by Terah Edun
She dropped down onto the dry grass, not quite sure if it was ready to welcome a new spring yet. The grass crunched beneath her feet as she walked slowly with a hand outstretched, trying not to scare the newcomers. It didn’t matter: they still whirled away with tails high and eyes wary.
“Hey, hey,” Mae called out to the skittish new herd members.
They were avoiding her, nervously prancing around the sides of the holding’s piebald mare and yearling filly, keeping other horseflesh between her and them. Mae snorted. It was a good tactic, and unfortunately, the paddock was large enough that if the strange horses decided to run, she wouldn’t get close enough to touch them.
Biting her lip, Mae tried a different tactic. She turned to the stallion of the herd. He was cordoned off by a rope at the end of the paddock. Physically, the line was enough of a barrier that he wouldn’t cross it unless enraged, and luckily for them all, Shadow was one of the most relaxed stallions the holding had ever seen.
He also happened to like food more than mischief, and just his luck—there was a fruit tree on his side of the paddock. As it was just past winter, it wasn’t flowering yet, but that was all right—there was a wooden barrel filled with water, apples, and a casting spell to keep them from perishing for just such an occasion. As soon as she crossed his line, Shadow came up to her and gave her a sniff and a nudge—instructions clear as day that he wanted a treat. Mae acquiesced to his demands by reaching into the barrel, fishing out two whole apples. Without delay, Shadow was chomping down on his favorite treats, and before long, Mae heard the rest of the herd walking over to see what she was giving their leader and not them.
She smiled; she had them exactly where she wanted them…as long as the strangers were interested too.
Shadow trumpeted a warning for them not to come over into his side or near his tree.
He might be easygoing, their Shadow, but even he had limits.
Thankful that he hadn’t seen fit to challenge her, Mae gave him another half apple, stuffed three more in her pockets, and trotted back to the divide. This time she had bribes, so she’d see if the strangers would take a bite.
After passing out bits to her own herd, Mae waited and waited, but then it worked just as she’d thought it would. Two of the new horses, ears pricked up in interest, came forward to receive their treats, and soon enough, she was accepted…or, at the very least, tolerated. Enough to get up close to see the brands on their necks, who their owner was, and maybe what they were doing in Mae’s commune. If they wore the brand of a local farm or even a reputable breeder, Mae would guess the riders were here to discuss trading ahead of the seasonal fairs. Not those horses in particular, but whatever stock they had on hand. If the numbers were large enough and the in-kind trading good enough, they could do the deal without having to barter over a few days in the hot weather.
But to Mae’s surprise, the brand she was expecting—maybe for the holding a few miles or even a city-state away—did not appear. Instead, an entirely foreign brand written in a cursive script met her eyes. It was a circle, and within was a rampant lion and a script she didn’t recognize around the border.
“How strange,” muttered Mae.
“Strange would be one word for it.”
Mae jumped nearly a foot in the air at the voice that came out of nowhere.
Whirling around, she saw a smiling face staring at her over the backs of three other horses.
Mae stepped around the head of the horse she had been reviewing and into a clearer section of the paddock. The female stranger did the same.
“You like the horse?” the woman asked with an accent that was hard to place. It was clear she was fluent in Mae’s tongue, though.
“More curious than anything else,” Mae answered.
“Fair enough,” the woman said as she hiked up the saddle, she’d been carrying to shoulder height and placed it on the back of the horse she’d been approaching. “Spring is coming,” she said cheerfully. “You must be happy the weather is warming up.”
“Not much to be happy about here.”
“And why is that?” the woman asked as she set a saddle on one of her horse’s backs.
Mae blinked. “In case you hadn’t noticed, our family is ill.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, a lot of your kingdom is,” the woman replied.
Mae crossed her arms. She didn’t like this woman’s tone. Who was she to talk like this to Mae?
“Doesn’t mean we’re not hurting still,” Mae said, acknowledging that what the woman had said was true, but so was Mae’s pain.
“On that we agree,” the woman said as she turned her horse around. Mae soon saw she was reaching for the adjustment straps on the other side. But she did something different this time. She casually raised her hands and snapped her fingers. Just as quickly the straps rose up to meet her hands.
She just did magic! Mae thought. She had heard something like that wasn’t unheard of outside of the kingdom she made her home in, but to see it in person…even something as easy as physically calling an object to hand…from a female was a revelation to Mae.
Biting her lip, Mae wished the woman could do some more but as she shifted uneasily in wait, there was nothing. Which made sense, as her checks of the rest of the saddle was by touch and feel. Before long the foreigner caught on to Mae’s intense interest and turned to her.
“Do you want to learn how to do this?” the woman asked in a bemused tone.
“No, sorry,” Mae mumbled as she flushed and quickly looked away—not wanting to be caught staring again.
By luck, she found herself just as riveted by the horse’s neck. Which bore the same brand as before. One she recognized, because she would be stupid not to. It was the mark of the Kingdom of Nardes’ archrival. It also included the seal of the house of Algardis. A land Mae knew little about, other than her holy rulers thought the twin empresses of the foreign nation were apostates. Apparently, the feeling was mutual, because the border, which her holding was near enough to see but never breach, was always closed.
