barn, and there was a rattle of hooves on wood. Philippa excused herself with some relief and hurried across the barnyard. Larkyn was saddling Sunny, it turned out, and Seraph was complaining about having to wait his turn. Philippa relieved Larkyn of Sunny’s rein, and let her go to her little stallion, scolding him all the way.

  Philippa tightened Sunny’s cinches and checked her wingclips, then led her out into the barnyard. The sky remained clear, as it had since they had arrived, and she thought they could perhaps take a flight up into the hills after their errand. That would settle Seraph, and the exercise would be good for Sunny, too.

  She mounted, and Sunny tossed her head, eager to be off. “Wait, my girl,” Philippa murmured to her.

  “Larkyn and Seraph are coming, too.”

  As she waited, Pamella came out of the coldcellar and stood beside the steps, watching her. On an impulse, Philippa rode close to her. “Pamella,” she said quietly. “Perhaps you need to see a doctor. Your brother Francis is at Fleckham House for a time, and if you wanted to go there, I could make arrangements, speak to him—”

  But Pamella, her eyes flooding with sudden tears, shook her head, hard, and fairly ran into the kitchen, slamming the door behind her. Philippa stared after her. She didn’t realize Larkyn had come out of the barn, with Seraph at her heels, until the girl spoke.

  “She hides whenever anyone comes, my brother says.”

  “But does she hide the boy?”

  “No one in Willakeep, except me, has ever had a blink at the Duke,” Larkyn said. “They wouldn’t realize.”

  “Ah. No. I suppose not.” Philippa reined Sunny around, and they started down the lane, side by side.

  They didn’t speak of Pamella again that day, but sympathy for her, and worry for her fatherless child, nagged at Philippa all afternoon, spoiling the peace of the day.

  “PAMELLAtells me that William keeps spies in the Uplands,” Philippa said to Brye Hamley. They were strolling on the edges of the Erdlin Festival, which filled the town square with revelers and music and a bonfire that blazed so hotly no one could stand near it. Larkyn and Nick and Peony had gone off in search of friends, and Edmar, with Brandon on his shoulder, wandered through the dancers, dipping and twirling to make the little boy laugh.

  “Duke has eyes in every part of Oc,” Brye said. “Tithe-men, prefects . . . spies.”

  “Was it so under Duke Frederick?”

  Brye shrugged. “Never noticed then. Never mattered.”

  “Ah. Indeed. Everything has changed for you.”

  He stopped in front of a booth and dropped a coin on its counter, coming away with two mugs of sweet, hot wine. She was on the point of refusing but then decided it didn’t matter, this one time. Sunny and

  Seraph were safe in the barn at Deeping Farm, and it was Erdlin, after all. The wine was too sweet and spicy for her taste, but that didn’t matter, either. She said, “There is no more talk, I hope, of confiscating your farm?”

  He grunted. “No. But it’s not over yet.”

  “No. Nor are my troubles with the Duke.”

  He led her a little away from the dancers and noise. She was aware that people were watching them, and in an odd way, she enjoyed it. A horsemistress in the company of one of the stalwarts of the village must be something new to Willakeep. He said, “You went before the Council.”

  “Yes.” The warm wine, the festive air, and the comforting presence of Brye Hamley eased Philippa’s reserve. “It was bad.”

  He waited in an easy silence as she hesitated. After a moment, she said, “I brought suit against Duke William for interfering with the bloodlines.”

  “That’s how we got Tup, I reckon,” he said.

  “Evidently,” Philippa said. “Though he has not admitted it.” Her lips tightened. “But now, he has bred another winged foal, and kept it for himself. I—we saw it, Larkyn and I.”

  “Aye. She told me.”

  Philippa bit her lip, wondering if Larkyn had also told her brother about William’s attack on her. But surely, she thought, she wouldn’t have done that. She knew too well what her brother’s reaction would be.

  She blew out a breath, irritated at the secrets and posturing William had made necessary. She drank again from the spicy wine and forced a small laugh, as if the whole thing had no real import, as if it were not her very life at stake. “Duke William has asked for me to be sent down from the Academy, from my service. He asked that my brother take me into custody at Islington House.”

  Brye looked down at her, and his eyes glinted with firelight. “Daysmith and Beeth will never allow it.”

  She stared at him, surprised. “Do you know the Council Lords, then?”

  “Aye,” he said grimly. “Know who has Oc’s interests at heart, and who doesn’t.” He looked away, to where the villagers and farmers of Willakeep danced before the bonfire, celebrating the winter holiday as if they hadn’t a care in the world. “Bloodlines are important. So is broomstraw, and the bloodbeets crop, and a dozen other kinds of business.”

  “You’re right, of course. I’ve been thinking of this only from my own perspective.”

  “’Tis natural,” he said. The firelight glimmered on his cheekbones and the strong line of his jaw. Threads of gray in his hair shone silver. “But this business distracts the Council from necessary business.”

