She returned to her horse and hauled her gear inside the hall. She rubbed him down, then left him free to graze with a gentle slap on his shoulder. Quickly she kindled a fire in the center of one of the fireplaces and roasted a rabbit on a spit she found there. She peered higher to discover there was also a rod which swung out above the flame. She’d heard of that. Gaily she hung her coffeepot from the upturned end and watched as the water boiled. She drank, leaned back against the stone wall, and sighed in satisfaction.
In the saddlebags she had looted from Gerae’s followers, she had found a packet of dried leaves. They produced a sort of herbal tea with a taste of sweetened lemon. It wasn’t coffee, but then she hadn’t been crazy about coffee anyhow. This lemon tea was more to her taste. She had been running low on it, but within the lines of bushes outside she had seen perhaps four or five that looked to be the source of the tea leaves. In the morning she’d check.
Her mind moved on to Cynan. What was he doing? Was he still strong enough to manage with what she had left for him? She had liked him, and yet when the time came she had ridden, leaving him alone. She knew this had been his wish, but she regretted doing so.
Still, he was a warrior; it was for him to choose his time and his dying. That was the white-eye way to deny a warrior the right to make his own choices. To drag one off to a hospital, there to die slowly, growing more bitter as the body withered. Far Traveler had also chosen. He had not wished to die shut away from the sky, from Earth Mother, from all her scents and the sounds of the mountains.
She remembered his last moments. It was well, very well. He had died as he had lived, in the clean air, in freedom. She grasped the pendant in her left hand.
“Look down on me, kinsman. Do not forget one who will ever love you. In this strange land let your wisdom guide me as it did in that other.” For a moment she felt a hand caress her hair the way the old man used to do to bring comfort to a small child. She felt his presence then, and reassurance that she, too, was loved and remembered, even from the sky trails he now followed. She sank down into her bedroll, a smile curving her lips. She slept, and if her dreams were more than she would recall on waking, that, too, was right.
During the night it began to rain lightly. While she slept, the Keplians had entered the hall and now dozed comfortably under a sound roof.
*This is a good land, kin-sister,* the mare announced as Eleeri opened her eyes. *There is more grass than we can eat, the water is sweet, and no Gray One could pass the gate runes.*
“What about Keplians?” the girl teased, but the mare was serious.
*I think few of the males could pass. Perhaps some of the mares, as I did. The foals: of them it seems to me that all would pass. They are innocent, having committed no evil.*
Eleeri considered that. “You think that the runes measure innocence. That may be so, but what evil have you done?”
*None, but we are of the shadow. The runes were not swift to let me pass until your mind touched mine. Then that which held me back was gone.* Her sending softened. *I have wondered, kin-sister, if our meeting was not meant. Together we have overcome that which would have mastered us had we not stood as one. I—I feel toward you as I have never felt, even to one of my own kind. Kin-sister you are in truth.* She turned inquiring eyes toward the girl.
“I, too, feel this way.” For a moment they remained still, gray eyes meeting the flowing red fire that were the mare’s orbs. Then Eleeri chuckled softly. “All this talk makes me hungry. I plan to find a nice fat bird, to do something about that.” But as she passed the mare, her hand slid out in a loving caress. Tharna was content. Her kin-sister understood.
Over the next few days they relaxed, sleeping when they tired, eating as hunger came. Eleeri found herself constrained to hunt outside the canyon but accepted this as common sense. In case of siege or illness, she would be grateful birds and other small game abounded within reach.
But as the time passed, they all grew restless. Hylan no longer needed to nurse, but ate the grass which abounded at his hooves.
They had been there several weeks when Eleeri and Tharna felt a drawing from the outer lands. They consulted silently. Then as one they acted, the girl calling her horse, tossing his gear up and swiftly bridling the willing beast.
Hylan remained, but together Keplian and human left the canyon and hastened down the trail toward the lower lands. They had wandered, moving slowly as they came, but now they struck straight for their goal, the river. After a day’s swift travel, they were there. Eleeri climbed a ridge and stared out over the area.
*What do you see?*
“No reason to call us here.”
*We go on?*
The girl climbed down and swung into the saddle as reply. In silence they marched on along the riverbank, heading ever deeper into the Gray Ones’ lands once more. Both knew this to be dangerous, but the call continued. They would be wary, and with no smaller, weaker foal to slow them, it was unlikely the Gray Ones would be able to catch them, if the two had any sort of a headstart.
Suddenly Tharna jerked up her head. At the same time, Eleeri halted the pony, seeking out the source of her unease.
“What is it?”
*Death—death comes to those of my kind.* She had no need to add that it was a death in pain and terror. That echoed in both of their minds. Eleeri nudged her mount into a slow trot as the sensation broke off abruptly. One was dead, but the sensations continued, although weakened.
They rounded a long line of trees together just as the feeling faded again, then again. Now there was nothing but emotions: terror, loss, panic. There was a youngness to those, a formlessness that signaled no adults remained.
Eleeri strung her bow in one flickering movement, laid an arrow on the string, and touched the pony with a gentle heel. He edged out from behind the bushes, Tharna at his side. Before them three foals stood shivering, as Gray Ones circled. To one side, Keplian mares lay quiet in death. The Gray Ones were playing, knowing they could kill at whim. The terror of the foals provided a vicious amusement until, in one flashing second, that changed.
7
Beside Eleeri there was a snort of fury and a roar of swift hooves. Tharna charged down on the foals, crying for them to follow. A Gray One thrust forward to intercept her, to be sent flying with a well-aimed kick. Another slashed at her heels, only to find she had swapped ends and he was seized in savage teeth. They met through his spine as he was hurled lifelessly aside. The foals screamed in terror, leaping for the big mare. They were too young to form thoughts into words as Tharna did. Nor could they send far. But at this range they were almost deafening mare and human with their emotions. Before they had reached Tharna, Eleeri had counted enemies. Nine, with two already down.
The girl had not waited to see more. Arrows flew; Gray Ones howled in pain and fright as they died or bled. Tharna had charged. To her the babies ran desperately and she stood over them, ready. Eleeri circled, continuing to shoot as the wolf-creatures attacked her. But they relied on tooth and claw, and the pack tactics. She swung the pony beyond them and shot again and again. Tharna was withdrawing slowly, foals clinging to her flanks.
The attackers slunk back, howling their baffled rage and frustration. Eleeri watched. They preferred to face safer odds, it appeared. She guarded the rear as her friend headed for the river again. With a sigh, the girl removed her leathers. She was getting tired of crossing this river. She grinned to herself. She’d better not say that; it was a safeguard, since the Gray Ones would not cross. She cantered after the Keplian mare and foals.
The babies were afraid of the water. They balked at the brink, but Tharna was not to be halted by juvenile intransigence. A swift nip sent a colt forward with a surprised squeal, more of fright than pain.