Toby Bishop - Horse Mistress 01

by Airs Beneath the Moon

  Tup lifted his head, following her gaze as if he understood her meaning. His wings flexed, and he whickered softly.

  “Do you see someone?” Lark asked. “They couldn’t have seen us, or surely they would have come out .

  . .”

  Tup lowered his muzzle and blew his breath on her cheek. She reached up to pat his neck, but before her hand touched him, he backed away from her, and went cantering down the field, wingtips fluttering, empty stirrups flying, the irons banging on his ribs. “Tup!” Lark cried. What was he doing? Surely he would not fly off and abandon her!

  Tup, head high, wings half-extended, galloped straight to the farmhouse. He whinnied, and spun in a circle, then stopped, head up, ears pricked forward. When no one appeared right away, he made a larger circle, cantering, his neck arched and his tail flying. He whinnied again, and again, the commanding bell of a young stallion, and pounded his front feet on the cold ground. Lark watched him, marveling. She touched the icon of Kalla at her neck, and was startled to find that the heat which had bothered her for days had cooled.

  At last a window blind lifted, and a moment later, the door of the farmhouse opened just a crack.

  Tup neighed, and whirled on his hindquarters. He dashed a few steps back down the pasture and then stopped, turning back to stare at whoever was in that doorway. When the figure didn’t move, he repeated his invitation, running a few steps, turning, waiting. Lark held Bramble in her lap, caressing the silky head and watching Tup, while the cold began to pierce her tabard and her torn skirt.

  Three times Tup repeated his invitation before the figure in the farmhouse door stepped outside. It moved slowly, and Lark now saw that whoever it was used a walking stick. Tup whinnied one more time, and dashed back down the pasture, skidding to a stop near Lark and Bramble, tossing his head triumphantly.

  “Well done, Tup!” Lark said. “Well done! Now someone will come and take a blink at poor Bramble, and maybe loan us a cart to bring her home.”

  It took some time for the woman, as it turned out to be, to walk up the long pasture from the farmhouse.

  She was elderly, with wispy white hair and sunken cheeks, and she peered at Lark through thick glasses much in need of cleaning.

  “Good day to you, Mistress,” Lark said. “I thank you for coming out.”

  “What is it?” the woman quavered. “What is it there? A dog?”

  “Aye,” Lark said. “An oc-hound. From the Academy of the Air. She’s been hurt.”

  The old woman said, “When I saw yon winged horse dancing in my front yard, I thought you must be from the Academy. But a dog . . . I didn’t see the dog. I thought you was the one hurt, Miss.”

  “I’m not,” Lark said. “But we need help—a cart, or something, to take Bramble back to the Academy.”

  The farmwife nodded, leaning on her stick. “Oh, aye, Miss, that’s all right, then. We farm this portion for the Palace, you see. My husband went there to ask someone to come.”

  Lark pressed her hand to her heart, which felt as if it had stopped beating. “Not—oh, not the Palace!”

  The woman tipped her head to one side, frowning. “Not the Palace? Why not?”

  Lark dropped her eyes to Bramble’s limp form, and bit her lip. She dared not say anything more.

  It was a long, cold wait there in the empty field. The farmwife, who wore a full-length goat-hair coat, seemed not to notice Lark’s shivering as the morning wore on to noon. Bramble lay still, panting slightly, her eyes closed. She needed water, Lark knew, and she needed to be truly warm, not lying on the half-frozen ground. Tup stamped his feet restlessly, but he stayed close. Lark cast him a grateful look.

  The farmwife seemed unimpressed by a winged horse in her pasture, but then Lark supposed the Academy flights drilled above her house often. Perhaps she had grown used to them.

  Just when Lark thought her jaw would burst from trying to clench her chattering teeth, a cart drawn by a pony pulled in at the far end of the field, circled around the stone fence that divided it from the lane, and bumped over the plowed furrows toward them. Lark tucked her coat around Bramble again and stood slowly, stretching her cramped knees, rubbing her icy hands up and down the sleeves of her tabard. Her pulse beat in her ears, and the icon of Kalla grew warm against her chest again, the only thing about her that wasn’t cold.