  They drank in silence and watched the revelers, until Edmar came up, with a sleepy Brandon now draped across one shoulder. “Taking the lad home,” he said to Brye. He nodded to Philippa. “Leave you the oxcart, though.”

  Philippa said quickly, “I don’t mind walking.”

  “Nay,” he said. “Not necessary. ’Tis not so far. Good Erdlin to you both.” He turned, with the boy securely lodged in the crook of his arm, and headed out into the darkness.

  Brye leaned back against the trunk of an ancient oak and drained his cup of wine. “Never thought to see my brother Edmar so attached to someone as he is to that boy.”

  “Pamella wouldn’t come tonight,” Philippa said
.

  “Nay. Doesn’t like people to stare at her.”

  “You mean, because she doesn’t speak?”

  “Aye. Except to Edmar, of course.”

  Philippa, startled, said, “Pamella can speak to Edmar?”

  Brye chuckled, a deep, rich sound that restored the sense of holiday to the evening. “Aye, Philippa.

  Pamella can speak to Edmar, who never speaks more than five words at once! You may be shocked to know it, but I think there may be an understanding between the two of them.”

  Philippa shook her head in amazement. The Lady Pamella, known far and wide for her temper tantrums, for her strings of admirers, for her dancing . . . to have an understanding with the stolid Edmar was too much to take in. “What does she say to him, Brye?”

  “He won’t say.”

  More secrets, she thought, but she kept that to herself. There were far too many secrets in the world, and she wished they could simply lay them all out in the open, like moldy sheets that needed airing in the sun.

  Brye went to buy more wine, and she accepted it, and drank it. They watched handsome Nick cavorting through the square with one girl after another, poor Peony trailing after him in an obvious plea to be noticed. Larkyn flitted here and there, greeting old friends. Brye and Philippa stood where they were, in the circle of the drooping oak branches, and watched the bonfire burn down to embers.

  When he put his hand under hers to help her up into the oxcart, the touch, though it lasted only seconds, felt like a caress. Philippa tilted her head up to look into the glory of the icy, star-filled night, and her heart shivered with pleasure. Her body did, too, in a way she thought she had vanquished long ago.

  She shook herself and wrapped her cloak tightly around her. Such foolishness, she thought. As if she were a first-level girl mooning after some youthful crush.

  When they reached the farm, she went straight to the barn to check on Sunny and to lean against her warm neck for a time, reminding herself where her first loyalty lay.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  SLATERdelivered the girl, slightly grubby and shivering with cold, to a small room at the back of Fleckham House. It had been intended, William thought, as a parlormaid’s room, sparsely furnished and tucked away under the rafters. It was empty now, dusty and abandoned. The bed had no sheets, and only a thin blanket and worn coverlet covered the straw ticking. William had trouble lighting the fire that had been laid, and sneezed at the dust. By the time Slater knocked, then opened the door, he was in a towering temper.

  “This house is falling apart,” he glowered, barely looking at the trembling girl, other than to notice she had dark curls, recently cut short, it appeared, and wore some sort of black tabard and skirt. “Tell Paulina if it doesn’t look better the next time I’m here, she’ll be out of a job!”

  “M’lord,” Slater said equably, “you don’t want them servants knowing you’re here, do you? Might lead to questions.”

  William slapped his thigh with his quirt and paced to the tiny window. He had to bend at the waist to look out. The scene beyond was truncated by the slope of the roof, and showed only a bit of the park, the gardens now filled with snow, the forest beyond. “Damn that Philippa,” he said. “I should have made her find another place for my brother. I loathe creeping around.”

  “’Tis all about the foal, though, isn’t it, m’lord?”

  William turned on Slater, ready to snarl some insult at his devotion to the obvious, but the girl had begun to snivel, and she distracted him. “Not another weepy one, Slater, ye gods,” William said.

  Slater gave the girl a sharp slap on her back, and hissed, “Listen, girl, if you want to get safely home, you’d best straighten yerself up.”

  She choked back her sobs and tried to wipe her face with her black sleeve. The tabard was far too large for her, and when she moved her foot, William saw that her skirt was divided.

  “Slater, what is this?” he demanded. “Is she wearing a riding habit?”

  Slater gave him a snaggletoothed grin. “Aye, m’lord. And doesn’t she look a good bit like—you know, sir.” His laugh was low and suggestive. “The brat. From the Uplands.”

  “I don’t know—lift your face, girl, so I can see you.”

  The girl looked up at him. She was small, like the farm brat, but her eyes were a light brown under heavy lids, and her hair was greasy and ragged-looking. In his current mood, he would have preferred to vent his rage on some drab who looked like Philippa Winter, but he would not admit that to Slater.

  William shook his head, feeling suddenly weary to death of the whole thing. “Oh, you take her, Slater,”

  he said, with a wave of his hand. “I’m not in the mood after all.”

