Lady of Horses (51 page)

“There’s no war yet,” said Cloud. “You’re guests. We’re
honored to serve you.”

“Once,” said Kestrel, “I was somewhat more than a guest.”

“Once,” Cloud said, “you were.”

Kestrel flinched beneath the mask he had made of his face.
So few words, to smite so deep. They were not spoken in anger or with intent to
be cruel. In Cloud’s eyes, they were the simple truth. They pierced Kestrel to
the heart.

Cloud did not know, and Kestrel would not tell him. The
prince had turned to Aurochs with an air of evident pleasure. “You are the
great hunter, yes? The Lord Sparrowhawk’s father?”

Aurochs bowed assent.

Cloud smiled at him. “You are welcome here, my lord. Very
welcome indeed.”

“Why is that?” asked Aurochs.

Cloud’s smile widened. “For your son’s sake,” he said, “and
for the sake of another who has been a guest and more. But come, eat; be merry.
There’s ample time later for higher things.”

oOo

Kestrel determined to be patient. Linden was more than
pleased to do it: he sat between Storm and Rain, and his servant was an older
girl than the others, lissome still but with her breasts sweetly budding. She
was not shy, either, as maidens of the People were taught to be. When she had
served him, she sat in his lap and played with his yellow braids, clearly fascinated.

Linden was a happy man. So were the rest of the companions
whom Kestrel could see. But Walker, despite the offices of a lovely young thing
and the attentions of several more, all captivated by his ice-pale beauty, wore
the expression of a man on the raw edge of endurance. When his servant took her
lead from Linden’s and twined herself about him, he rose abruptly, spilling her
to the ground, and stalked away.

Kestrel half-rose to follow, but Cloud’s hand stopped him.
Cloud’s eye slid. Kestrel saw what he indicated: a nearly imperceptible drift
of certain people in the shaman’s wake. Walker was being watched. Kestrel
should stay where he could be seen, and betray none of his suspicions.

Kestrel sank down reluctantly, but he could not deny the
prince’s wisdom.

The girl who had so discomfited Walker came to join those
about Linden, with no sign of offense to have been cast off so rudely. “Such an
odd man,” she said to Linden. “Do you have many like him?”

“I think he’s the only one,” Linden said.

“Good,” she said.

Kestrel began to see a great many things. Fortunately no one
saw him fall back, laughing soundlessly; or if anyone did, he did not speak of
it.

“Treachery.”

The hiss brought Kestrel starting awake. For a moment he lay
in confusion. Then he remembered: he lay in the outer room of the king’s tent
in the Grey Horse camp, with his father beside him and the king’s companions
beyond. Linden was in the inner room with Storm, who had claimed him from among
the rest and taken him to a fate most of them could well imagine. They had
heard it clearly enough from beyond the curtain.

Morning light slanted now through the open tentflap. Kestrel
heard voices without, the soft clamor of a camp rising, dressing, breaking its
fast. One of the voices was Storm’s, warm, deep for a woman’s, and rich with
contentment.

Linden was still in the inner room. Walker was with him—and
none of the companions had roused.

None but Aurochs. The space beside Kestrel was empty.
Kestrel’s father knelt close by the curtain, listening as unashamedly as
Kestrel went to do.

“Treachery,” Walker said again, barely above a whisper.
“They’ve trapped you here, separated you from your warband, and lulled you with
strong drink and willing women. Where do you think my sister is? Wouldn’t you
wager that she’s leading an army against you?”

Linden yawned audibly, and must have stretched: Kestrel
heard a soft and distinct cracking of waking bones. “Walker,” he said with a
slight edge of petulance, “you woke me up to tell me that? You worry too much.
Storm told me your sister is a shaman now—can you believe that? A woman, a
shaman. She’s gone to a holy place to do whatever shamans do. When she comes
back, she’ll bring my stallion. Storm promised. I made her promise that he’ll
be alive and fit for me to ride. That was clever, don’t you think?”

“Very clever,” Walker said without conviction. “My lord, you
believe what the she-king of an enemy people tells you? Of course she’ll say
what you want to hear. That’s part of the plot.”

“There’s no plot,” said Linden. “Guests are sacred here.
We’ve eaten their bread, drunk their wine. They can’t kill us. It’s against
their religion.”

