by S E Zbasnik
“Quit it!” he shouted, playfully shoving her face away. Copper didn’t rear back or try to take a bite out of him, her jaws too busy munching away on the treat she did have. The sight drew a strange calm to Finn, his smirk dying in favor of a serene smile while he futzed with her mane.
Hayley remained a hop and a half away, her arms crossed over her chest, but she wasn’t quivering in terror. She should be, she’d just been strapped to the back of that thing and her only way back was the same. But the sun was warm, her thighs stopped burning, and she could see the road. Even if Finn ditched her, there was a chance she’d make it back before nightfall.
“You still don’t like ‘em, do you?” he interrupted her thoughts while shoving another carrot under the bit so Copper could slobber in his palms.
He looked so damn earnest at that moment with a horse eating out of his hand, the sun flaming his hair like a stained glass cup of Christ's blood. Without the whole ‘I’m so sarcastically charming’ facade, Hayley almost found herself liking him. The horse, however…
Shaking her head fast, she stared down at the ground.
“What’s the matter? Fall off one as a kid?”
“No.”
Frozen ice seeping up her ankles, the manacles threatening to rust for how long she hid in that ditch. Scrape of evergreen boughs against her scalp and, through the snowy air, twin smoke puffing from the nostrils of massive war horses.
Hayley gasped at the memory, her shoulders rolling up to protect her as she turtled her head in safe. “Just don’t, okay. I bet there’s things you don’t like too. Like…like tight spaces!” He only shrugged. “Spiders!” At that Finn laughed.
“Rats?”
“No one likes rats,” he threw out so fast Hayley’s eyes gleamed.
“So…someone doesn’t like ra-ats,” she sang, darting back and forth on her heels. She wanted to dash towards Finn, maybe make a squeaking noise while poking him, but Copper lifted her head and quickly reminded Hayley the horse was still right there.
A shudder traveled across his shoulders, but the boy wouldn’t admit to a thing. “I can take ‘em or leave ‘em. Certainly don’t scream and leap up on chair crying ‘Oh, won’t some big strong Knight save me!’” He cranked his voice so high it cracked like a broken waterwheel.
Taking some offense, Hayley swung in close to him, her body lifting up on her toes as she stared right into his eyes, “Wanna know what I bet? If I dropped a fat rat down the back of your shirt, you’d squeal like a piglet.”
“That so?” Finn released his grip to Copper’s bridle, his body locking in to size up Hayley. He didn’t have much when it came to mass, even her hips looked wider than his.
Nodding her head, Hayley smirked, held out her palm flat and made squeaking noises. To finish her threat, she moved to reach behind his head for the back of his shirt, when Finn leaned closer. Her arm froze, her eyes opening wide as a sickly sweet heat wafted from the boy a mere inch from her face. A breath away from her mouth with those full lips of his.
“Like that,” Hayley cried leaping clean back, her threat fading on the wind. “I’d do it to you, one night, as payback for…for dragging me out here.”
Finn remained in place, his eyes cutting through her with a smirk as if she did something he wanted. No. Hayley never did anything right. “It’s a damn good thing I ain’t scared of rats then,” he snickered. “Besides, oh high and mighty squire lady, I’m not the one whose job calls for getting my back trampled by rodents.”
When he jerked his head back to the horse, Hayley’s legs turned to runny gravy. She clanged her knees together like a bell even as her head nodded to the sense. “I know. I…I had a plan.” No, you didn’t.
“Oh? Was it really, really hope your Knight didn’t notice you running around miles behind? Cause, sorry to say, Gravy ain’t that stupid.” Finn drew a palm up and down Copper’s neck but, at Hayley’s glare to defend her Knight, he turned to her and shrugged. “Look, no kidnapping this time, get on up into the saddle.”
“What? No!” She had no intentions to ever go anywhere near that horse, or Finn, ever again.
“Ya have to learn. Either it’s me teaching you while you flap your lip about as if’n I care, or it’s tall, dark, and menacing. Bet he’d do it in the rain too, seems the sort.”
Hayley’s entire leg began to bounce, her fingernails clawing into her arm. “You don’t know a thing about him.” She kept racing to Gavin’s rescue as if it was her duty, as if she knew anything about him. Finn took it all with a slope of his features before tipping his head to the horse. Damn it! Why couldn’t he have waited a week or two before tormenting her?
