By that afternoon, the tailor’s wife had one shirt ready for her to try on. Paks would gladly have taken it then, but the woman insisted that she must do more work. “See on the inside, lady? The edges there? I’ll turn those down, and they’ll not ravel or be rough—”
“But—”
“Nay, we’re proud of our work, my husband and me—we won’t let such as this leave our hands. But I’ll have it tomorrow, by lunchtime, and the other plain shirts in two days—unless you’d rather have the trousers first?”
Paks thought of all the riding she’d be doing, and asked for the trousers next. Outside the shop, she headed for the saddler’s, and bought a jug of the heavy oil he used on his leathers. In Doggal’s yard, she found the smith forging heavy wagon fittings, and waited outside until he paused.
The next morning she was able to bridle and saddle the black horse without help—but with constant support from the ring. Sevri offered to hold the rein, but Paks feared the horse might hurt her. Instead, she faced him into a corner. Her attempt at a quick mount felt as rough as the day before, but she had gained the saddle before he moved out from under her. She pulled the left rein gently, and he turned toward the gate. Once out from between the walls, the horse seemed slightly calmer. Paks turned him along a path between the back of the inn yard and a cottage garden, and then through the fields behind the village. She found the ford the Marshal had spoken of by following a cow path, and the black horse pranced gingerly through the swift shallows, rocks rolling under his hooves. Now she had reached the lower end of the grange drill field; she could see the Marshal standing near the grange. Ambros, mounted on a rangy bay, rode around the barton wall from the street as she came up.
“You made it safely, I see,” said the Marshal. “Ambros rides three times a week, and this will give both of you practice in riding with others.”
Paks said nothing. The black horse had laid his ears back flat at the sight of the other horse.
In the next few days, Paks acquired a whole new set of bruises. The Marshal was as hard a riding master as Siger had been in weapons training. Like all occasional riders, Paks hated to trot—but the Marshal insisted that they trot most of the time. He was particular about the placement of her feet, the way she held the rein, the angle of her head. But the black horse no longer jumped out from under her. She could control his pace, and stop him, turn and return, without difficulty. Much of the time she did not need the action of the ring, except for grooming and mounting.
She could ride along the roads, now, and spent several hours a day learning where they led. The Marshal had told her that such quiet slow work was excellent for a high-strung mount.
But at night she dreamed of the snowcat, and woke, sweaty and trembling. Once it was the black horse’s neck that Macenion hacked at, instead of the cat. Another time a shadowy spotted creature followed her along the trails she’d ridden that day, disappearing when she tried to turn on it. Every time she used the ring on the horse, she felt a pang of remorse. At last she decided to talk to the Kuakgan about it.
This time, as she came in sight of the clearing, she saw the Kuakgan talking to another near the fountain. Uncertain, she paused. She could hear nothing from where she stood, and wondered whether to intrude or go back. She turned to look the way she had come, and froze. No path lay behind her. The white stones that should have marked one had disappeared, and a tree rose inches from her back. She shuddered, sweat springing out on her neck and back, crawling down her ribs. She looked forward, and the clearing was open before her. Master Oakhallow beckoned. She saw no one else. Paks took a deep breath and stepped out of the trees. As she came nearer the fountain, she felt the quiet deepen. She laid the oatcake Hebbinford had given her in the basin.
“It is well,” said Master Oakhallow in his deep voice, “that you did not try to leave again. The unsteady of purpose find my grove unsettling.”
“Sir, it is not that,” said Paks. “But you were speaking to another. I would not intrude.”
He smiled. “Your courtesy is appreciated. But you could not have come nearer than I wished. Enough: you came with a purpose. What troubles you?”
Paks did not want to meet his eyes. “Sir, I did not take the time to tell you all that happened on our way across the mountains—”
“You had no need to tell me all, or anything you would not,” he interrupted. “But you shied from some part of your tale, and it speaks in your eyes yet. Is it this you came for?”
Paks felt her heart begin to hammer against her ribs. She wished she had gone to Marshal Cedfer. She wished she had done nothing at all. From everything she had heard of the Kuakkganni—their deep love of wild things, their distaste for men’s arts, their contempt for war and soldiery—she was in danger now, danger against which her sword was no protection. She ducked her head lower yet.
“Yes, sir. It is. I—did something, sir, and I—I can’t—I don’t know what to do.”
“Are you sure,” he asked, “that I am the one you wish to talk to? You have spent much time lately with Marshal Cedfer. You are not kuakgannir; I have no claim on your actions.”
“I’m sure,” said Paks, fighting the tremor in her voice. “It—has to do with—with the elf, and wild things, and he—Marshal Cedfer—he would think it silly. I think.”
“Hmm. By elf, I presume you mean Macenion? Yes. And wild things. I doubt, Paksenarrion, that he would think it silly, but I am more used to dealing with those than he. Now—” His voice sharpened a little, and Paks flinched at the tone. “If you can spit out your tale, child, and let us see what it is, perhaps I can be of some use.”
Paks took a deep breath, and began, haltingly, to tell of the night in the pass. The Kuakgan did not interrupt, or prompt her. When she told of the coming of the snowcat, she felt through the bones of her head the sharpening of his gaze and struggled on.
“Then he—Macenion—told me to use the ring—”
“The ring?” His voice might have been stone, from the weight of it.
Paks held out her hand, and withdrew it. “This ring, sir. He said it was made to control animals.” She explained how she had caught Macenion’s horse, and how that had upset him, how he had cast a spell to identify any magic item, and had found her ring.
“You did not know that before?”
“No, sir. I thought the horse came because—well—I like horses. Star always came to me.”
“Mmmm. So, you had a ring made to control animals, and you used it on a horse without knowing its power. Where did you get it?”
“From the Duke, sir. He—he gave it to me, at Dwarfwatch last year, for bringing the word to him.” Suddenly tears ran from her eyes as she thought of the honor of that ring, and how she’d used it.
“Did he know what it was, do you think?”
“No, sir. It was part of the plunder from Siniava’s army that we’d beaten. He said he chose it for the form—the three strands for the three of us that went—”
“The others?”
“Died, sir.” She expected him to ask about that, but he did not. Instead, he returned to her original story.
“So then you were faced with the snowcat. Had you heard of one before? No? And Macenion told you to use the ring. How?”
“He said, sir, to make—make the cat hold still. Not jump at us or the horses. And it worked—” Paks could feel, in memory, the surprise of that. She had really believed her ring was magic until the great beast crouched motionless on the trail before them, the snowflake dapples on its coat blending with the falling snow. “And then he—told me how dangerous it was—”
“You didn’t see that for yourself?” The Kuakgan’s voice was edged with sarcasm.