  The cart rattled to a stop beside them, the pony tossing his head and blowing clouds of fog. The farmer climbed out, stiffly and slowly, and joined his wife. The driver of the cart jumped down, and Tup snorted and backed away.

  Lark knew this man. The icon began to burn, and she plucked it away from her tabard with her fingers.

  It was the Duke’s Master Breeder who had come to fetch Bramble. It was Jinson. He looked down at the oc-hound huddled on the cold dirt, and his face was as pale as mountain snow. When he raised his eyes to Lark’s, she caught her breath at the look in them.

  “Is she dead?” he asked.

  Lark hesitated. She had no doubt he had known before he arrived that it was Bramble in the farmer’s field. “She’s half-dead,” Lark finally said. “She needs help.”

  The look on his face made her stomach turn. It was the face of a tormented man, a man with no choices left. He sidled closer, as if reluctant. “I’ll take her,” he said.

  Lark gripped the icon of Kalla in her cold fingers, and prayed.

  The old farmwife exclaimed, “Who’s that, then?” and pointed back to the lane beyond the stone fence.

  Lark and Jinson both looked up, and Lark’s heart leaped with joy.

  It was the Beeth carriage, with its footmen and two swift draught horses, coming down the lane toward the farmhouse, pulling up beside the entrance to the pasture. The door with its painted crest flew open, and Hester—Hester, tall, rangy, and strong—jumped out, and dashed toward them over the rough ground.

  “Oh!” Lark breathed. “Oh, Kalla’s heels, was there ever a more beautiful sight!”

  WITHthe help of Lady Beeth’s footmen, they bore Bramble tenderly home, still wrapped in Lark’s coat, laid on the cushions in the warmth of the carriage. Tup followed, his lead attached to a hitch ring on one

  side of the carriage, the footmen well to the opposite side so as not to upset him. Lark put his wingclips on before they set out, and spoke to him sternly about staying close to the draught horses, and to her. He tossed his head and snorted, as if to tell her he didn’t need any such warning.

  When everything was in order and they were on their way, having bid farewell to the farmer and his wife, and to a pale and anxious Jinson, Lark said, “Hester. He tried to kill her.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Duke William tried to kill Bramble.”

  “You don’t know that, Black.” Hester spoke in an even tone, but her eyes were dark with worry, too.

  “You couldn’t prove it.”

  “I couldn’t prove it, but I know it just the same. That’s why Jinson—” Lark’s voice broke. She bent to put her cheek on Bramble’s silky head, and the oc-hound sighed. “’Tis because of me. He blames me for—for everything! For Tup, and for Pamella, and for passing my Airs when he wanted so much for me to fail.”

  Hester didn’t speak for a long moment. She leaned forward to stroke Bramble, then settled back against the cushioned seat, frowning at the passing scenery. “Papá and two of the other Council Lords have had a meeting. Mamá arranged it. They believe the Duke to be unfit to rule.”

  “Then who?” Lark said.

  “Lord Francis,” Hester said with some regret. “Poor Lord Francis who prefers libraries to palaces. We like him, everyone does, but he has never wanted his brother’s position. He is too gentle to be Duke.”

  “What will the Council of Lords do about Duke William?” Lark asked cautiously.

  Hester turned away from watching the bare winter fields spin by. “Nothing,” she said. “Nothing at all. It requires a unanimous decision, and most of the Council, Mamá says, reveres the rule of succession. It would take something truly awfu
l—and more than just rumor—for them to depose the Duke.”

  “So the paternity suit . . .”

  “Has come to nothing. Everyone believes the girl is telling the truth, but the court found she could not prove it.”

  “Which leaves only Pamella.”

  Hester nodded, her face grim. “And she will never speak of it, I suspect.”

  “I wish Mistress Winter were here,” Lark said, a little plaintively. She was tired of worrying, tired of watching over her shoulder day and night.

  “So do we all,” Hester said. “So do we all.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  PETERwas sent ahead to pull back the leather panel covering the hut, and Philippa hurried past him, ducking under the sagging doorfame into the dark, noisome space. Sunny stood at one side, her head hanging, her wings drooping. She still wore her flying saddle. Her flanks were frighteningly gaunt, and there was no sign of water anywhere.

