Monso was a full four lengths in the lead when he swept past the finish pole. There was no cheering from the crowd, only a stunned silence.
” ‘Tis unnatural!” the woman with the hens exclaimed finally. “That creature ran past Hawrel’s Grey Arrow as though the beast was hitched to a plow-and that grey is the fastest horse the town’s seen in a score o’ years!”
“Aye,” the blank-shield muttered, disgustedly snapping his wagering chip in two. “No horse should have been able t’ run like that, after that chase cross the fairground today. No normal horse, that is.”
No normal horse.
Sudden realization made Lydryth fasten her teeth in her lower lip to avoid crying out in recognition. Now she knew where she’d seen Monso’s like before. That spark of red in the beast’s eyes had been no reflection of the sun! That creature is no more a mortal horse than Hathor’s Ghost Stalliort\ she thought. But. . . howl How could anyone catch and master a Kepliani
The songsmith vividly remembered the time she had seen one of the demon horse-spirits sent by the Dark to lure un- wary travelers. It had been shortly after her mother disappeared. She, Jervon and Lord Kerovan had been out searching, and had camped for the night near a stream in a seemingly deserted valley.
Lydryth had rolled out of her blankets in the silver dimness before dawn, only to see the creature standing just outside their camp. The Keplian had the seeming of a tall, perfect black stallion as it had stood cropping the dew-heavy grass. Both she and Jervon had cried out with pleasure at the sheer beauty of its delicate head, its straight, clean-boned legs… the flowing lines of its arched neck and straight-backed body.
Both she and her father had started toward it, enthralled by the creature’s unearthly beauty. Both of them might well have been ensnared past all saving, but suddenly, Kerovan stepped into their path, the wristband that he wore glowing brightly. As its light bathed their eyes, they staggered back, returning to their senses, for the ancient talisman possessed the ability to warn and guard against the presence of any evil.
Kerovan had raised his arm in a warding gesture. “Get you gone, fell thing! Do not return!” As the wristlet’s light struck the Keplian, it had snorted with pain, then raced away.
So Monso is a Keplian. That explains much, Lydryth thought, standing bemused, hardly hearing the disappointed grumblings of the departing onlookers. And yet …he does not have that unnatural perfection of form that the creature I saw possessed. Could he be a crossbred? Is it possible that Keplians can mate with mortal horses?
Her speculations continued without answer as the songsmith turned to make her way through the thinning crowd, her goal the wagering tent and the claiming of her winnings.
The race had been the last event of the horse fair; all around her horse traders and merchants were feeding their stock and closing up their pavilions until the morrow, when the fair would reopen. The sun was setting rapidly now, and by the time she emerged from the wagering tent, blue twilight was stealing across the land like a thief, robbing the place of color and life.
Lydryth smiled as she walked, feeling the heavy purse weighing down the belt she wore inside her jerkin. Enough, and more than enough to purchase a fine mount. I’ll be in Lormt ere I thought possible!
As she set off across the nearly deserted tangle of tents and booths, Lydryth saw Dakar walking Monso not far from where they had first met. Shrugging her pack a little higher on her shoulders, the songsmith veered aside from her chosen path with the intention of thanking the youth.
Torchlight sputtered in the night breeze that had sprung up, its reflection again awakening that disturbing scarlet spark in the black stallion’s eyes. Lydryth halted, staring at the unlikely pair. After all, what did she know of Dakar? He rode a Keplian. It was therefore entirely possible-nay, probable-that he himself was of the Left-Hand Path, one of the Dark Ones. Legend held that they were often handsome, or beautiful … as fair outside as they were foul within.
As she wavered, on the verge of turning away, Dakar looked up, then waved cheerfully. “Lady Lydryth!” he called, as she came toward him. “Did you see the race?”
The minstrel nodded. “I did. Lord Faral’s horse could not have run more swiftly!” As she reached him, she added, in a lower tone, “Now I will be able to reach Lormt in only a few days, thanks to my wager. I am indeed in your debt.”
