Two Queens (Seven Heavens Book 1) (12 page)

“Ah, there you are! Have you seen Patrick?” Riley called out, spurring his horse to meet them.

“No, we have not,” Devlin answered.

Patrick and Riley. Orion felt how the names sounded under his breath. He glanced at the others—the lanky one with the brightest colors, the stout one, the two who looked like twins. Apparently the boring one who didn't say much was Patrick. Too bad, he was too placid to be much annoyance. Now only if the lanky one had gotten lost.

“Sound the horns!” Riley said. The three in company blew. Their echoes bounced about, like two young dogs let into a new room, and faded. Silence. “Why can't we hear him? He can't be that far.”

“Does he know how to whistle?” Delvin asked.

“Of course he knows—” Riley snapped back. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“It's easier to hear than shouting.”

“I expect so. But why would he shout when he has a perfectly good horn?”

The stout one coughed into his collar and the other three stopped their pacing. “Out with it,” Riley said.

“Um, Patrick may or may not have a horn.”

“What is that supposed to mean, imbecile?” Orion found this entertaining. So they annoyed each other too, not just those of Darach.

“Ahem, um, he doesn't carry a horn. I mean, didn't today.” The stout one cringed, half shutting his eyes.

“Not today?” Riley shouted.

“Not ever,” the stout one muttered.

“Well.” His voice, quieter, was as cold as a creek in a cave of rock. “I guess we have to wait for him to show up.”

They didn't have to wait long. A “Halloa!” wafted through the air and the group jumped into their saddles. Those that were already saddled spurred their horses after the sound. Orion jumped, too. He turned to see his father remaining motionless. After some undecided pacing he settled back down where he'd been resting against a tree.

The hunters thundered away. Devlin stood up, looked about with shaded brow, then started walking away. Orion clicked his tongue for Kerry and followed suit.

“Where are we going, father?”

“There's a interesting place up ahead. I want to take a look. Again, after all these years.”

“Won't they miss us?”

“No, they'll be occupied for some time.”

“How do you know?”

“Easy. When does a hunter halloo for others to come to him? He either has killed his quarry and wants an audience or, what I think, he has lost his horse and has had enough of walking for one day.”

Orion smiled. He could just see the man, footsore already after a half-hour's walk. Lost, frightened, fearing the approaching nightfall. There would be no good camp—the slopes were steeper and the falls longer than where they'd been before.

It turned out just as Devlin had said: the man was unhorsed. Or worse, they didn't know for sure, because they couldn't see the man. Just the horse, about a hundred paces ahead of them and as much or more down. Orion didn't know how he got there but could see why Patrick had left him behind. It was a tough climb even for a man: for a horse? That is, after you got him turned around.

“This is it. The same as ever.” Orion looked at his father's face. It was strange—both grave yet... mocking. He eagerly jumped up on a rock that perched on the sheer downhill side. Crouching he brushed at the debris on the rock and crowed. “See this, Orion? Claw marks. First sign of a hunter in this forest.” He laughed without merriment.

Orion looked at the scratches. They weren't very exciting. He turned around and looked up the mountain. Maybe just a rock that bounced its way down from higher up? He turned back to see his father weaving his way down the rock face towards the horse. He heard noises and was surprised to see the horsemen down in the valley below. They looked like rabbits from here.

He looked back at his father, proud that his own two feet had beaten the horsed men to their goal. With a hand to steady himself against Kerry's halter he followed his father. It was slow going. Within minutes he let her go ahead of him to pick the trail, always staying uphill of her at her shoulder.

Halfway to the horse he watched his father speak to it. The beast was spooked: it didn't belong here. It should be down in the broad plains it was born in. Kerry took a couple more steps. At a pause Orion looked up to see Devlin with his hand on the horse's halter. He could hear the men yelling something from down below but didn't catch any words. He looked at his feet and took another step down.