So seeing a foreign stranger was not only unusual, it could possibly be dangerous.
“Why are you here?” Mae asked, resting her hand on the familiar neck of her herd’s piebald mare.
Mae wasn’t much of a rider, but she could get away if needed…or scream for help from the stable boys. But surely they knew this foreign female was here. Why else would horses with such a brand be amongst the family’s own?
“I’m a guest of your household,” the woman said.
“For what reason?”
“I think that is something you’d best ask your elders.”
Mae frowned. That wasn’t an answer. But it seemed like all she was going to get.
Changing the subject, Mae asked, “You have four horses. Three riders with you?”
The woman gave her a mysterious smile. “Only two.”
Mae eyed the horses and shrugged, figuring the fourth would be a backup horse in case any of the others went lame on their journey.
Apparently eager to turn the tide of questions onto Mae, the stranger asked, “What’s your name?”
Mae wasn’t sure she wanted to tell her—their holding wasn’t used to strangers, and no good usually came of them. But this woman had been welcomed in by someone, so it was only polite of Mae to offer up her greetings.
Before she could make up her mind, though, the woman said, “I’m Donna Marie SunReaver.”
What a strange last name, Mae thought, but she didn’t say that aloud, figuring the customs of the Algardians were different from her own.
Instead, she shook Donna Marie’s hand when she offered it. “Maeryn Darnes.”
“Well, Maeryn,” Donna Marie said as she swung up into the saddle, “what brought you rushing out of your castle in such a tizzy?”
Mae blushed. She hadn’t known Donna Marie had seen her.
Still, she answered flatly, “That family illness you were so blasé about.” Her voice was as dry a
s noon wind.
“Hmm, it’s tough, isn’t it? Seeing someone you care about ailing?” Donna Marie said.
It wasn’t really a question that needed an answer. Mae looked down and kicked up a clod of dirt. “Yes, it is.”
“I can’t say it always gets better,” Donna Marie said. “But I know that if it was me, I wouldn’t be standing around doing nothing.”
Mae’s head snapped up. At the moment, the foreign woman was looking off toward the holding gates with her gaze shaded, as if she hadn’t just insulted Mae to her core.
“You don’t know anything about me!” Mae shouted. “I am doing what I can to help them.”
Donna Marie turned to her with flat eyes. “Standing around in a paddock moping?”
“No,” Mae said, furious. “Thinking, planning, strategizing.”
“Oh. You could have fooled me.”
Mae snarled. “You don’t have any idea what I’ve been through.”
Donna Marie shrugged. “That is true. But when you’re done strategizing and want to do something about that illness, perhaps come find me.”
Then she picked up her reins and urged her horse toward the paddock gate, leaving Mae behind, mouth agape, and staring after her in enraged shock.
10
After that confrontation, one thing was clear to Mae: she must do something.
She couldn’t sit around moping or wishing for a cure. She had to act!
So she turned on her heel and walked out of the paddock. She was in such a hurry that she didn’t even remember to hand out the last of the apple treats. Instead, she rushed back to where this had all begun.
Mae made it back to her hiding place in record time, but upon reaching the shadowy nook where she had carefully placed the tome which would begin her journey, she saw it was gone.
No trace of the book remained, even after she picked up the cloth that had been partially hiding it and checked in other corners of the corridor, afraid she had made a mistake.
But she had not. It was gone.
As panic set in and her motivation dwindled at another setback, Mae remembered what the woman in the paddock had said, and that more than anything else told Mae she was on the right track. Could the gods have possibly sent a clearer message? This was meant to be, and she had to be the one to do it. But first she needed the casting instructions, and Mae knew that if someone had stolen her text, there was a fairly small range of people it could be.
In fact, only one person had seen her with it and put two and two together. It had to be Ember. To be fair, Mae blamed Ember for a lot of things, but in her experience, if it walked like a duck and quacked like one, it was a duck. And her sister was known to interfere where she didn’t belong. And what better way to upset Mae’s plans than to take the source of their power away from her?
Even if Ember had no clue what Mae intended to do with the text, she had the right idea. Without what was in those pages, Mae was powerless. Determined to get it back, she raced off toward their family’s corridors, where she hoped Ember would be hiding like a thief seeking refuge. Mae was fuming mad by the time she hit the stretch of rooms that deadened into their shared space. So mad that she wasn’t really looking where she was going, and when she ran around a corner at full speed, she did so straight into another body.
They both went flying.
Just before she hit the ground, the sound of pottery shattering met her ears. Whatever he’d been carrying fell hard enough that its contents, including pellets of grain, hit her on the face as she got up.
Sitting up and trying to brush off the grains, Mae realized she’d plowed into another person she didn’t know, this time a boy. Her guilt at making him break his grain vessel was quickly overtaken by annoyance that it seemed her home and community was being invaded.
Perfect, Mae thought in disgust. Another stranger.