Blowing her hair back, Hayley moved to stuff the long tendril that fell from her cap back into place. The movement drew Finn’s attention and he pointed at it. “That your hat?”
“Yes?” she spat out in confusion. It was on her head, whose else would it be?
Finn tipped his head to the side, “Ever take it off?”
“No, I never take it off. In fact, I bathe with it,” Hayley shot out fast and a curious thing happened. The smart-ass boy froze, his cheeks turning ruddy as he gasped in air. While he gulped around, Hayley sighed, “What do you care?”
“You’re always in it. Didn’t think squires wore hats.”
“Well, I…” Don’t know a damn thing about squires. Gavin never said she shouldn’t, so she didn’t stop. Damn it, Finn wouldn’t cease staring at her. “I’m a squire and I wear a hat.”
His storm grey eyes danced around her face, the look bringing a flush to Hayley’s cheeks. “What do you look like without it…?” Finn’s words snapped away, his free hand nearly colliding with his massive forehead on the trip back to rub through his hair. “Just, where’d ya get it from?”
Her heart stopped dead. Hayley clung tight to the wide brim, chewed up and tattered from use. “I…” she shifted on her shoes, “I thought you were here to teach me to ride, not talk about my clothes.” Before Finn could argue she marched towards the horse, her brain pinging back and forth. She’d risk her greatest fear to end that line of conversation.
Despite her mind ordering her to not look, for a beat her eyes whipped to her right thigh. It’s safe, still covered where no one could see. Finn didn’t seem to care; he patted a hand onto the saddle and made a motion. “Get on up.”
Oh god. Hayley gripped onto the saddle horn, her eyes boring into the worn leather. She was going to do this? She agreed to it? What the hell was wrong with her?
“Usually helps if you put your foot in the stirrup,” Finn instructed. He had a loose grip to Copper’s bridle but seemed ready to launch forward to hurl Hayley into place by himself. For a beat, her eyes traveled to his hand. The wrist was thin, but the palm was wide as a cow’s liver with long but meaty fingers prodding off. That hand easily swept her up off her feet and… No, you do not want him to do it again.
Grunting, Hayley raised her leg nearly as high as her waist. She flopped around looking like a fool while Finn steadied the rapidly uncertain Copper. But eventually, she got into the saddle. “Wow,” Hayley gasped, “this is a lot comfier than the horse’s ass.”
“Hey,” Finn reached to Copper’s ears. “Don’t listen to her. You have a lovely hindquarter for a mare half your age.” Once he finished consoling the horse that didn’t care, he said, “Let’s start real simple, pick up the reins.”
They’d remained loosely knotted over the saddle horn, Hayley too afraid to touch them. Now she undid the loop — the thin strips of leather hanging limply in both hands. Her elbows bowed out, forming a box.
“No, no, one hand,” Finn said, yanking the reins from her left. “You use this one for balance, and if you’ve got to swat at a fly or itch. Keeps ya from wearing out on the long rides.”
Nodding her head, Hayley took a deep breath. It came out in spurts because she was on a horse and had the reins in her fingers. They were dangling so limply, Copper could rip them free with a gentle toss of her head, but the h
orse seemed content. “All comfy up there?” Finn asked, gazing skyward at her.
It was strange to be so much taller than him, the angle making his forehead seem not as gigantic. Hayley nodded again when Finn smiled. “Good, ‘cause it’s time to walk.”
“No, no, no!” she cried, but he tugged on Copper’s bridle and the mare took a step forward. Hayley lunged towards the saddle horn, prepared to wrap both her hands around it, when Finn reached back. His hand landed square on her stomach, forcing her to sit upright.
“Like that, don’t slouch, just…yeah, yeah,” his words faded as his eyes drifted from Hayley’s wide eyes to where he was touching her. Yanking it free, Finn scratched his head and released off of Copper. Certain in her steps, the horse continued to walk while Hayley panicked.
“What do I do?” she cried, the horse swaying back and forth like a boat below her. Should she match it? Fight it? Oh god, what about the reins?
“Trust in Cop, she’s done this tons!” Finn cried for encouragement.