The horse neighed, louder than before. There was a crash: Orion looked but couldn't see man nor beast. A split second later he saw the horse again, rearing up from where it had been behind rock. Orion saw, seared as with flame, his father's hand, bloody and stuffed into the halter. His body made no effort as the horse's neck rose up but swung like a pendulum into its shoulder. The horse lost his balance and tripped the other way when, rising up again with its powerful hindquarters, it screamed.

Orion knew that humans screamed and was used to it. But the horse was the first animal he had heard scream. Not a wail, not a whimper, not a high-pitched squeak. A scream.

Orion had never heard a horse scream before. He never wanted to hear one scream again. Only the sound like the “harrumph” of old men. In one second what he thought he knew about horses exploded, like a dry leaf when it's stepped on. That one scream had so much passion and intelligence behind it. And terror and horror.

Its left forepaw trod the empty air. Its right jerked spasmodically, caught between Devlin's legs. With a last wild look from its eyes the horse fell of the edge of the mountain.

Astra's face turned red. She breathed short bursts as if trying to speak. She clutched at Enda. “Devlin dies. Tell Orion.”

“Oh no! Ramona!”

Astra convulsed again. Blood ran out of her mouth. She spat it out. “Take. Ring. Queen. A sparrow.” She fell back.

Orion sat under drumming rain. He hated and feared the mountain. He hated the loud men who called up to him to come down. He hated himself for having Kerry when his father did not have Myra.

He cried into Kerry's coat then sat pressed against her, willing her frame to fill the aching emptiness he had within him. It was no use. Yelling a wordless noise he pushed himself off the mountain onto Kerry. She stumbled sideways then wheeled downhill and ran. He bounced on her back, willing it to be over, hoping it was over. Hoping that there was a place he would be with his father again.

Kerry's hooves left the ground and Orion floated weightless for a moment as beautiful as a rainbow.

But it was not to be. With a staccato thudding Kerry found her feet and navigated her way down the mountainside, slowly depressing the headlong rush.

Mere seconds later, shaking and breathing shallow, jerky breaths she stood with the boy on her back in front of the horsemen.

Ten

Paris had enough of wandering around, hearing local gossip until he was blue in the face, running through his plan again and again and again. In short, anything but the thing that needed to be done. His hand still went to the strange weight over his left ribs. The heavy steel annoyed him, whacking him every so often when he abruptly changed direction.

In villages nearer Darach he hinted at the raven-tressed woman. Villages further west or even north didn't understand the question, the barmaids taking it as an insult. He didn't know her taken name and so eventually circled back southeast.

He heard more of the same stories the high-pitched woman had told him. Once, though, he was told of her husband's background, the word “husband” always marked with a different voice or replaced with a different word. He was illegitimate, born to an unmarried country woman. No one knew who the father was. The joke outside Darach was that it was a problem of too many candidates, not extreme secrecy. Then the stories faded into a heated debate over who of the young couple was more to be despised.

“I tell you all,” one woman said at the town inn, “he's lucky to have her. Why, she's beautiful, none of the tales deny, and what did he expect, being baseborn with no father? That any woman would look twice at him is a great gift.” She nodded at her audience with the air of one who had a share in bringing about the said gift.

“Aye, that any
woman
should look twice is a wonder. But who here would consider a witch fit company for even a bastard? He's a harmless fool with no pity from me but she—why, excepting a monster from the utter East”—at this the speaker drew his palm down in front of him from head to chest as the others collectively drew breath—“she's evil.”

Paris laughed softly into his mug. That the outcast princess could find no better identity among these destitute peasants delighted him. Beautiful, a hundred times yes; intelligent, at least more than these bumpkins. A new twist to his plan formed in his mind. Why kill her? Who would care one way or another if he made her his slave? All girls he had known were the same: a pretty face, a young body, but nothing else. She would be interesting. She
was
interesting. He sipped at his beer.

