Marjorie answered softly, trying to keep them all calm. “I don’t know why we mustn’t ride to the Hunt, but it is clear that we must not. My counsel, Ambassador, for what it is worth, is that we do what that stiff, awkward Haunser man has arranged for us until we find out what is going on here. We are notbons,after all, and Obermun bon Haunser took some pains to point out to me that neither Sanctity nor Terra know anything at all about Grass.”
Rigo might have said something more, except that a sound interrupted him. Such a sound as a tormented soul might make, if such a one had the voice of the thunder and the cataract. It was a wholly natural sound, as a small world might make, being rent apart, and yet they did not doubt that it issued from a throat and lungs and a body of some indescribable sort. Something that a name could be put to if one only knew what it was. A cry of desperate loneliness.
“What?” breathed Rigo, unmoving, alert. “What was that?” They waited, poised, perhaps to run. Nothing. In the time ahead they were to hear the cry several times. Though they asked about it, no one knew what made it.
El Dia Octavo woke from evil dream to uncomfortable reality. His feet were not on the ground and he thrashed, though weakly. A voice came incomprehensibly through a veil of pained dryness. “Lower that sling, you fool, and put him down.”
Hooves touched solid surface and the stallion stood trembling, head lowered. He could smell the others. They were somewhere near, but it was impossible to lift his head and look. He flared his nostrils instead, trying the odor for that complexity which would include them all. A hand ran along his side, his neck. Notherhand. A good hand, but not her hand. Not hishand, either. This was the male-one most like her,not the female-one most like him.
“Shhh, shhh,” said Tony. “That’s a good boy. Just stand there a little while. It’ll come back to you. Shhh, shhh.”
What came was the dream. Galloping with something after him. Something huge. Huge and fast. A threat from behind. A fleeing. He whickered, begging for reassurance, and the hand was there.
“Shhh, shhh.”
He slept standing, the dream fading.
He woke enough to walk up a ramp into something that moved, then he slept again. When the thing stopped moving, he woke enough to walk down the ramp again andshewas there.
“She,”neighed Millefiori. “All right. She.”
He nodded, making a sound in his throat, dragging his feet as he tried to followher.Nothing smelled quite right. There were familiar sounds, but the smells were wrong. When he was inside the stall, lying on the grass there, it didn’t smell right either.
There was noise outside The other stallion screaming, making a fuss.
El Dia Octavo nickered at him, and so did the mares. In a moment Don Quixote quieted, making a sound of misery.
Thenshecame, patting, stroking, talking to them, saying, as Tony had, “Shhh, shhh,” giving him water.
He drank, letting the water flow into that place of dry fear. After a time he slept again, dreamlessly, the dream gradually losing itself in the smell of the strange hay.
“Odd,” murmured Marjorie, staring down at him.
“They seemed frightened,” said Tony. “The whole time, they seemed scared to death but so lethargic they couldn’t do anything about it.”
“I had bad dreams when I first got here. And I woke up frightened all the time.”
“So did I.” Tony shuddered. “I wasn’t going to say anything, but I had real nightmares “
“An effect of coldsleep?” Marjorie wondered.
“I asked around at the port. Nobody seems to think that’s a usual thing after coldsleep.”
“Odd,” said Marjorie again. “Well, at least the stalls were finished on time.”
“They did a good job. People from the village?”
“People from the village. It seems to be a reciprocal kind of arrangement. We give them employment and buy their produce, and they provide whatever help we need. They’ve been here for years, maintaining the place. I’ve picked a few of them to work with the horses. Perhaps we can find two or three grooms among them.”