Leeana felt her cheekbones heat. Coursers were even more devastatingly frank about certain matters than war maids, and she expected it was going to take her some time to grow accustomed to Gayrfressa’s amused perspective on her relationship with Bahzell.
‹ I don’t understand why you worry about that at all,› Gayrfressa said calmly. ‹ I mean, it’s not as if he didn’t understand how to-›
“We’ll…talk about that later, all right?” Leeana interrupted a bit hastily. “That’s one of those areas where two-foots and coursers need to…take a little time deciding how-or if-to talk about it at all.”
‹ Well, if you say so, › Gayrfressa agreed equably, but not so serenely that Leeana didn’t taste the mare’s bubbling amusement. ‹ But it’s not as if he doesn’t understand how to, is it?› she continued, and Leeana laughed and shook her head.
“Yes, he certainly does ‘understand how to,’” she admitted, and it was true. She was still growing accustomed to the notion that by Horse Stealer hradani standards she was a tiny, delicate little thing, and at first Bahzell had clearly been afraid he might inadvertently break her. Once she’d disabused him of that notion, however, it had turned out that he “understood how to” even more thoroughly than she’d ever allowed herself to hope he might. Which, she was forced to admit, was indeed one of the reasons she was so unhappy at riding steadily away from him on this beautiful, cool morning.
‹ And so it should be,› Gayrfressa told her. ‹ But it’s only one r eason. And the other reason is that you’re worried about him, not just unhappy about leaving him behind.›
“Yes,” Leeana admitted. “I’m worried about all of the others, too, really-especially Trianal and Brandark. But I’m discovering I’m more selfish than I thought I was.”
‹ That’s another two-foot attitude. It’s not selfish to worry about your other half, Leeana. And that’s what he is: your other two-foot half. Not worrying about what might happen to him would be like trying not to worry about what might happen to your right forehoof!›
Gayrfressa was right, Leeana realized, yet it was difficult for her to admit it. War maid or not, she was the daughter, granddaughter, and great-granddaughter of baronesses. Generations of her mothers and grandmothers had sent husbands and fathers and sons and brothers off to war, obedient to that drumbeat of responsibility and duty.
And too many of us never saw them come home again, she thought. Maybe that’s my real problem. He’s so much larger than life-a god-touched champion, the most deadly man I’ve ever known…and the gentlest. He’s all of those things and more, even if he is a blanket-stealer in the middle of the night, grumpy in the morning, impossibly stubborn, and impossibly determined to do the “right thing” however maddening it may be for the people who love him! But despite all that, I know he’s not really immortal. I know he won’t necessarily be coming home again just because of how much I love him, how much I need that “other two-foot half” of mine. And the truth is, that terrifies me. The thought of losing him, of feeling some cold, empty hole where he used to be…I’m not sure I’d truly have the courage to face that. Not that I’ll ever admit it to him; not after he tried to use that very argument to convince me I was making a terrible mistake!
She snorted in sudden amusement of her own, and felt Gayrfressa’s encouragement and affection in the back of her brain.
“I think you’re good for me,” she told the mare, breathing the resinous air deep once again. “You help me ‘put things in perspective,’ as Mother always used to say. Usually,” she admitted with a thoughtful air, “about the time I started feeling most sorry for myself, now that I think about it.”
‹ So two-foot mothers do that, too, do they?›
“Oh, yes!” Leeana said fervently.
‹ Good.›
The ground sloped downward in front of them, and Leeana automatically adjusted her seat and balance as Gayrfressa started down the slope.
‹ I’m glad you spent so much time learning to ride the lesser cousins,› the mare remarked. ‹ Walsharno didn’t have that advantage when he climbed into the saddle the first time. I got to watch, you know.› The mare tossed her head again, this time with a whinny of laughing memory. ‹ He fell off a lot.›
“He hadn’t had much opportunity to practice, you know,” Leeana said a bit primly.
