“And the hounds?”
“They, too. Except that their hooves are softer. More like pads. It makes them very sure-footed.”
Almost all of the hunters were mounted.
“Come,” Rowena said again in the same emotionless voice she had said everything else. “The transport will be waiting for you.” She glided before them as if on wheels, her wide skirts floating above the polished floors like an inconsolable balloon, swollen and ready to burst with grief. She did not look at them, did not say their names. It was as if she had not really seen them, did not see them now. Her eyes were fixed upon some interior vision of intimate horror so vividly imagined that Marjorie could almost see it in her eyes. When they approached the car, Rowena turned away and floated back the way they had come.
Waiting near the car was Eric bon Haunser. “My brother has joined the Hunt,” he explained. “Since I no longer ride, I have volunteered to go with you. Perhaps you will have questions I can answer.” He moved somewhat awkwardly on his artificial legs, stopping at the door of the balloon-car to nod for Marjorie to enter first.
They rose to float silently over the Hunt, driven by silent propellers as they watched long miles flow by under the hooves of the mounts, longer and more tortuous miles run beneath the wider-ranging feet of the hounds. From the air the animals were only short, thick blotches superimposed on the texture of the grass, blotches which pulsated, becoming longer and shorter as legs extended or gathered for the next leap, mounts and hounds distinguishable from one another only by the presence of riders, the riders themselves reduced to mere excrescences, warts upon the pulsating lines. The hunters entered a copse, hidden from the air. After a time they emerged and ran off toward another copse. After a time, the Yrariers forgot what they were watching. They could as well have been observing ants. Or fish in a stream, Or water flowing, wind blowing. There was nothing individual in the movement of the beasts. Only the spots of red spoke of human involvement. Except for those dots of red, the animals might have been alone in their quest. Though occasionally the grass moved ahead of the mounts, the observers could not see whatever quarry the Hunt was chasing.
Marjorie tried to estimate how fast the animals below them were running. She thought it was not as fast as a horse would cover the same distance, though it might not be possible for horses to thrust through tall, thick grasses as the animals below were doing. She spent some time estimating whether horses could outrun the Hippae— deciding they might be able to do so on the flat, though not uphill— then wondered why she was thinking of horses at all.
At last they came to a final copse and hovered above it. Branches quivered. High upon the roof of the copse the fox crawled onto a twiggy platform, screaming defiance at the sky. Over the soft whir of the propellers, they heard him. All they really saw was an explosion of what might have been fur or scales or fangs, talons, a great shaking and scouring among the leaves, an impression of ferocity, of something huge and indomitable.
“Fox,” Anthony muttered, his voice breaking. “Fox. That thing is the size of half a dozen tigers.” His mother’s hand silenced his words, though his mind went on nattering at him. Where it isn’t toothy, it’s bony. My God. Fox, Merciful Father, will they expect me to ride after that thing? I won’t. Whatever they expect, I just won’t!
Ride, Stella thought. I could ride the way they do. A horse is nothing to that. Nothing at all. I wonder if they’ll let me …
Ride, thought Marjorie in a fever of abhorrence. That isn’t riding. What they are doing. Something within her writhed in disgust and horror; she did not know what the people below her were doing, but it was not riding, not horsemanship. Suppose they want us to join their Hunt? She thought. At least one of us. I suppose there are teachers. Will we have to do this to be respected by them?