Trust the horse? How the hell did someone trust a horse? Hayley’s trembling free hand dipped down towards Copper’s neck, the coarse mane hairs snagging between her fingers. “Okay, I…I trust you,” she whispered when Finn laughed uproariously.
“Not like that! Just know that she won’t try to scrape you off on nothing.”
“They can do that?!” Hayley shrieked, spinning towards Finn to glare at him. In doing so, she tugged the reins on accident and Copper’s head then body turned to the right. “Oh shit, I didn’t mean to do that!”
“No matter, just tug the other way,” Finn ordered even as he scampered out of the way.
Okay horse, trust. We trust each other. We have to…to know that we won’t screw each other over first chance we get. Hayley pursed her lips at that thought, but she tugged the reins to the left and the horse turned back towards the path.
“I did it!” Hayley cried in triumph.
“Yup, now how’s about going faster?”
“How’s about you falling off a cliff,” Hayley spat out fast. The boy laughed, easily jogging up to keep pace with a horse barely moving beyond a crawl. She half expected to glance down and find snails sliding past them, but the thought of moving any quicker lodged her tongue tight in her throat.
Finn fell into a jaunty walk beside Hayley, his hand reaching back behind her. She whipped her head, making certain to not tug on the reins, but he innocently held onto the saddle and not her. “Let’s head back to the estate this way, get a feel for roads and the like.”
She bobbed her head, not doing a damn thing to change course. It seemed as if Copper knew what Finn wanted and was happy to pull it off without Hayley mucking it up. Just sit up here for…however long it takes, and eventually she’d be back at the estate, on solid ground, and not near a horse.
“Ya know, at this rate we won’t get there 'til tomorrow,” Finn chuckled, shattering Hayley’s calming thoughts.
“Don’t care, not going faster,” she gritted through clenched teeth.
“Just a little, little little click of your tongue. Wouldn’t be more than a…” When her eyes threatened to wither his soul to jerky, Finn laughed, “Fine, only trying to teach. One step at a time and all.”
Her heart throbbed from both fear and, yes, exhilaration. She was on a horse. She never in a hundred years thought that would happen. At least, not without her being punched in the jaw or something. Bouncing in the saddle, her thighs clung tighter to Copper’s warm body as she glanced out over the fields. Tan birds with breasts of pure gold darted through the green brush, their songs trembling the air.
“So, Hayley, if you ain’t no Lady, where do you come from?”
The meadowy pastoral was shattered in an instant, her shoulders slumping as she glared at the boy beside her. “What makes you think I’m not a lady?”
Finn scoffed, “Ladies don’t go around calling Duchesses ‘Battle-ax.’”
How in the hell did he know that? She almost never said it aloud. Okay, maybe a few times when she was bathing, but…
“Ania, see, she thinks you’re some princess that was taken from the royal family as a babe and hidden in the woods for your protection. Now that you’re approaching adulthood, you have to be trained to take back your rightful place in the kingdom,” Finn announced with grave certainty, his head lifting to the horizon. When his eyes met Hayley’s he snorted, “Course that’s nonsense, but Ania always did love to spin up fancy tales. Last one had a dragon with the head of a goat in it.”
“What about you?” Hayley stuttered. She shouldn’t ask, it didn’t matter.
“Me? I can see the royal seed part, but you’d be a bastard through and through. Probably off one of the princes cavorting at too young an age with some trollop.”
Hayley had no idea what a trollop was, but the way he said it caused her stomach to burn. It couldn’t be good and yet he associated it with her?
“So,” Finn licked his lips, “what is it?”
“You’re both wrong,” she said, shifting uncomfortably in the saddle. A long lost princess or even a bastard would be a much better answer than the truth.
“What then?” He wouldn’t cease prodding, but Hayley buttoned up her lip tight. Her eyes burned through the horizon wishing the estate’s green and white trim would appear like magic. “Not gonna give me nothing? Come on, I deserve a sliver. I’m teaching ya how to ride.”
“I’m from Ostmount,” she spat fast at him hoping that would be enough, but the damn boy narrowed his eyes.
“No, ya aren’t. That’s where he plucked you up, but you ain’t from there. What’s the real truth.”