‹ Of course he hadn’t! Which of the lesser cousins could have carried him?› Gayrfressa inquired pragmatically. ‹ Doesn’t change the fact that he looked like a bag of feed in the beginning…when he wasn’t bouncing along the ground behind Walsharno, at least.›
“I suppose not,” Leeana agreed, lips twitching on the edge of a smile. “He’s made up for it since, though,” she added, remembering Bahzell’s graceful seat…and other things about him.
‹ Yes, he has.› Gayrfressa’s mental voice carried a possessive pride, and Leeana leaned forward to pat the courser’s shoulder. ‹ In fact,› the mare continued, her voice turning more serious, ‹ he’s learned quite a few things you’re going to have to learn.›
“Such as?”
There might have been the very thinnest edge of pique in Leeana’s two-word question. She was a Sothoii, after all. The suggestion that her equestrian skills might be wanting in any respect came perilously close to insult.
‹ How to fight from the saddle,› Gayrfressa replied with a tart snort. ‹ Nobody ever taught you a thing about that, now did they?›
“Well, no,” Leeana admitted after a slightly huffy moment, then shrugged. “Properly reared young noblewomen aren’t supposed to even think about something as unladylike as actually fighting.” She grimaced as she remembered a long ago morning in Kalatha when Ravlahn Thregafressa had invited a very young Leeana Hanathafressa to “attack her” with a practice knife. It hadn’t been a very…impressive attack.
“If I’d had the good taste to be born a boy, they would have taught me to fight mounted before I ever got to Kalatha,” she continued. “Except, of course, that if I’d had the good taste to be born a boy I wouldn’t ever ever have had to run away to Kalatha. Which I did. Have to run away to Kalatha I mean.” She paused, trying to straighten that out in her own mind, then shrugged again. “But after I got to Kalatha, there wasn’t anyone to teach me. War maids mostly fight on their own feet, you know. We’re not very cavalry oriented.”
‹ No, you’re not, › Gayrfressa agreed in a tone of distinct disapproval.
“It wouldn’t be fair to expect anything else,” Leeana pointed out. “Not given where most of us come from. Garlahna, for example. Or Raythas. Or even Erlis. They may be Sothoii, but nobody was throwing them into a saddle when they were two years old, you know!”
‹ I suppose not,› Gayrfressa conceded. ‹ Not that that explains why they couldn’t have learned later!›
“I suppose not.” Leeana used Gayrfressa’s own words deliberately, accompanied by a snort of purely human dimensions. “Although,” she continued more thoughtfully, “I really wouldn’t be too surprised to find out the war maids decided years and years ago that they weren’t going to put mounted troops into the field because of how much they expected all the menfolk would carry on if they did. They may have decided that was one toe they didn’t need to step on.”
‹ Well, you’re going to have to learn how to do it.› Gayrfressa said in a no-argument sort of way.
“Fine,” Leeana replied, a bit surprised by the firmness of Gayrfressa’s tone.
‹ And you’re going to have to get rid of those silly short swords when you do it, too, › Gayrfressa continued. ‹ How do you expect to reach anyone with something like that from my saddle? And we have t o get you a bow. You do know how to shoot a bow, don’t you?›
“From my own two feet, yes.” Leeana frowned down at Gayrfressa’s single ear. “That’s not the same as using a horse bow though, you know!”
‹ Oh, don’t I know? ” Gayrfressa shook her head in profound disgust. ‹ It took years for Walsharno to convince him to learn to use a bow properly. If you can call the way he uses one even today “properly,” that is!›
“There are some advantages to that arbalest of his,” Leeana pointed out.
‹ Not from a courser’s saddle, there aren’t, and a wind rider doesn’t have any business fighting from anywhere else!›
Something clicked in Leeana’s brain, and she cocked her head, still looking down at Gayrfressa’s ear.
“I don’t think it’s going to be very easy for Balcartha to integrate a single wind rider into the Kalatha Guard,” she said slowly.