But first: her ring. That was the linchpin in his great game, the fulcrum that would swing him back to where he belonged. She was but a toy, to be kept at his pleasure or cast away at his pleasure.

The next morning, his cart stocked with new items for sale, he made his way into Darach. The oaks were brilliant in their fiery oranges and yellows but his eyes had no use for gold such as that. He went through the town direct to the smithy. There was no sound to greet him nor smoke issuing from the chimney. He couldn't make sense of it. He encamped and set out for the woman's cabin.

There he found the blacksmith and the redhead. They were standing next to the cabin. She had her arm around his waist and was sobbing into his chest. He was murmuring something. Paris sat in his old hiding place for what seemed like hours until they left. Where they had been standing he saw a pile of rocks, crowned with a pink ribbon. He just looked and wondered, waiting for the noise of the four departing feet to trail off in the distance behind him.

He approached the cairn. The pile didn't look like three graves, only one. Did these people bury families together, one body on top of another? He sickened at the thought of digging it up. To disrupt the sacred last resting place. They're criminals, he told himself, and if it should be done it will be done. His stomach didn't believe him: turning to the side he retched bile onto the ground next to the grave.

There was one other option. It would be real work, something slaves were made for, not him, but anything was better than
that
. He walked over to the cabin and opened the door.

Orion sat there, numb. He hardly saw the men standing there, shock on their faces. Except for Riley. His thin lips curled back. “Now isn't that a fine piece of mountaineering. Mayhap the old tales have some truth in them.” He looked over Kerry's trembling body. “But as for you,” he swung his fist and socked Orion in the face.

“No!” Patrick called out. Orion didn't understand. Why was he struck? The pain made little impact other than to wake him out of his stupor. What had just happened? Why was he down here, and not up there? Where was his father?

“That fool of a guide just lost me a horse. Now, I wonder how you could pay for that.”

“Leave him be. It wasn't the man's fault, by the Hairs of the Mane!” Patrick said.

“Quiet!” he snapped, and grabbed at Orion. When his hands brushed against Kerry's side she kicked her hindquarters away from him. He jumped at her neck but she rose, breaking out of his hold. On the way down she struck at him with her forelegs. He fell to the ground, unconscious, and she galloped away with Orion swaying in his seat.

“You're a dead man!” one of the horseman called out. Orion glanced back to see two of them spur their horses after them. The others clustered around the fallen lord.

He felt dizzy and turned back forwards. Falling against her shoulders all went black. Just the rocking of her thundering legs under him for a few more seconds then nothing.

When he awoke they were in a valley he had not seen before. He looked for men and horse but saw none. Kerry's coat glistened with sweat but her breathing was steady and deep. She walked daintily through the scattered trees. He slid off of her. His legs buckled and he fell to the ground. He rolled on his back and lay on the grass. Kerry walked over to him and sniffed then, contented, bit at a clump of grass and started grazing.

Rain awakened him. He coughed a couple drops from his throat and sat up. He couldn't see Kerry. He shuffled over to a clump of trees and huddled under his cloak. When he could whistle he did. Kerry snorted nearby. He walked over to her where she sat. He lay down, half beside half on her, and wept. The tears ran out and sleep came again.

Morning dawned cool and clear. He woke, stumbled down the valley until the mud led him to a small creek. They both drank. He inspected her all over and noted nothing amiss but some swelling in her left foreleg.

“How'd you do it, girl? Run down a slope that steep?” He petted her nose. Her eyes flicked at him but she made no answer. “Well, wish I could let you eat all day but we need to move on. Get back to mother.” His voice cracked. He silently mounted her. He hadn't thought of having to tell his mother what happened. His own grief seemed as nothing: sympathy for hers hit him as no fist of Riley's ever could.

He pointed Kerry towards the south end of the valley and then let her pick her own path. A couple stops for grass and sleep and water was all that hindered them: they saw no sign of the others. Orion was hungry, but had neither the patience nor the tools to turn aside after game.