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“All right, then—here’s the job,” said the K’mir. “You, me, and my dog take the herd south, like I said. I have the Gift, and I can shield our camp at night. It’s two coppers a day, two silver nobles as a bonus at the end. I pay all expenses, and we share chores. No drinking, no drugs. If you leave me on the trail, you’ll wish you died as a child.” Daine giggled. “At the end of the road—we’ll see. We’re bound for the capital of Tortall—”
The girl’s face lit up. “Where a lady knight is the king’s champion, right? And they let girls in the army? That Tortall?”
“You heard those stories too,” the K’mir murmured. “Well they don’t let girls in the regular army, mind—just the Queen’s Riders. Why—have you a fancy to be a soldier?”
Daine shook her head. “Not me. But if they take girls for that, maybe they’ll let a girl be a hostler, or work around the camp, or some such.” Her eyes were filled with painful hope.
“As it happens, they do let girls work as hostlers—or at least, they let me. I’m in charge of the horses for the Riders.”
“Oh, glory,” the girl whispered. “I’ll do whatever you want, if you’ll take me on—”
Onua put a hand on Daine’s shoulder, touched by her eagerness. “We’ll see. If we don’t get on, I’ll make sure you have some kind of work. I won’t leave you stranded. Sound fair?”
Daine nodded vigorously. “Yes, Mistress Onua.”
Onua offered a callused hand. “Then shake on it. And stop calling me ‘Mistress.’ My name’s Onua.”
Daine returned the woman’s firm grip. “Onua Chamtong, of the K’miri Raadeh,” she said. “I remember.”
Onua smiled. “Very good. Now, will your Cloud mix in with the others?”
“No reason not to.” Daine removed packs and saddle from Cloud’s back.
“Stow your things with mine.” Onua pointed to a canvas-covered mound in one corner. “They’ll be safe—these ponies are better than guard dogs.”
Daine ushered Cloud into the pen and stored her packs with Onua’s. She finished in time to stop Cloud from biting the yellow stallion, and then from kicking a blood bay mare. “You behave,” she ordered her pony. “I mean it.”
Cloud flicked an ear back, and lifted a hind foot experimentally. Daine leaned down and whispered in her ear. The mare snorted, then stood on all fours, looking as innocent as a summer sky.
“What did you tell her?” Onua asked, letting the girl out of the pen.
“I said I’d sell her to the man that makes dumplings down the way.”
Onua chuckled. “That’s the threat my mother used on me. Look—I want you to meet my dog, Tahoi.” She put her fingers to her lips and whistled two short notes. A large form surged over the rear wall of the pen and wound through the ponies, ducking hooves and teeth with the ease of long practice. Coming over the fence in another easy jump, he sat panting at Onua’s feet. He was as tall as his owner’s hip, and covered with curling gray fur.
“He’s near big enough to be a pony himself.” Daine offered her open palm. The dog rumbled in displeasure, and warily sniffed her fingers.
“Tahoi means ‘ox’ in K’mir. Careful—he’s a one-woman dog—” Onua shut up. Tahoi’s plumed tail had begun to wave. The wary guardian of her stock turned into an eager-to-please pup that licked Daine’s hand, then stood to sniff her face. “He’s supposed to be a guard dog,” Onua continued, frowning. “Not a pet. Not a dog who believes every human’s his friend.”
“Don’t blame him.” Daine looked up at Onua apologetically. Her fingers scratched Tahoi in a place he couldn’t reach, while his tail thudded in the dust on the ground. “Animals just take to me, is all.”
“Hmph. Can you spare her, Majesty?” the woman said to Tahoi. “I’d like to get some grub, saving your presence. And your new friend is coming with me. Guard!” She steered Daine away from the pen.
At one of the cook tents littering the fairgrounds, Onua ordered a rich meal for them both. When it was over, they explored. After a while Daine’s eyes hurt from staring so much. Coming from a poor mountain village, she couldn’t believe the variety they found at every turn.
“How are you fixed for gear?” her new employer asked. She was eyeing a pair of boots in a leather-worker’s stall.