  “Sunny,” Philippa murmured. She hurried to her, saying over her shoulder, “Peter, water! Sunny needs water, and right away!”

  Sunny’s head came up at the sound of her voice, and the horse stumbled forward a couple of steps. She whickered, but it was a dry, weak sort of sound.

  “Damn them,” Philippa said, but she said it softly, even as she held Sunny’s head close in her arms.

  “Damn them! Oh, Sunny, Kalla’s teeth, what have they done?”

  Sunny pressed close against her, snorting faintly, breathing in her scent. Philippa stroked her a moment, and then stepped to her side to undo the breast strap and cinches, to slide the flying saddle off, and the saddle blanket after that. She bit her lip at the cold, wet coat beneath it. It must have been a misery all night. She turned the saddle blanket, and began to scrub at Sunny’s back with it, cursing steadily and fervently under her breath.

  Peter came back and stood staring openmouthed at her.

  Sunny smelled the water in the bowl he held and stepped forward to plunge her muzzle into it. Peter held the bowl as she drank, his thin arms shaking.

  Philippa looked past him to where Hurg, feet planted wide as if to claim the place for his own, stood in the doorway, framed by the snowy background beyond. She gestured with her chin at him. “Even if she would let you fly, you’d fall and kill yourself,” she said.

  He stared back at her, his eyes flat and stubborn. She knew he didn’t understand her words, but she suspected the meaning was clear enough.

  Peter said, “Missus. He wants you to tie him on.”

  Philippa snorted. “Tie him on? He’ll never get near her. Does he know that?”

  “I tried to explain,” Peter said. “But I don’t know enough words. And now he thinks, because your horse lets me near . . .”

  “You’re only a boy,” Philippa said. “Two more years, and she wouldn’t have anything to do with you.”

  “I know that, Missus, he don’t. He don’t know nothing about winged horses.”

  Sunny finished the water and lipped around the bowl, searching for more. “Later, Sunny,” Philippa said, patting her. “Not too much yet.” She was relieved to see Sunny pick up her wings and fold them, rib to rib. Her eyes looked a bit brighter, and her breathing sounded better already.

  “Will she be all right, then?” Peter asked.

  Philippa nodded, keeping a protective arm around the mare’s neck. “She’s all right for the moment,” she said. “But we have to get away from here, Peter.”

  “Can she fly with us? Both of us?”

  “No.” Philippa cast a glance at Hurg, who had taken a step closer. “No,” she repeated. “Together we would be too heavy.”

  “There’s no place to go, anyway,” Peter said sadly. “I’ve tried it lots of times. They always find me. The last time Hurg knocked me in the head, and I lost my tooth.”

  Philippa touched his shoulder, wishing she could comfort him. Sunny, with a snort of fear, laid her ears flat and began to back up.

  Philippa spun about.

  Hurg was coming toward them, his rolling gait making him look like some sort of bearded drunkard. He had the rope he had used on Peter in his hands, coiled, but with one end free. He had made a loop in it, and was holding it out, ready to put it over Sunny’s head.

  The Aesk chieftain had such an aura of sweat and fish and ancient furs about him that Philippa wondered it didn’t choke him. Sunny’s nostrils flared, showing red. She had little room to move, and when her hindquarters struck the sod wall, her hocks bent as if she would try to back right through it.

  “No!” Philippa shouted at Hurg. “She won’t tolerate it!”

  But Hurg, his narrow eyes gleaming with avarice, pressed forward. He even began to swing the rope, as if to throw it. Philippa tried to step in his path, but he batted her away with the coiled rope. She dragged at his heavy arm with both hands, and he swung a fist at her. She fell back just enough that the blow missed, but she lost her footing in the dirt. By the time she regained her balance, Hurg was within rope’s throw distance of Sunny. The mare whinnied in fear, and reared, her front hooves clawing the air a hand’s breadth from the barbarian’s face.

