Firebrand

“Next thing I know, she’s haltering him and hooking him to the crossties in the aisle. All of this one-handed, of course. After brushing him, she brought out his tack. I think she must have heard the floorboards of the loft creak as I shifted my weight, because she looked up and demanded, ‘Who’s there?’ I replied, ‘No one.’ ‘Well, No One,’ she said, ‘why don’t you come down here and show yourself.’ I remember thinking her rather frightful with her red hair and sharp voice. She could not have been more than seventeen at the time, but she seemed very old to me. I had been taught, of course, to be respectful of elders, so I obeyed and climbed down from the loft.

“She was a fairly new Rider then and did not know me on sight. Royal princes don’t normally spend time in common stables. I think she probably thought I was one of the other castle children. ‘Well, No One,’ she said, ‘what are you doing here?’ ‘Nothing,’ I replied. ‘Nothing, eh? Then you can help me put a bridle on this horse.’ And so I did. We saddled Bluebird, and she led him out to the pasture with me opening gates for her.

“She stood there, staring at Bluebird, then prepared to mount. I told her she couldn’t do that, not with her arm in a sling. ‘Whether I can or can’t,’ she said, ‘I have to try.’ You probably won’t be surprised to know that she made it onto Bluebird’s back.”

“No,” Karigan murmured, “not at all.”

“She managed the reins one-handed and rode about the pasture, crouched over in pain. You see, Bluebird was green, hardly gentled, and Laren was green, as well. You know that she’s from Penburn?”

“Yes.”

“From a family of river drivers, many generations counting. She knew boats on unsteady river currents, but not horses. I learned later that two days previous, Bluebird had thrown her off into the paddock fence. She smashed a whole section of it. The hazards Green Riders face are numerous, and horses are just the beginning.”

“When did she realize who you were?” Karigan asked.

Zachary smiled. His story had engaged her. He hoped it distracted her from the pain, at least a little. “Joss found me watching her ride. She overheard him address me as ‘Your Royal Highness.’ I think her face blushed as red as her hair.” He chuckled. “As you can imagine, she had made quite an impression on me, and I think I fell a little in love with her the way a young boy might. I kept turning up at Rider stables to look for her and help with Bluebird—against my grandmother’s wishes, of course. Laren was soon called to the throne room to explain herself. I would have loved to have seen those two formidable women in that face-to-face encounter, but I was not invited. They must have come to some accord, for after that, Laren became a strong presence in my life—not as a tutor, not as a mentor, exactly, but as an elder companion who looked out for me when she wasn’t on a message errand. Because of her, I learned at an early age the stern stuff of which Riders are made.”

After a quiet moment, Karigan said, “Thank you.”

He touched the tent wall as if doing so would bring her closer to him, almost like a caress.

Telling the story had helped him, too. It took his mind away from what had been done to him, away from worries about Second Empire, and it brought other memories to the fore, of Laren reading to him when he was sick or feeling sad, going riding with her, playing games, the countless ways in which she had made his childhood much brighter.

He closed his eyes and almost imagined that Karigan pressed her hand against his from the other side of the tent wall.

BROKEN

Nyssa came into Karigan’s mind whenever she was most vulnerable, when the pain was intolerable and she felt weak and useless and endlessly tired. Nyssa came in dreams, too, or in the gray haze between sleep and waking and, of late, even when Karigan was fully awake and lying prone in Enver’s tent. She came flailing the thongs of her whip.

“You are broken,” Nyssa said.

Broken, broken, broken . . .

The words burrowed deeply into Karigan’s soul, worse than barbs into her flesh, and she knew Nyssa spoke truth.

Nyssa made her relive not only the flogging, but she brought the shadow of Cade to her, as well. He told her yet again how she had failed him. “It is all your fault,” he told her, “that I suffer.”

“No, no, no,” she murmured. She crushed bedding in her clenched hands.

“Karigan,” Estral said, “wake up. You’re having bad dreams again.”

Karigan gazed up at her. “Was . . . was I loud?”

“Not particularly. I was just looking in on you.” Estral placed her wrist against Karigan’s forehead. “Your fever doesn’t seem to be back. That’s good.”

Karigan realized she was dripping with sweat.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Estral asked.

Her voice, Karigan noted, seemed to be eroding by the slightest amounts. “No,” she replied.

Estral’s lips formed a narrow line.

“I’m fine.” Karigan wiped sweat from her brow.

Estral shook her head. “If you are fine, maybe you would feel even better getting cleaned up in the hot spring. It’s quite wonderful, and Enver says it has minerals with healing qualities.”

It did sound enticing.

Go ahead, Nyssa murmured in her mind. Try it. But you won’t feel any better.

Go away, Karigan thought back at the apparition.

You are not strong enough to send me away.