She was not pleased. Mae had grown up in a holding where family was everything and almost no interaction with outsiders was permitted. It was just the way their ethos worked. Select older representatives of the family journeyed beyond the greater holding walls to interact with other members of the Nardes kingdom and outsiders, like the boy she had run into. What experiences they brought back to share with the group as a whole was the extent of knowledge Mae and her siblings had about the outside world, until they were old enough to experience it themselves.
Every interaction otherwise was carefully monitored, which was also why Mae had been looking forward to the harvest festival. It was a chance to get together with individuals from other holdings. To make friends, to dance, and to be joyful, even if the cloud of death still hung over them all. But that wasn’t important now. What was important was a second stranger wandering about her grounds unattended. This one was dressed even worse than Donna Marie.
He had on torn, patchy pants under a top that hadn’t seen a wash in weeks. Mae could tell by the numerous food stains on it…and the rips. If he hadn’t been scowling from where he lay on the ground, she might even have felt sorry for him. Obviously from the state of his clothes, the other two foreigners he traveled with weren’t taking care of him.
Maybe it’s not their job, Mae thought as she kept looking him over. But if they’re going to treat him so poorly, why would he be traveling with them?
The boy was staring at her as blatantly as she was him. Neither of them was shy, it seemed. Though he took it to another level, preening under her observation…and glowering.
It was the strangest thing to witness, and as he moved to brush off some stray grains that had landed on him, she finally was able to yank her focus off those tantalizing eyes and instead look at his regular skin color. Regular because every other inch of his skin that she could see was dark with dirt, even his cheeks. Though she realized that the last bit might have been because of her. Momentarily distracted, Mae grimaced and tried to fling the mixture of mud and grain off the cuffs of her sleeves. It didn’t really work, which meant not only had she scuffed her boots, but also potentially ruined a new tunic.
“Perfect,” Mae muttered, fed up with how much worse this day was getting with every passing hour.
As he stood up and leaned forward with his hand out, ostensibly to help Mae rise from the ground where her butt was solidly planted, Mae noticed something odd. Well, odder than the terrible state of his clothes and face. He smelled. And not in a good way. His scent was like a pig farmer that had just finished rolling in offal and decided to top it off with a sweaty run in the field.
She couldn’t help it. She commented on it.
“Well, that certainly woke me up,” she said as she took her first deep whiff. It wasn’t intentional. The breath had been knocked out of her by her fall, and her lungs still needed air.
“You ran into me.”
“Yes,” Mae said, a little dazed and winded.
This time it wasn’t her airways that were causing the problem, though. She had only briefly seen his eyes before. But now they were wide open. Only because he was staring at her in anger, true, but Mae realized that whereas everything else about him was as earthly as she was—disturbingly so, with the smell and dirtiness and bottled-up rage—his eyes were ethereal. Large and brown, with a shimmer that looked like it was responding to the sunlight pouring in all around them from the windows above. Mae was stupefied.
She’d never seen anything like it. Nardes was not a kingdom with others. All her people were the same; all her people were uniform. So seeing someone with those eyes, eyes that changed, and she couldn’t even pinpoint them as one hue…well, that was a first for Mae. Then she looked past his eyes, to the sharp arch of his nose and cheekbones and hair that was full of riotous curls. It was hard to tell exactly what color his mane naturally was, but the hair that wasn’t dirty seemed blonde at the roots. She looked over his head and down to the almost shoulder-length curls, and they were darker.
Maybe a dye? But it was as much of a mystery as everything else about the boy.
Well, everything except th
e foul stench that followed him around like a cloak.
Mae half turned away to disguise reaching up with the back of her hand to briefly cover her nose. At least for a time she could breathe through her mouth, although inhaling the scent was its own special punishment.
As she turned back and politely dropped her hand to hide the fact that she had to take a moment to compose herself, the boy asked her, “Problem?”
“No,” Mae said hastily. “No problem.”
That was the kindest thing she had done all day. Maybe even this week. Lying to a person to spare them humiliation.
Trying to ease around the subject, she said, “Long few days on the road?”
He scratched his armpit like a heathen and then replied, “Not particularly.”
Swallowing the bile that rose in her throat at his manners, or lack thereof, Mae said weakly, “Surely then there’s…a reason for your…ah…”
She hesitated to say the word, but he looked clueless as to what she was hinting at, and even if she wanted to be kind, there was no way he was just going to wander about her holding with that foul stench following him around. It was unpleasant being in his presence, and made her feel like taking a bath right that moment. She couldn’t imagine letting him just meander away to inflict this sort of stench on others if she could help it.
The problem was that getting him to do anything about it meant bringing up what it was.
“My what?” the boy asked with raised eyebrows. The expression on his face almost dared her to challenge him.
He’s cocky, this one, Mae thought, almost impressed. Unfortunately for him, she was more revolted by his lack of bodily care than impressed by his repartee.
So she just said it.
“You stink,” she blurted out.
“Do I? I hadn’t noticed.”
Now that she had gone ahead and said it, Mae saw no reason to hide her actions in an effort to be politer. So she raised her forearm to block her nose.