  Hurg hesitated for the first time. A winged horse on its hind legs, hooves flailing, teeth bared, was a daunting sight. He even took a half step backward, but then, with a muttered exclamation, lunged forward again. Perhaps he had meant to surprise the horse, to get the rope around her neck before she could evade it.

  Winter Sunset exploded. Her wings opened, though Philippa cried out to her to keep them closed, and they beat uselessly in the cramped space. Her forefeet came down, barely missing Hurg’s face, and she reared again, striking her head on the thatched roof so that pieces of it fell in dusty clods over her back, over Hurg’s head, over Philippa. Hurg roared something, and one of his guards, the whites of his eyes showing, ran into the hut and froze, openmouthed, transfixed by the sight of a winged horse in fury.

  Philippa said, “Peter! She might kill him if he doesn’t—” But it was too late. Sunny whirled, and fired at Hurg with both hind feet, so fast the movement was impossible to see. She caught him directly in the

  chest.

  Hurg’s body sailed across the hut, slamming against the wall, slumping to the dirt floor. The guard shrieked, and ran.

  But Sunny wasn’t finished. She had been pushed too far, and until Philippa could get her away from the smell of men, she wouldn’t be calm. She bucked, and squealed, and her wings flapped against the walls, against the floor, against Philippa as she tried to get close. She kicked at random, so that even Philippa had to fall back.

  “Peter! I have to get her outside!”

  And Peter, shouting something in the Aesk language, managed to clear the guards from the door, to get Jonka out of the way. Leaving Hurg where he was, stunned and still, Philippa seized Sunny’s rein, and pulled, calling her name.

  At last, with Aesks shouting and running around them, Philippa and Sunny were out in the clean air, where Sunny stood, sides heaving, breathing the cold scent of snow, cleansing her nostrils of Hurg’s scent. Philippa finally succeeded in persuading her to fold her wings. Warriors, keeping their distance but with spears at the ready, circled them. Jonka, having retrieved her knife, stood to one side with the weapon in her fist, a look of satisfaction on her ruined face. Peter stayed by Philippa’s side, the two of them with their backs to the winged horse, facing the enemy all around them.

  Hurg, looking dazed, staggered out of the hut. He lurched over to Jonka and seized her knife from her hand. He turned, with the knife held out before him, and loudly proclaimed something.

  Peter said, “Nay! Nay!” His freckles stood out on his ashen face.

  Philippa said, “What is it, Peter? What’s happening?” Peter said, in a tone of pure horror, “Missus!

  Zito’s ears, Missus. He says if he can’t fly her, he might as well eat her!”

  SNOWfell intermittently all day, covering the meanness of the compound with clean, glittering white. Not until evening did the snow stop. A hard win
d blew in from the sea, and the clouds lifted, showing cold white stars and a frozen landscape. Philippa and Peter shivered together in the hut, where they had been forced to go by Hurg and the guards. Through the crack in the door, they saw that a great fire had been started in the fire pit.

  “I can’t believe he would do this,” Philippa said, over and over, in an agony of fear for her mare. “It’s an abomination.”

  “All I know is,” Peter said once, “there’s been no meat in this place since we came. Only fish, fish, and more fish.”

  Many times, Philippa pulled back the leather panel to beg to see Jonka, or Lissie, or Hurg. Each time the guard leveled his spear at her, flat face unreadable. Only the wardog seemed to respond, so that the last time she had gone out, the beast wagged its tail when it saw her. This won it a vicious yank on the collar, but it still watched Philippa with something like intelligence.

  My only ally, she thought. A dog.

  Sunny had been circling the shallow valley all through the afternoon, whinnying, calling to her bondmate.

  Philippa had screamed at her, when the Aesks dragged her and Peter away, to run, and Sunny had, her wings rippling beside her, her red mane and tail flecked with snow. One or two of the warriors, to Philippa’s horror, had thrown spears at her, but their weapons were clumsy, with their double points, and their range was short. Still, Sunny would not go far, not with Philippa still in the compound. She galloped around the rim of the valley, neighing frantically, and the wardogs responded with barks and howls. By the time the bonfire was raging, Philippa was dry-mouthed and shaking with fear.

  “They can’t catch her,” Peter said.