Rohana help her to her saddle, slip suede boots-far too big on her feet.
She looked around anxiously for Jaelle; saw that one of the Amazons had wrapped her in a cloak and lifted her to a saddle behind her, where she sat alert, amazed, her long straight hair streaming down her back, too excited and astonished even to ask questions.
Kindra took the reins of Melora’s horse, saying, “Sit your horse as best you can, Lady; I will guide her.” Melora clung to the saddle-horn (unfamiliar, after so many years, to ride astride again!) and watched, tensed against the pain of moving, as Kindra moved to the front of the little column of riders. She said in a low, tense voice, “Now ride like hell, all of you. We may have as many as five hours before the sun comes up and somebody finds Jalak in his blood; but we won’t have more than that no matter how lucky we are, and from this day on for the next three dozen years, no Free Amazon’s hide will be worth a sekal anywhere in the Dry Towns. Let’s go!”
And they were off. Melora, clinging to her saddle, bracing herself as best she might against the jolting of her horse’s gait (though she realized that Kindra had indeed provided a horse with an easy gait, the best available for- a pregnant woman), looked back for an instant at the black loom of the walls of Shainsa.
It’s over, she thought, the nightmare is over. Thirteen years of it. Jalak lies crippled for life, hamstrung, perhaps dying.
I hope he does not die. Worse, oh, worse for him to live and know that a pack of women has done this to him!
I am avenged, and Valentine! And Jaelle will live free!
They rode into the night, unpursued.
Chapter THREE
To the end of her life, the Lady Rohana Ardais never forgot that mad ride, fleeing from the walls of Shainsa; alert at any moment for some small sound behind them that would mean Jalak-or his dead body-had been found, and the hunt for them was up.
For the first hour it was very dark, and she rode blindly after the sound of hooves from the other horses, with only dim shadows ahead. Then Kyrrdis rose, a brilliant half-circle above the horizon, so bright that Rohana knew it was not more than an hour or two ahead of the sun; and by its blue-green light she could make out the forms of the other horses and their riders.
They were traveling more slowly now. Even the swift horses from the plains of- Valeron could not keep up the pace of those first hours. She wondered how Leeanne had found their road in the darkness; the Amazon’s reputation as a tracker was evidently well deserved. She could see Jaelle, a huddled, dark small form, collapsed in sleep against Camilla, clinging drowsily to the saddle. What did the child think of all this?
She was reared in the Dry Towns. Perhaps, to her, all this is quite normal: murder, midnight raids, the stealing of women. What if her loyalty is to Jalak? After all, he is her father.
None of us has any idea what Jaelle is like . . .. We have thought only of Melora’s wishes. …
Melora is a telepath. She must know her child’s heart . . ..
In the final hour before dawn they stopped to breathe the horses; Leeanne went to the top of a nearby hill to spy out any sign of pursuit. Rima came and put some bread and dried meat into Rohana’s hand, poured wine into the cup at her saddle-horn.
“Eat and drink while you can, Lady. There won’t be much time for breakfast if we are being pursued. There are a few hiding holes between here and Carthon, and Kindra knows all of ’em, but mostly our safety lies in a good long start. So you eat now.”
Rohana chewed a mouthful obediently, although her mouth was dry, and the stuff tasted like stale parchment. She thrust it into a pocket of the unfamiliar Amazon trousers; maybe later she could manage to swallow it. She sipped at the wine, but it was too sour to drink, almost; she rinsed her mouth and spat it out again.