  At this, the girl began to sob again, her eyes rolling to Slater and then back to William, pleading. This

  made him laugh. “Little fool,” he said. “You’ll be better off, believe me.” From where he stood, he stretched out his arm to chuck her under the chin with his quirt. He hit her just hard enough to make her head snap back, and she cried out, stumbling backward to bump into Slater, then trying to step to the side to get away from the touch of Slater’s dirty hands.

  The sight of her fear almost made William change his mind, but his body was utterly unresponsive. He felt no craving at all, not the slightest stirring of lust. In fact, he thought, he had felt no physical desire for some time. He knew it was the potion, but he didn’t dare reduce the dose, not now, not with his goal so close. Sometimes, at night, he stared at his changing body with something like revulsion. It made him feel as if he were divided into two pieces, as if his soul and his body were fighting each other. And though he had denied it to Francis, it was true that the filly was in his mind, night and day, the smell and touch and sight of her driving out all other thoughts.

  He turned away to the window again. “Go on, you stupid girl! Get out of here before I have second thoughts. You’re spared an hour of rather hard work, as it happens.” He glanced at Slater over his shoulder, and said softly, “I’m sure Slater will be kinder than I would have been—won’t you, Slater?”

  Slater sniggered and pulled the girl out of the room, closing the door behind him. He came back a moment later. “I sent her on her way, m’lord. Not inclined myself, neither.”

  “Poor Slater,” William said idly. He leaned against the window frame, tracing the sill with the quirt.

  “Everyone else has all the fun.”

  “Nay, m’lord. I have my fun.”

  William turned his head to eye his serving-man’s unappetizing form. “Do you,” he said lazily. “What fun would that be?”

  Slater grinned again as he dug through the pockets of his caped greatcoat. “I meet people,” he said.

  “And eat well.” He came up with a flask and two grimy glasses. “Drink, m’lord? Brandy. Took it from that Paulina when she wasn’t looking.”

  William sighed and turned his gaze back to the window. “No,” he said. “I’m going to the stable to see Diamond.”

  He heard the gurgle of the brandy as Slater poured it, then slurped from the glass. The sound made William’s stomach turn. “Tell me, Slater,” he said. “What’s in this for you?”

  “Beg pardon, m’lord?”

  “You can’t care about the bloodlines as I do. You’ll never fly, after all.” William turned, and braced his shoulders against the wall. He said dryly, “I hardly think I am an inspiration to great loyalty.”

  Slater showed his yellow teeth. “T’be honest, m’lord, ’tis money and power. Nothing fancier than that. I likes being where the power is.”

  “Then you’ve chosen well.”

  “Aye. Don’t I know it.” He drank again.

  William straightened and pulled down his vest with his hands. “And I suppose, excellent Slater, that if I lost my power, you’d follow after it. What would I do then?”

  Slater shrugged, emitting a cloud of body odor, and drained his glass. He grinned again and gave a phlegmy chuckle. “M’l
ord, if you lose your power, your old Slater will be the least of your problems.”

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  AFTERErdlin, the hand of winter passed lightly over Oc, leaving only its rain-soaked print on the paddocks and fields around the White City. Tup, who had been a winter foal, was now three years old, and Golden Morning and Take a Chance and the other horses of the second-level class would soon turn four. Spring touched the hills with a tentative green finger, and the bravest birds began to twitter in the hedgerows. At Deeping Farm, Lark thought, with a nostalgic twinge, it would be time to till the dead vines and stems from the kitchen garden and think about laying out the rows of beans and lettuces and squash. But there was little time to dwell on that at the Academy. She and her classmates had begun to

  worry about mastering the Graces for Ribbon Day.

  They wheeled through the misty morning sky at Mistress Star’s command, the horses’ wings sparkling with moisture, the girls’ faces damp with it. Graces could take a variety of balletic forms. For the Foundation flyers, Graces seemed a nuisance, simply a requirement to be dispensed with as soon as possible. For the Nobles, like Anabel’s Take a Chance, they were meant to impress the aristocracy. But for the Ocmarins—and for Tup—Graces were the whole point.

  Couriers flew in strange places sometimes. They might fly over the smooth flat fields of Isamar or the rugged peaks of Marin. Their assignments might take them over seas or into the private estates of some of the great lords, or they might take them into the cities, where routes between towers and spires and domes could be narrow and unpredictable. Tup, with his long, narrow wings and small body, was perfect for courier work. And there would be no challenge to the Graces at all if Lark could only fly without the cumbersome saddle. But she had promised to learn to use it, and she meant to keep her promise.

  Mistress Star had set the pattern before they launched. Aloft, Hester and Golden Morning took the lead, and Lark and Tup the end. It was like a great dance, the flyers ascending, tilting like swallows around a barn as they swept to the right, their wings at as sharp an angle as they could manage. Mistress Star had told them to imagine they were flying between the crenellated towers of one of the farthest castles, to come to ground in the keep, safe from attackers.