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Authors: Gwen Dandridge
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dim-sighted dragon would mistake a twenty-five stone pig in a ball gown for me. Besides, every time we try to put a hat on her, she tears it to ribbons.”
Chapter 11
Chris gritted her teeth as she struggled onto the saddle. Captain Markus had rearranged the supplies, mounting her on a tall cow-hocked gelding with the unlikely name of Glory. An uglier riding horse I hadn’t seen, with masses of coarse brown mane, a thick shaggy coat and an unfortunate braying whinny. Chris immediately renamed him Janis after a heroine of hers. Dressed in one of my riding skirts and a large inelegant jacket of Lucinda’s, Chris wasn’t likely to set fashion. And no matter what I did, her straight hair escaped my third best snood.
Much to Chris’s annoyance, Jonathan and Malcolm told everyone who would listen about her attempts to mount from the wrong side. Jonathan argued that the horse couldn’t tell the difference between Chris and the supplies the pack horse had recently carried, but Malcolm insisted that he had seen sacks of meal that rode with more grace. Fortunately, Glory, or Janis Joplin as Chris persisted in calling him, appeared indifferent to his new burden, placidly following nose to withers with my horse, Winter. We kept to a fast walk most of the next morning. My men took bets on how soon Chris would fall.
We rode through a forest of oak and ash that spilled out to a stand of willows clustered by the side of a stream. Every few miles the landscape opened, and the hills of Perpinan appeared, and beyond, wrapped in a cloak of mists, the Crystal mountain of Fandrite. A frisson of fear crept down my back as we neared my destiny, and I was glad that Chris rode beside me.
Chris kept her eyes pinned to Janis’s neck, her fingers entwined in his mane as if that might help her stay on. Where could she have been raised that she rode so badly, worse than any peasant? I had so many questions about her and few answers.
My gaze flitted over her, trying to fit the puzzle piece that was Chris into my circumstances. Something that could explain Chris to me, to understand her better. I ventured a guess. “Is your card a family heirloom? Something handed down from a seer ancestor?”
She gingerly extracted one hand from Janis’s mane and reached inside the folds of Lucinda’s jacket. “It was a gift from Nana, my great-grandmother. She was known as a bit of a firecracker but never a seer.” She held the card out for me to reexamine. I had seen it once before: the girl sitting on the throne supported as if by clouds. Across the top, an interlocking design framed the illustration. I frowned; something niggled in my brain.
“Nana died during the holidays. The card was left for me. Part of my inheritance: money for college, the small enamel box that contained this card and the poem written in her curly script.”
We both looked at it again.
“When I was little, she kept it near her, though she would never let me touch it. She would sometimes look at it and I thought she might cry—longing and pain or whatever. I never understood.”
I tried to concentrate on her speech. It was difficult to parse out and there were concepts that I didn’t understand. I tried to shape her words into something I could comprehend but I found my mind wandering. Something about the design on the card distracted me; it seemed familiar.
She shook her head, tucking the card back into the jacket. “That day, the first time I saw you, I had cupped the card in my hand. And I felt pulled, drawn in. The words on the note whispered themselves to me and I heard myself repeating them like a mantra—the next thing I knew, I was there in your room.” She waved her hand at the landscape.
Janis lifted his head and jogged for a few steps. Chris grabbed back onto his mane. “Each time I hold the card and say the words, I’m here with you. Wherever you are.” She looked around, with some peculiar expression of contemplation and study. “She meant
Chapter 11
Chris gritted her teeth as she struggled onto the saddle. Captain Markus had rearranged the supplies, mounting her on a tall cow-hocked gelding with the unlikely name of Glory. An uglier riding horse I hadn’t seen, with masses of coarse brown mane, a thick shaggy coat and an unfortunate braying whinny. Chris immediately renamed him Janis after a heroine of hers. Dressed in one of my riding skirts and a large inelegant jacket of Lucinda’s, Chris wasn’t likely to set fashion. And no matter what I did, her straight hair escaped my third best snood.
Much to Chris’s annoyance, Jonathan and Malcolm told everyone who would listen about her attempts to mount from the wrong side. Jonathan argued that the horse couldn’t tell the difference between Chris and the supplies the pack horse had recently carried, but Malcolm insisted that he had seen sacks of meal that rode with more grace. Fortunately, Glory, or Janis Joplin as Chris persisted in calling him, appeared indifferent to his new burden, placidly following nose to withers with my horse, Winter. We kept to a fast walk most of the next morning. My men took bets on how soon Chris would fall.
We rode through a forest of oak and ash that spilled out to a stand of willows clustered by the side of a stream. Every few miles the landscape opened, and the hills of Perpinan appeared, and beyond, wrapped in a cloak of mists, the Crystal mountain of Fandrite. A frisson of fear crept down my back as we neared my destiny, and I was glad that Chris rode beside me.
Chris kept her eyes pinned to Janis’s neck, her fingers entwined in his mane as if that might help her stay on. Where could she have been raised that she rode so badly, worse than any peasant? I had so many questions about her and few answers.
My gaze flitted over her, trying to fit the puzzle piece that was Chris into my circumstances. Something that could explain Chris to me, to understand her better. I ventured a guess. “Is your card a family heirloom? Something handed down from a seer ancestor?”
She gingerly extracted one hand from Janis’s mane and reached inside the folds of Lucinda’s jacket. “It was a gift from Nana, my great-grandmother. She was known as a bit of a firecracker but never a seer.” She held the card out for me to reexamine. I had seen it once before: the girl sitting on the throne supported as if by clouds. Across the top, an interlocking design framed the illustration. I frowned; something niggled in my brain.
“Nana died during the holidays. The card was left for me. Part of my inheritance: money for college, the small enamel box that contained this card and the poem written in her curly script.”
We both looked at it again.
“When I was little, she kept it near her, though she would never let me touch it. She would sometimes look at it and I thought she might cry—longing and pain or whatever. I never understood.”
I tried to concentrate on her speech. It was difficult to parse out and there were concepts that I didn’t understand. I tried to shape her words into something I could comprehend but I found my mind wandering. Something about the design on the card distracted me; it seemed familiar.
She shook her head, tucking the card back into the jacket. “That day, the first time I saw you, I had cupped the card in my hand. And I felt pulled, drawn in. The words on the note whispered themselves to me and I heard myself repeating them like a mantra—the next thing I knew, I was there in your room.” She waved her hand at the landscape.
Janis lifted his head and jogged for a few steps. Chris grabbed back onto his mane. “Each time I hold the card and say the words, I’m here with you. Wherever you are.” She looked around, with some peculiar expression of contemplation and study. “She meant
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