“So they told you,” Walker said.

“Lord Sparrowhawk told me, too. He knows these people. And
he’s loyal.”

“Is he?”

“I trust him,” Linden said. “Now go away, please. I want to
sleep a little longer.”

“You’ll sleep long in your death,” Walker said tightly. “My
lord—”

“Go away,” said Linden.

oOo

Kestrel and Aurochs were well away from the curtain and
feigning sleep when Walker burst through it. He was beyond knowing or caring
who listened, Kestrel suspected.

When he was gone, sweeping through like a wind across the
plain, Linden emerged from the inner room. He was naked, and his hair was a
sun-colored tangle. He did not look nearly as sleepy as he had sounded.
“Sparrowhawk,” he said.

Kestrel sat up. Linden frowned at him. “Come in here. Help
me.”

He meant more than that Kestrel should help him dress and
make some order of his hair. Between them, Aurochs and Kestrel made short
enough work of that. Linden frowned through it, as troubled as Kestrel had ever
seen him.

At last, as Kestrel finished plaiting his hair, he said,
“Walker’s going to crack.”

“That’s the intention,” Kestrel said.

Linden shook his head. “I don’t like the way he feels. He
should be happier. His other army is coming. He has me safe, until he needs to
take me away. I think he knows about the rest of it.”

“It is possible,” Aurochs said.

“Then you can do something about it?”

“We’ll think of something,” said Aurochs.

Linden’s frown relaxed at last. He sighed heavily. “I’m not
good at this game. I think I’d rather have come in and raided, and never mind
all this.”

“If you had come in so,” said Kestrel, “you wouldn’t have
found the stallion. They’ve hidden him away. And Walker would still be plotting
to give you to the gods at the new moon.”

Linden shivered. But he said, “He can’t do that without the
stallion.”

“Which means he’ll set himself to find the horse.” Kestrel
sighed himself, almost as heavily as Linden had. “Storm’s people are watching
him. Our part is to pretend to be joyful guests—and to watch our backs. Do I
have your leave to send scouts? Walker’s army will be near, if it’s coming. I’d
like to know how near.”

“Yes,” Linden said. “Yes, do whatever you need to do. Am I
safe with Storm?”

“As safe as you’ll be anywhere,” said Kestrel.

Linden smiled. “Oh, that’s good. That’s very good.” He
paused. Then: “She’s old, and I don’t know that she’s beautiful, but . . .
aaahhh!
” It was a sigh of rapture.

That startled laughter out of Kestrel. “Was I right, then?”

“You were very right,” said Linden.

oOo

Sparrow rode into the camp at midmorning. She came without
fanfare. She was riding a dark grey stallion with a silver mane, with a small
dark colt gamboling after. She had no escort but a single rider, a woman
mounted on the moon-grey mare who had come with her from the north.

Linden was learning to shoot the shorter, stronger bow of
these people, afoot for now; later, Cloud had promised him, he would try it
from horseback. They had set up targets on the open field, and had mounted a
contest, men and women of the Grey Horse against the men of Linden’s warband.

Sparrow rode straight across the field, taking no notice of
arrows that flew about her. They all flew wide. Yet some, it seemed to Kestrel,
came very close; one should have struck, but a trick of the wind sent it
veering aside.

He shivered lightly. The sight of her was like rain on dry
land. She was as she had always been, small, dark, unprepossessing until one
met her eyes.

She rode up to the king, with the other following. Linden’s
eyes were fixed on the stallion, ignoring for the moment the woman who rode him
as easily as any man.

The stallion did not notice. He was nibbling the neck of the
colt who could not but be his son: the foal was his image in miniature, with
already a glint of silver about the eyes and in the tail.

Linden approached him blindly. No one else moved. They were
all watching him, except Kestrel, who was watching Sparrow. She was almost
smiling, doting as always on that handsome face.

Linden laid his hand on the stallion’s bridle. The stallion
noticed him then, and snorted at him, warning him away from the colt. The colt
nosed inquisitively at the end of one of his braids.

“You are riding my horse,” Linden said to Sparrow. His voice
was light and calm, but it made Kestrel’s shoulders tighten.