The young man shook his head. “Nonsense. We would have raced for the winner’s purse whether or not you were wagering on us, my lady. I am just glad that you will be able to continue your journeying well-mounted.”
Lydryth hesitated, tempted to ask where he and Monso would be going, now that the race day was over, but what was the sense in that? She would never see him-or his strange mount-again. The songsmith sighed, resolutely straightening her shoulders beneath the heavy pack. “Farewell, then, Dakar, and a safe journey to you on the morrow,” she said.
He appeared to hesitate in his turn, then finally nodded. “A safe journey to you . . . and may you find what you are seeking.” He held out his hand.
Lydryth clasped hands with him in a warrior’s grip, feeling the leather-callused roughness of his palm against her own harpstring-toughened fingers. She saw his eyes widen slightly at the strength of her grip; then he smiled, his clasp shifted, and he bowed formally over her hand in courtly fashion. “Fare you well, Lady Eyd-”
“Spawn of the Dark!”
“You cheated! That’s no ordinary horse!”
“Cheater! You witched my Grey Arrow!”
Lydryth and Dakar started, whirling to see a group of men approaching them, their shadowy forms huge and wavering in the wind-whipped torchlight.
Monso’s rider put up his hands in a conciliatory fashion as the figures ranged themselves around them, hemming them in past all escape. “Gently, goodmen, gently! If any of you feel that my horse did not win fairly, you should have spoken to the judges before Monso was officially declared the winner. There was no such protest entered.”
“That’s because we were all bespelled!” Grey Arrow’s owner, Hawrel, a tall, rawboned farmer with the fair hair of a Sulcannan, stepped forward. “You made fools of us all, but we’ve come to our senses now, and we demand you make right our losses!”
Monso lowered his head, snorting. One sharp hoof pawed in unmistakable challenge. Dakar grabbed the Keplian’s halter, whispering to him, and slowly the black calmed. “Very well,” his master said. “I want no trouble-for your sakes, as much as my own. I will give you what I have.”
Lydryth made a small motion of protest, but did not speak, as Dakar slowly withdrew his winner’s purse from within his jerkin. Five . . . six . . . She counted the figures in that grim circle, noting that several were armed with cudgels and one with a sword. Too many to fight. And Dakar did cheat . . . racing a Keplian against mortal horses is hardly fair-
-but neither is this\ she thought angrily, watching the young man grimly weigh the purse in his hand, then toss it at Hawrel’s feet. “Take it, then, and leave us in peace,” he said, his shoulders sagging with sudden weariness. “I will leave your town, and nothing could induce me to return, I assure you.”
The protesters did not miss the bitter mockery in his words.
Stung, they surged forward until Lydryth could recognize other faces-Grey Arrow’s bowlegged little rider … the broad-shouldered blank-shield who had been standing near her in the crowd, the palm-polished grip of his sword gleaming faintly . .. the village blacksmith … the horse trader whose animal she’d rejected. The sixth man wore a muffling hood that hid his features.
“We’ll not stand here and be mocked by a cheating rascal of a boy!” the smith snarled, slapping the rasp he carried against his callused palm. “You and that unnatural beast both deserve a beating, and that is what you’re going to receive!”
“Wait!” Dakar held up both hands, genuinely alarmed now. “You must not! You could be killed! I want no bloodshed, please! At least allow the songsmith to-”
“At them, then, lads!” Hawrel shouted, and in deadly silence, the men rushed them. The songsmith dodged the one wearing the hood, her quarterstaff sweeping the ground, sending her attacker thudding heavily to the ground.
As he lay there, winded, Lydryth gave him a carefully calculated rap on the back of the head that stretched him out, unconscious; then she turned back to aid her companion. Dakar was holding onto his horse, shouting commands, while the heavyset blacksmith brandished his rasp at the young man’s head, all the while trying to pull Monso’s lead-shank away.