"But that — but I — " Leopold opened his mouth and closed it a few more times. He scratched his head, looked around for a bench here on the servants' side of the hedge and sat down in the shade. "You're...right."
Siegfried nodded, then added casually, "Of course, the shepherds will be there on the side, with their dogs. I see nothing in this that says you cannot go to them and give them money to herd the sheep for you. Or I suppose you could hire a shepherd and a dog and take them double with you on the horse. That is also what a leader does. He finds people that know how to do what he needs done, then he puts them in charge of doing it so he doesn't have to."
Leopold stared at him, then burst into laughter.
Siegfried patted his shoulder. "Do not say it. I already know. I am smarter than I look."
Leopold shook his head. "All right, let's just look at this thing and figure out what needs to be done and how we can do it better than the rest of them. We don't have horses, but this says they'll supply them. I don't think there will be any advantage to anyone there. I'd bet a round of ale that the Godmother had a hand in this, and that she'll be making mouse-horses."
"Magic armor, too." Siegfried considered this. "I have armor. You don't. Mine is light, compared to some of the foolishness I have seen people trying to wear around here. You could ask for light armor too, but..." He considered. "Now that I think about it...there could be a problem with this. I am fairly certain that at some point we'll have to fight. And I am fairly certain that at that point, if we made a specific request for this trial, they will give us the same armor we asked for the first time and make us fight in it. These sorts of trials are full of things to catch you like that."
"Hmm. I see your point. Riding in armor is no joke. But if you pick light armor for this, you'll be stuck with it when we fight. If you pick heavy armor, you'll be laboring at this trial." Leopold sucked his lower lip. "Unless — "
"Unless they allow us to pick whatever we want?" Siegfried brightened, thinking of the one thing that
would serve both purposes.
They looked at each other in glee, and said, simultaneously, "Dwarven chain mail!"
"I have wanted a set of that since I first saw it," Leopold said, matter-of-factly. "My father, the King, has a set. It's been passed down in the family for generations."
"I would seriously consider trading my mother for a set," Siegfried replied fervently. "I would definitely trade my father. Of course, given that my father was not noted for thinking very far ahead, that would not be a good bargain for the Dwarves."
"You'd better not consider trading me," the bird twittered in his ear.
Both men chuckled at Siegfried's quip about his father, then sobered. "Well, assuming they have thought of that already, and have already decided what sort of armor those who don't have any are going to get..." Leopold pondered. "This might not be a question of winning the race so much as not being eliminated."
"A very good point." Siegfried nodded. "It's the whole thinking-ahead business. People who race to the midpoint could get themselves into trouble. Arriving exhausted to deal with the sheep and the eggs..."
Leopold shook his head. "It won't be pretty. So, as long as we don't actually fall off in the race, and we look as if we are making an effort, that ought to be enough to keep us just ahead of the middle of the pack."
"The middle is not a bad place to be," Siegfried pointed out. "If you are not a leader, no one is shooting at you."
Leopold's glance sharpened. "You think that might happen?"
Siegfried nodded toward the other side of the hedge. "All of the Princess's enemies sent young men to this trial. I very much doubt that they are concerned with anything but winning, and making sure that what they do to win is done quietly enough that no one suspects them. And besides the obvious candidates, those enemies could have covert agents, as well, placed not to win for themselves, but to make sure that their own Prince wins." As Leopold's mouth dropped open, he shrugged wryly. "Just because my people are sometimes dim, it does not follow that they are not cunning and treacherous. Remember, the keeping of hostages is routine in the north."
"I have the feeling that before this is over, I am going to be more grateful to you for your insights than you are for mine," Leopold said ruefully.
Siegfried smiled. "That depends on which of us wins the Princess."
Chapter 12
Siegfried reckoned that he and Leopold would not be the only ones to get advance notice of what the first trial was going to be; they were only the first. And he was right. A full day before it was to take place, it was an open secret. And there was not a shepherd or sheepherding dog to be had neither for favors nor money for miles around. It seemed that the first thing that came to most of the clever candidates was to take an expert riding doubled with them on the horse, on a pillion pad behind the saddle.
Siegfried, on the other hand, went out and talked with sheep.
Or rather, he listened to sheep.
They were, on the whole, just about as dim as most birds — or the men of the north. But he spent a morning paying very close attention every time they wanted something. By afternoon, he had a good idea of what they liked. He had thought they were grazers and ate grass — well they did, but it wasn't what they preferred. They preferred things with leaves and flowers. Clover was a favorite, but any leafy, sweet plant would do. In fact, that was a great complaint of the flock that he listened to; there were bean plants they would dearly have loved to get at, and at least once an hour they would drift over to the fence, lean against it longingly and complain that it hadn't gone away.