“This is the goddess’ horse,” Sparrow said with equal calm.

“He belongs to me.”

“Are you greater than a goddess?”

Linden blinked. “I am a king.”

“You should be careful,” said Sparrow, “that you don’t anger
her.”

“This is my horse,” Linden said again.

Sparrow shrugged, swung her leg over the stallion’s neck,
slid lightly to the ground. “He doesn’t belong to any man,” she said.

“You’ll have to die,” he said, “because you rode the king of
stallions. You, a woman.”

“I, Horse Goddess’ child.” Sparrow smiled at him, completely
without fear. “I’ll lay you a wager, king of men. We’ll turn him loose and let
him wander. You finish your archery. Then when the field is clear, call him. If
he comes, he has chosen you. If not, you forsake your claim to him. Will you
wager so? Are you as bold as that?”

“He is
mine
,” Linden
said.

“Then prove it,” said Sparrow.

She had him. Kestrel could see how it rankled at him to be
casting the bones with a woman, but her boldness, it seemed, intrigued him. And
it was an easy wager, if his claim was true.

“I’ll do it,” he said. He slipped the bridle from the
stallion’s head and let him go.

The stallion snorted, tossed his mane, lifted his tail and
pranced down the field, reveling in men’s admiration. His son loosed a high
whinny and sprang after him. They danced together, the stallion gentle in his
strength, the colt springing into the air and making a great show of ferocity.

No one could shoot while they were there, nor was anyone
minded to venture it. They put away their arrows, unstrung their bows. Those
who had wine or kumiss passed it round.

But Linden had eyes and mind for only one thing. “Now?” he
asked Sparrow.

She spread her hands. “When you will.”

Linden shouldered the bridle and walked out across the
field. The stallion was grazing, the mare nearby, nursing the colt. Linden
approached as a horseman should, easily, expecting no trouble.

The stallion grazed unperturbed. The mare had not seemed to
move, but somehow, where Linden wished to go, she was there, with her colt at
her side.

Across the field, somewhat apart from the rest of those who
watched, Sparrow was smiling.

It was not a chase. None of the horses ran from the man. But
he could not come near the stallion. Either the mare impeded him, or the colt.
Or the stallion moved away just as he came close.

Linden persisted. He was not a man to surrender without a
fight—even if that fight was as subtle as shifting mist.

At last Sparrow walked calmly over the trampled grass,
straight up to the stallion; stroked his neck and his inquiring nose; and swung
easily onto his back. She rode him up in front of Linden.

Linden’s face was slack with shock. “My lord king,” she
said, “what belongs to Horse Goddess can never belong to a man. And yet . . .”
She held out her hand. “Come up,” she said.

He hesitated so long that Kestrel thought he would refuse,
but in the end he took the proffered hand. He swung up behind her. He sat on
his own stallion—but only by her leave.

She laughed. The stallion wheeled, flagged his tail, and
sprang into a gallop.

Not everyone was frozen in astonishment. A few cried out,
even ran after them. But no one had a bow strung, even if he would have dared
to shoot the woman without fear of striking the king.

“Gods,” said Curlew of the companions. “Gods, she’s stolen
the king, too.”

“She has not.”

That clear voice startled them all. No one had noticed the
mare’s rider: she had slipped down before the game began, and effaced herself
near Storm and her heir. But when she spoke, she drew every eye; and the sight
of her was dazzling.

By the gods, she was beautiful. More beautiful than the
king, and in the same mode: sunlight and summer sky. Kestrel had not known Keen
could stand so tall or speak so distinctly, as if she had been a king of this
country. “She has not stolen your king,” she said. “She’ll bring him back
before too long. I give you my word on it—and myself as hostage, if you have
need of such.”

Men looked down abashed—those who were not gaping at her as
if they had never seen a woman before. Maybe they had not: not a woman of their
own kind, standing with head up, eyes level, bold as a man.

oOo

“You!”

Walker had retreated to his tent after he left Linden that
morning, there, no doubt, to brew up poisons and to ponder his myriad plots.
But something had brought him out. Maybe he was enough of a shaman after all to
know when his sister had come.

But his eyes were on Keen now. “You,” he said, his voice as
harsh as anyone had ever heard it. “Wife. Come here.”