Jorin had come to stand next to her, his forepaws on the box edge, neck stretched and ears pricked. From him too she felt only fascination, not fear.
“All right.” She eased the lid down, leaving it slightly ajar. Was she being foolish? Ancestors only knew what shape the wyrm might take next, with what animal needs. Then too, it had bitten her brother and presumably been blood-bound to him. It might even have gotten a taste of her blood as they had grappled on the kitchen floor. If so, did one binding supersede the other? In Tori’s absence, what would it do?
“Prrrr . . . ” rumbled the cocoon, and seemed to bump against her hand.
“Where are you?” she asked the voice in the wall. “Come out.”
“Now, why would I do that?” The voice had changed subtly. Now it mocked her. “You don’t want this pathetic little half-breed, do you? Your neglect makes that clear.”
Jame took a deep breath. “Greshan. Uncle. Let him go.”
“Why should I? What use do you have for him?”
“Graykin, listen: in twelve days I leave for the hills and Winter’s Day by way of Mount Alban. I want to take you there, to the Scrollsmen’s College, to learn all you can about Kothifir, the Southern Wastes, and especially about Urakarn.”
“And why should I-he want to do that?”
“If I’m assigned to the Southern Host, I want to know what to expect. In the spring he-you can go south as my spy-master. Thanks to my brother, I have the money to send you. Neither of us has to scrape for clothes or food again.”
Her only answer was a soft, fading laugh that might almost have ended in a sob.
The next few days saw a rash of practical jokes in the Knorth barracks, some funny as such things went, others not.
Among the former, someone cut off every pair of Vant’s pants at the knees and turned all of Rue’s clothes inside-out—something she only discovered during morning assembly. Mint received a nicely wrapped present of fresh manure and Killy, the gift of a dead mouse in his boot. Less amusing was the pebble in the porridge that broke one cadet’s tooth and a trip wire at the head of the stairs that nearly caused a clutch of broken necks.
Everyone knew that their lordan’s Southron servant was behind all of this. Jame wondered if Greshan wanted Graykin completely discredited, just when she had found a real job for him, maybe because it would take him away from Tentir. Perhaps Greshan still had business here. It wasn’t altogether logical, but then neither had been her uncle, from what she could make out. Such sly, stupid malice seemed his trademark, alive or dead.
Moreover, with his door now hanging on one hinge, Gray’s sanctuary was gone. Cadets came and went freely, looking for wearable or stolen clothes. Meanwhile, Jorin mounted a fascinated guard on the chest that contained the wyrm’s cocoon. Jame could have ordered everyone out. Perhaps she should have; but it did help clear the air somewhat that the haunted chambers had at last been thrown open.
However, Jame was still in a quandary. She wanted the Southron found, but not if it led to some outraged cadet wringing his neck. The link between them told her that Graykin was cold, hungry, and miserable. She hadn’t done right by him. Now her nose was being rubbed in it at the cost of his suffering. She could only hope that he emerged on his own before she left for the hills. In her absence, there was no telling what might happen to him, so high was feeling against him running.
So she told the horse-master when she met him uphill on the fifty-second of Autumn.
“Assume a responsibility and you’re responsible for it,” he said, dumping a load of tack on the ground. “What’s strange about that?”
“Nothing, I suppose. It just gets so complicated.”
“Not that I can see. Take the chicken. Lure ’em up.”
Jame rummaged in her sack, found the knobby end of a greasy leg, and wrenched it free. Discovering that the rathorn loved roast chicken had made things a lot easier, although she wondered about the wisdom of training him with treats. After all, what happened if the henhouse ran dry?
Death’s-head snuffled at it. His nostrils were fiery pits in his ivory mask, not unlike his red eyes but deeper. He had the breath of a carnivore and the teeth of one too. His jaws gaped and he snapped the offered fowl from her hand, barely missing her fingers. Simultaneously, the horse-master dropped a saddle on his back.
“Now feed ’em a breast.”
The rathorn was still chewing, chicken bones crunching in his powerful jaws. Jame had learned that he could digest anything, probably up to rocks if a lump of one should take his fancy. If driven to it, he could even eat small trees, although they turned his droppings bright green.
As he bit down on the breast, the horse-master threaded the girth and drew it taut. Given the slick ivory plates sheathing the rathorn’s barrel, the tighter the better. Riding him bareback, to the extent that she could, meant gripping exclusively with her knees as her feet could find no purchase further down.
“Now let’s see if he’ll accept a hackamore.”
This proved more difficult. As soon as he saw the bitless bridle, the rathorn snorted and tossed his head up out of reach.
“Oh, come on!”
The horse-master jumped, caught the nasal horn, and tried to pull it down. Instead, the colt raised his head higher until the man dangled from it and went on chewing, cross-eyed with pleasure. When he swallowed, Jame put the open sack on the ground. Instantly the ivory mask swooped down to the partially dismembered chicken and the master tumbled free. Jame slipped the noseband around the beast’s muzzle and had it buckled at his poll before he had found his favorite tidbit. Clipping on the reins only took a moment.
“There we go, at last,” said the master, rubbing his sore bottom where he had been dumped. “Next time will be easier. I hope. Up you go.”
He hoisted her into the saddle between its tall cantle and pommel. The tree also rode high to accommodate the rathorn’s spine when it roached up.
Death’s-head went on rooting in the sack.
How far it seemed to the ground. Even secure in the new saddle, Jame felt as if she were at the top of a high, unstable ladder. The horse-master’s bald head only came to her knee.
“Master, are animals ever evil?”
He looked up. “A fine time to ask me that. I’ve met some that were vicious and a few that didn’t seem right in the head, but evil? No.”
“I knew one once. My father’s war-horse Iron-Jaw. Come to think of it, though, that was only after he turned into a haunt. Before that, he was just bloody-minded. Either way, I was truly scared of him.”
The rathorn raised his head, jaws dripping grease, and shook himself so hard that Jame nearly fell off despite the saddle.
“Here we go,” said the master.
And there they went.
On the fifty-third of Autumn, Tentir had visitors.
When they arrived, Jame was practicing armed, mounted combat in the training square, and making a thorough mess of it. She had been given too heavy a sword and shield, also a walleyed horse who shied at everything. Arguably, most of the weapons in the armory were above her weight. As hard as she trained for strength, there were limits which not all instructors chose to recognize.
“If you can’t cut, hack!” the Coman sargent in charge roared at her.
She tried, and was easily disarmed by her opponent. Simultaneously, her mount decided that now was a good time to spook at a shadow.
On her back in the dirt, fighting to regain the breath that had been knocked out of her, she was at first glad of the obstacle that blocked the sun’s glaring eye, then puzzled by it. This unexpected eclipse had a corona of white hair and a familiar voice.
“Are you all right?”
“Kindrie!”