It was after supper by the time he hiked his way back from the pasture, but Leopold had promised to meet him at the tavern, and by the time he got there, Leopold had ale and a good meat pie waiting for him — the kind you picked up and ate, rather than the messier sort you had to carve up and fuss with.
"So, I hope you learned something?" the Prince said, as Siegfried bit into the tasty crust.
He nodded, but waited until he had stilled the complaints of his stomach before answering. "I have a plan. Sheep like clover and bean plants. We'll carry bunches of bean plants in flower with clover at the center. When we get there, we'll just lure them into the pens with those."
"You think that will work?" Leopold held up his hand. "Never mind, forget I asked. You're the one who can understand animals. If the sheep said they like beans, then they like beans. I've been working out a way to deal with the eggs."
"Oh?" Siegfried was glad of this. There was always a chance that metal gauntlets would still be too clumsy to handle the eggs. And the rules specifically said that gauntlets had to be worn.
"The rules say nothing about using tools. I picked up what we need in the market this morning." Leopold held up a wooden spoon and a small dustpan, the sort that careful housewives used to collect crumbs from tabletops, to go into the chicken feed.
"Oho!" Siegfried grinned around his pie. "Roll the egg into the dustpan with the spoon, use the spoon to guide it into place in the line. We are clever fellows."
"I'm sure the smart ones will figure out something similar. Or use magic." Leopold shrugged. "One race isn't going to win this set of trials."
* * *
"Well, this should be interesting," Lily observed to the Princess, as they watched the candidates milling about and getting themselves lined up for the start of the race. She felt relatively relaxed; word from the borders was that all the armies had withdrawn — though not completely. At least they weren't bivouacked close enough that it would be an easy march to invade. "It's certainly proved lucrative for the local shepherds."
It was an absolutely lovely day; the sun shone down with a warmth that was pleasant in a summer gown, and would soon be hideous for anyone in armor. There was a brisk breeze that no one in armor would feel. The scent of the Forest — green with a hint of something blooming deep within the shelter of the trees — was in the air, which none of the candidates would appreciate, poor fe
llows, because they would be far too busy concentrating on the trial.
Rosa giggled; about twenty of the sixty or so riders had someone up behind them — obviously shepherds. The lucky ones had a couple of pretty little shepherdesses, and their dogs, tireless little fellows who could run all day and easily keep up with a horse, were sitting patiently at the horse's heels. The unlucky ones had taciturn old men with older dogs in their laps. All of the dogs were of a small, shaggy, black-and-white variety that was the only sort of dog she had ever seen tending sheep. As she and Lily had guessed, of the hundred or so princes who had first arrived, a good half had decided that they would either take the penalty of not being in the first trial, were not in the least prepared for a race in full armor and what that implied about the difficulty of the rest of the trials — for some of them had not bargained on trials that might actually require fighting something — or were not interested in taking part in a contest that began with so little dignity. The Palace was a good bit emptier this morning. It probably would get even more empty when those still competing or those waiting on the sidelines realized that things were only going to get worse from here.
Of the adventuring types...well, they weren't out here right now, but the requirements for them were more stringent. They either would take this first trial, or forfeit and leave. Their race would be tomorrow, but already the tents were emptying. A great many of them simply could not ride a galloping warhorse, or even ride any sort of horse whatsoever, and that disqualified them immediately. Sadly, that was most of the clever shepherds, and a great many of the sell-sword mercenaries, who typically were infantry, not knights or cavalry. Rosa felt a bit sorry for them, but not so sorry that she was going to allow people who had turned up uninvited any sort of leeway. Lily was in agreement here. It wasn't as if anyone could claim she just didn't want to marry a commoner, either. Not with her pedigree...
The starting line was well away from the Palace, on common grazing land that anyone could use, and many city folk had a beast or two out here, tended by herders whose wages were shared among all those who used his services. Even in a wealthy land like Eltaria, meat was not the sort of thing you had on your table every day if you were a common working man. The animals generally grazed there were milk cattle, geese and goats; these had been herded off to one side so the race could take place. It would follow the edge of the Forest, rough land that wasn't much good for farming, so no one's crops were going to get trampled. That had been a great concern for both Lily and Rosa; how was it fair to destroy someone's livelihood just to have a race? Yet there was no way to have that many men pounding around on horses on a road. Once they had decided on the form of the trial, the hardest part had been finding a good place to hold it.
In the interest of fairness, or at least the appearance of it, Lily had decided to supply everyone with the same mouse-horses and magically created armor. She and Rosa were the only ones who knew where these things came from; it was possible that the ability to just produce that many trained mounts and suits of armor on a moment s notice might give their enemies something to think about. But that was only one of the reasons; given the rough ground, neither of them wanted to risk a horse stepping into a hole and breaking something.
A mouse-horse, being a Magical Beast, might step into a hole, but if he did, he knew to roll so he didn't break a leg. And hopefully the rider knew to leap off if the horse went over. He might end up lying on his back, unable to get up, like an overturned turtle, but if he knew how to fall, he wouldn't break anything of his own, either.
