She had her dream, but it was a distant one now, and it only stung her when she came face to face with the fact that someone else—some other person, through no work, no effort, no obvious virtue of their own—was living the life that she had dreamed of and yearned for ever since she could remember.
Still, if the Heralds—they never traveled alone—came in for a meal and left their Companions in the pasture runs, she could sneak out for a few minutes and watch them, and pretend. Because no matter how stupid it was, she couldn't let go of her dream.
It was clear from the moment he walked into the tavern that something was wrong. Heralds were able— although how, she wasn't certain—to keep their Whites white and in very good repair, and this Herald's Whites were neither. He was pale, and the moment he stepped out of the glare of the doorway, she saw why; his arm was bound, but bleeding, and his face was scraped and bruised.
- 'Excuse me,' he said, in a very quiet, but very urgent voice, 'I need help. My Companion is injured.' ' Heralds seldom traveled alone. Kelsey tucked her rag into her apron pocket and made the distance between the table and the door before Torvan had lifted the bar's gate.
'What—what happened?'
He shook his head, and it was obvious, this close up, that he was near collapse. She put an arm under his arms—she was not a weak woman—and half-walked, half-dragged him to a chair. 'Don't worry about me,' he said softly, his face graying. 'She's hurt, and she needs help.'
'Why don't I worry about both of you?' Kelsey replied, mimicking the stern tone of her grandmother in crisis. 'Torvan—send Raymon for the doctor, and send Karin for the vet!' The Herald started to rise, and she blocked him with her arm. 'And where do you think you're going?'
He opened his eyes at the tone of her voice, and studied her face as if truly seeing her for the first time. Then he smiled wanly. 'Nowhere, ma'am,' he replied. It was then that she realized that he was probably twice her age, with gray streaks through his long braid and two faded scars across his neck and cheek. His features were fine- boned, unlike her own; he looked like the son of a noble, except it was obvious that he was used to doing his own work.
'Good. What are you smiling at?'
'You. You remind me of my grandmother.' The smile faded as he winced; his expression grew distant again. She knew that he was seeing not only the loss of the Herald he traveled his circuit with—for she was certain that that Herald must be dead—but also the fear of the loss of his Companion.
She brought him an ale and made him drink; he finished most of it before the doctors—human and animal— arrived.
'If you make her travel on the leg, you can probably get a few more miles down the road, but you'll lame her,' the vet said, staring intently at the cleaned gash across the knee. 'I don't know much about Companions—but I do know that if she were a horse, she would never have made it this far.' That he didn't offer more,
and in the lecturing tone that he was wont to use, showed his respect for the Herald.
The Herald—who called himself Carris, although that was dearly not his full name—nodded grimly and wiped the sweat absently from his forehead with a handkerchief. His uniform was safely in the tub in Kelsey's room, and he wore no obvious weapons, although a sword and a bow were in easy reach. 'How long will it be until she can travel safely?'
'Hard to say,' the older man replied.
Cams nodded again, absorbing the words. The doctor had been and gone, and Kelsey had been forced to rather harsh words with both doctor and Herald before an uneasy truce had been reached between them.
'You don't interfere with His Majesty's business,' she'd snarled at Dr. Lessar. 'And you—what did you think we called the doctor for? He'll bind and treat that arm—and those ribs—even if you feel it's necessary to go out and break them again. Is that clear?'
The doctor laughed. 'And you're telling me how to talk to a Herald?'
Oddly enough, the Herald laughed as well. And he did submit to the doctor's care, electing to more quietly ignore most of the doctor's subsequent advice.
Torvan accepted Kelsey's desertion with as much grace as he could muster during the season when the trade route was at its busiest and the tavern could be expected to have the most traffic. She did what she could to lend a hand between the doctors' visits with Carris and his Companion, but it was clear that she felt them both to be her concern, and clearer still that the Herald [was almost in bad enough shape to need it, so he gruffly chased her out of the dining room and told her to finish off her business.
Her business took her to the stables, where, in the dying light, the orange flicker of lamps could be seen through the slats of the door.
Cams was kneeling at the feet of a pinto mare, gently probing her knees. She nickered and nudged him, and he nearly fell over as he spun quickly to face Kelsey.
'What are you doing here?' they said in unison.
Then Carris smiled. 'You know, lass,' he said, although she'd passed the age of 'lassdom' five years back, 'you should consider a career in His Majesty's army. You've the makings of a fine regimental sergeant.'
'Thanks,' she replied, feeling that he meant to tease her, but not seeing anything in his words that could be viewed as perjorative. 'You haven't answered my question.'
He chuckled, and it added wrinkles to his eyes and mouth that suggested he often laughed. 'No, lass, I haven't. What do you think of her?'
'Of—' She looked at the horse, and then realized that it wasn't. A horse. 'That's your Companion.'
'If she forgives me for the indignity and the desertion, then, yes, she is.'
'Why—why have you done that?' She lowered her lamp, as if to offer the Companion a little more privacy. Her tone made it clear that she thought it almost sacrilegious.
'Don't you start as well,' Carris said, mock severely. 'I've done it,' he added, his voice suddenly much more serious, 'because I've a message that must be delivered—and I can't take her with me, but to leave her here, as an obvious Companion, is to risk her life.'
Kelsey let the seconds tick back while she figured out exactly what he meant. Then she lifted the lamp again. 'Are you crazy?' she said at last. 'You can't ride with your arm like that and your ribs broken—you'll pierce your lungs for certain!'
The Companion bobbed her lovely head up and down almost vigorously.
'Don't start,' Carris said again. 'We've already covered that ground, and I've made my decision. She knows it's the right one.' He stood slowly, but winced with
pain just the same as if he'd jumped up. 'Kelsey, you've done as much as any girl can to help me—but I've one more favor to ask of you.'
'W-what?'
'I want you to take care of her.'
'Of . . . her?'
'My Companion, yes,' he replied. 'Her name is Arana.' He waited for her to answer, and after five minutes had passed, he said, 'Kelsey?'
She couldn't even speak. Instead, she walked past him, holding the lamp as if it were a shield. She approached the dyed Companion, met her eyes, and held them for a long time. Finally, she remembered that she wasn't alone, and had the grace to blush.
'I meant to tell you that dinner's been laid out for you. It's probably cold, but you should still get to it while you can.'
'Kelsey?'
'I'll have to think about it,' she replied, not taking her eyes off of Carris' Companion.
That night, with the moon at half-mast, it was dark enough that she stubbed her toes twice on the path to the stable. The lamp that she held was turned down as low as possible—she didn't want to attract attention from the field mice and the rats.
She wanted to look at Arana again, without Carris intruding upon the privacy of her old dreams and her old desires. Could she watch the Companion. Could she take care of her. Ha!
She opened the doors, paused as the smells of the hay and the horse scent hit her nostrils, and made her