“What about you? Are you some long lost prince? Or…or a bastard to a Duke or Earl? Maybe a Duke and Earl’s bastard?”
Finn scratched behind his ear in thought, “Not certain how that would work, but no, not at all.”
“How do you know?”
“Cause my da’s often knocking into my forehead with a flick of his finger telling me to smarten up.”
“Your father lives at the estate?” She’d seen no sign of him, but then Hayley kept to the knight’s house and the barn. If anyone extra lived in the main house she never saw them.
“Not entirely. My pop’s a horse trainer, one of the better ones. Specialized in breaking the old, tough cases. Lady Braying can’t afford to keep someone like him around all the time so he travels a fair bit with my mum.”
“They left you,” her voice thudded in her chest, a chill seeping through her bones.
Finn didn’t seem to share in the moment, his cheeks yet rosy as he shrugged. “They come back, often to harangue me for shit that ain’t even my fault. Paying my dues, it’s what we’re all doing.” His head tumbled down a moment in thought, line of sight bouncing towards the ground before he narrowed his eyes to look at her, “How many dues you got to pay?”
Hayley sighed, “You’ll have to ask Knight Gravy about that.”
At that, Finn laughed hard, and — despite how angry she was at him, how she wanted nothing to do with him — Hayley couldn’t stop from joining in. For a beat the two stared into each other’s eyes, laughing like loons, when Copper’s ears twitched and her head bumped into Finn’s. Seemed the horse wanted Hayley off her back as much as she did.
“I’ve got an idea,” he said, trying to guide the horse back to her job of pretending to listen to Hayley. “Scoot up a bit.”
She glanced down at the saddle which seemed to fit only her, “Scoot where?” Before she could get an answer, Finn placed a hand to Copper’s ass and hurled himself up right behind Hayley. Oh shit! His thighs suckered him closer across the horse until Hayley felt his sweaty chest lean into her back.
“Give me the reins,” he commanded, one hand reaching forward while the other gripped onto her stomach. It was only a moment before he positioned himself and hung on elsewhere, but Hayley’s breath lodged tight in her throat. His warm words kept wiping across the nape of her neck, almost like a caress.
Once he got into whatever position he wanted, Finn clicked his tongue. “We don’t get back soon, I fear both Gravy and Battle-axe will have our heads.” Giving a quick jangle of the reins, he drove Copper from a gentle walk into a run. “Might want to hold on,” Finn ordered, Hayley lashing both hands for the horn as he laughed from behind.
The ride back wasn’t quite as tumultuous, though Hayley still kept her eyes shut as tight as possible. On occasion, Finn would hold onto her back or stomach to keep himself from falling, and he kept up a small chatter about nothing. Before coming up the estate’s road, he slowed Copper to a trot — the pair of them chatting as he gave Hayley control of the reins.
“And I ain’t never seen a thing like it before, bluer than the sky and naked as the Lord made him,” Finn laughed to himself at the anecdote, his legs both lifting high to stretch.
“Which part hadn’t you seen before, blue skin or a naked man?” she asked. Copper started to swerve her inquisitive nose towards a berry busy, but Hayley tugged on the reins to put her back on track.
Finn didn’t comment on the move, his one hand loosely bunched to her stomach as the horse clip-clopped through the stone arches of the main gate. “Do they got a lot of blue men where you come from, Hayseed?”
“No,” she laughed. He’d moved on from assuming she was some long lost bastard princess to now being a fairy child left in exchange for a pile of gold.
“Well,” his sweet, green-grass scented breath wafted at the back of her ear. The voice snickered, “what about naked ones?”
A giggling laugh broke from Hayley’s chest, her fingers digging in tight as her cheeks blushed hard. She gulped in air, trying to swallow away the sudden burst of shame in her gut. Turning in place, she gazed back to Finn, when a voice shouted, “Squire!”
Both kids whipped their heads fast to watch Knight Gavin bearing down upon them. His face stormed, the candle eyes narrowed to a shaft of light while a glint of iron clanged from his torso. He looked dressed for a fight. “Where have you been?” Gavin shouted, causing both Hayley and Finn to wince. His voice rang with both anger and…something else she couldn’t recognize. She’d call it fear, but he was a knight. They didn’t know fear, nor would they suffer it.