“I’m fine,” Daine assured her. Meeting the K’mir’s warning look, she insisted, “Really. It was too wet”—she swallowed, trying to speak as if it were someone else’s farm that was attacked—“too wet for our place to burn much, so I saved a lot. Clothes, boots, my sleeping gear. I really don’t need anything.” Seeing the woman’s gray green eyes remained suspicious, she raised a hand. “Swear by the Goddess.”
“All right, then. Just remember, it’s my responsibility to keep you decently clothed and outfitted. I don’t want people saying I’m a skinflint.”
Daine thought of the huge meal she had consumed. “Just point them out to me, and I’ll set them straight,” she offered.
Onua chuckled. “Good enough.”
On their return, the K’mir raised a sleeping platform outside the pen. “We’d best turn in,” she advised. “We leave an hour before dawn.”
Daine laid the bedrolls out, wriggled into hers, and took off everything but her shift under the sheltering blankets. “Onua?”
The woman was nearly asleep already. “Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
They had a cold breakfast: fruit, cheese, and bread. Onua said little as they ate and packed. She split a pile of lead reins with Daine, indicating she was to connect half of the ponies into a string, while she did the same with the others. They worked quickly as the fair came to life and the air filled with breakfast smells. When the ponies were ready, Onua placed their packs on the first animal in each string.
“Aren’t you going to put her on a lead?” Onua pointed to Cloud, who stood free of the others, wearing only a halter and a cross expression. The mare snorted and shook her head.
“She’ll be fine,” Daine assured the K’mir. “She’s as good as a guard dog, that way.”
“You know best,” Onua said, dubious. “Let’s move ’em out.”
The K’mir led them away from the fairgrounds and the traffic coming in. They had reached open road when she called for a midmorning break. Digging apples out of her pocket, she gave Daine one. “You eat this,” she ordered. “I’ve more in a basket for the ponies. I should’ve warned you, by the way—I’m a real bear in the morning. It’s no good talking to me—I’ll only bite your head off. You didn’t take it personally, did you?”
Daine had begun to wonder if the K’mir regretted hir
ing her. She smiled her relief. “It’s all right. Ma always says”—her lips tightened—“Ma always said there was no living with me until lunchtime.”
“You miss her,” Onua said gently.
Daine twisted the stem off her apple. “Her, Grandda, our farm—” Her face was grim. “They took my life, those bandits. I saved things, like clothes and food, but all my family was gone except Cloud. They wouldn’t even have left her, except she was with me and we weren’t there.” She got to her feet. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“To speak of it?” asked the K’mir. Daine nodded. “You have to, just to bleed off the poison from the memory.” The girl shrugged. “Well, it doesn’t have to be today.” She peered at the sun. “We’ll be at Coolspring by noon—a village, good-sized. Let’s pass that before we stop again.”
If Onua and Daine were now well awake, so were their charges. They fussed at every turn. Luckily, many who passed them were traders who knew mountain ponies: they kept a respectful distance. Only Cloud, who seemed to realize she would go into a string the moment she misbehaved, walked meekly beside Daine. The only time she offered violence to a bystander was when he, or she, was too interested in how well the strings were tied together.
Daine worked on the ponies one by one, talking, pleading, cajoling. Repeatedly she explained why she wanted them to follow Onua, without making a fuss. One after another the ponies listened as she appealed to their better natures. Some people would have said these creatures had no better nature, but—as Daine told Onua—she had found most animals listened, if things were properly set out for them.
Onua had explained things to ponies and horses for twenty-eight years without the success this thirteen-year-old was having. How does she do it? the K’mir wondered, fascinated. They’re ponies, by all the gods. They’re wonderfully clever animals, but they don’t think, not the way people do.
Past the village of Coolspring lay a rest stop, one of the springs that gave the town its name, sheltered by elms. Picketing the animals, the two women sat down to share a meal of bread and cheese.
“Tell me if you get tired,” the K’mir ordered. “I can go for hours, once I get moving.”