The muttering and sounds of restless hooves on turf began to die away as the candidates sorted themselves out into a line. Finally the milling stopped. All eyes were on the majordomo, splendid in the royal livery, who had a flag-boy beside him, a blue-and-white banner held high and floating bravely in the breeze. The tension mounted, and from where she sat, Rosa was able to make out the majordomo smiling a little.
He tapped the boy's shoulder. The flag dropped.
They were off, pounding away in a flurry of hooves and flying clods. The noise was louder than anything Rosa had ever heard before, louder than thunder. The earth trembled under her feet, and the air filled with the scent of fresh earth and bruised grass. A clear number of faster riders surged ahead of the rest. All those carrying double immediately dropped back; so did the most timid riders, as the more aggressive shouldered their way through the pack. Before they were out of sight, the pack had gotten strung out, and it was possible to single out individual riders and identify them. Siegfried and Leopold, easily picked out because of Siegfried's height, were a bit ahead of the middle.
"What on earth do that Northlander and the scoundrel have tied to their saddles?" asked Lily, shading her eyes with her hand and peering as they all vanished into the distance. "Some great shaggy bundle of green. I couldn't make out any details."
Rosa could only shrug; she had seen whatever it was, too, and had been just as puzzled by it. "It looked like bushes. I can't imagine why they would have bushes with them, but I'm sure they have a plan."
"I would be surprised if they didn't," Lily replied matter-of-factly. "Well, time to go to the next stage. I confess, I am looking forward to this." She turned around and went into a small pavilion that had been set up with a guard to mind it. Inside was nothing but one of her mirrors, but no one would know that but the two of them. She set the spell, and led Rosa through the mirror.
They came out of a second one in another small pavilion set up at the middle stage.
The race was going to be long enough that overeager riders would exhaust even mouse-horses, which only had the stamina of real horses — but the mouse-horses had more sense than a real horse and could not be goaded into overextending themselves no matter what you did. So if the mouse-horses pulled up here tired, they would be trotting, or at best cantering, the return route. At this end of the course, there was an enormous sheepfold made of stakes with thornbushes impaled on them — in it, the flock of sheep drifted from one side of the fold to the other, baaing and bleating. There was more than a hint of pungent wool on the breeze.
These were white-face sheep, although Eltaria supported flocks of both black and whitefaces. Far enough away from the full sheepfold to make it a challenge were the small pens, attached to another, empty sheepfold. These were the pens that the candidates were supposed to get their sheep into, and once they did, gates would be opened in the back of the pens to let the sheep into the other fold. Along the back of the space between the two folds were the baskets of eggs for the egg-challenge. In theory it didn't matter which you did first, but the smart ones would see how crowded and chaotic the sheep situation was before they decided.
They stood now on a bit of a hill set out with the shade-pavilion; in the back of it was the mirror behind a dividing curtain. The front of it held a pair of chairs and a table that provided a viewing stand for Rosa and Lily. There were already servants here — Brownies disguised as ordinary human servants — with cold water and fruit. "I would willingly have killed someone for all this when I was in the forest," Rosa said, looking down at the food, the comfortable chairs, being careful not to mention the renegade Dwarves.
"We have to look the part, dear," Lily replied, taking a fan from the servant and fanning herself with it. "Appearances are important. You don't know who is watching. We must show that we are vitally interested in the outcome of this trial."
Rosa took that as the cue and warning that it was, and nodded. There truly was no telling who might be listening. Unless Lily took magical precautions, which in and of themselves would betray that she was, in fact, a magician, it was very easy for another magician to eavesdrop on everything they said and did here. Some would be friendly, some merely opportunistic, and some unfriendly.
When the first riders came over the hills, their horses were, predictably, tired — not quite stumbling with exhaustion, but not far from it. The mouse-horses were not going to put up with that sort of abuse on the return leg, and al
l the speed that the riders had gotten on the outward leg would be lost as their mounts took their time getting back.
And now came the part that Rosa had been looking forward to. She had not really laughed much since her mother died. She and her mother had shared so many things, and laughter was high on the list of the things she missed. And — all right, she knew she was going to be laughing at those hapless Princes, and that was not kind — she needed laughter desperately.
As she had known it would be, as the trial unfolded before them, it was not just funny, it was hilarious. Three of the first men to arrive had brought shepherds with them, the lightest of the lot, two girls and a boy and their relatively small dogs. The shepherds jumped off the rumps of the horses without being told; the little dogs looked eager to get to work. The shepherds at the big sheepfold released about two dozen sheep, which looked bewildered at suddenly finding themselves without the fence around them; the dogs went to work, each of them cutting out three sheep and driving them expertly toward the little pens, while the Princes went straight for the eggs.
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