“We could be here all day,” said Tal.
“Shh,” said Adrian.
And the awkward, suspicious little being came very tentatively and sniffed my outstretched fingers. I kept still, and kept talking. He came in closer, and very slowly, letting him see my hand move, I touched a spot at the ,side of his chin and gently stroked it. Then I trailed the hand to the top of his head—not leaving the soft coat, for there must be no surprises—and behind his ears, and by now he’d moved in closer and my other hand was working symmetrically. A minute later I was hugging him, and his tail was pounding the floor like a drumbeat. “There you are, sweetheart. There you are.”
“You’ve made a conquest,” said Adrian.
I looked up to see him standing beside us. “I’ve made a friend, I hope.” The dog seemed to shy away from this new presence, and I had to reassure him with my hands. “It’s all right, sweetheart.”
The dog’s eyes looked at me wildly, and I smiled and touched my nose to his. “I said it’s all right. Trust me.”
“I see your point,” said Adrian, “but if all his training takes this long, he’ll be a loss as a hunter or a pet.”
“I’d like to buy him,” I said.
“None of the dogs here are for sale; they’re held in public trust. Besides, you could never afford to cover what we paid to bring the sire uphill.”
“A minute ago you were going to make a dinner of him, sir.”
“An expensive dinner, Miss Gray. Funds to go to the Treasury. I’m sorry, but we sell no living thing of the Diamond to Outsiders. Policy.”
The tail was still lashing. Two paws planted themselves against my thigh and a rough tongue reached for my face. “I’d like to pay for his upkeep, then, out of my salary. There’s no harm in keeping him as long as I can pay his way, is there?”
“I suppose not,” said Adrian, with a touch of annoyance he seemed to regret at once. What an irritating Outsider I must be; hardly the best of guests. He bit his lip, bowed, and said, “Of course you can. We’ll consider him unofficially yours. And if you’d like, I can get you a pass to visit the kennels as often as you wish. Generally the public isn’t allowed in—they only get to see the occasional show.”
“I see. Yes, thank you, Adrian, I’d be very grateful.”
I couldn’t help beaming at him. Finally he shook his head and smiled back.
The mounts had been brought out, and most of the party were gathered by the hill just beyond the stables. Adrian introduced “Miss Gray” all around. Iolanthe Pelagia was there, resplendent in a gold-and-black riding habit … so this was Adrian’s betrothed. A Sergeant Stockton sat uncomfortably beside her, looking out of place on a horse. He had the unhappy expression I tended to associate with bodyguards at open social functions; I hoped that I didn’t give off a similar aura.
This Hartley Quince, however, seemed very much at home. His seat was graceful, and he smiled at me, stroking the neck of his mount with an air of open, athletic pleasure in the day. He was a figure out of a painting, with Renaissance curls and a courtier’s face, gently featured and sensitive to nuance. I distrusted him at once. Then I questioned my own reaction; I’d been spending ten minutes of every day in subjectivity sessions focused on Tal’s tarethi, and I was beginning to suspect that Tal was not fully sane by human standards.
Adrian said, “You have a very gentle mount, Miss Gray. We weren’t sure of your experience. Brandon will be nearby if you get into any difficulty.” Brandon Fischer bowed slightly from his perch on a massive chestnut.
“Thank you, Adrian. I’ve ridden at home. The saddles, I admit, are new to me.” And the horses’ manes looked strange, trimmed and braided.
There were a half-dozen other riders; mostly knights, I gathered, from the devices on their capes, piloting animals now instead of battle-capsules. They gawked at me to greater or lesser degree, and I began to suspect I was the only orphan of admin here among the glitter. Perhaps I should have taken Adrian up on Ins hint and changed clothes. Too late now. I felt like something between a zoo animal and a hired acrobat.
I was offered a swarm of names by the Protector, polite host that he was. Well, I could always surprise him later by repeating them all back to him while juggling oranges.
There was a mounting block at the end. As I stepped up on it, Hartley Quince maneuvered closer to me. With an open smile he said, “Would you consider tagging along with me, Miss Gray? I can promise you I’m more conversible than Fischer, and I have the advantage of preconquest. I’ve been longing to meet you.”
That startled me so badly I nearly lost my balance climbing up on the mare the stableboy held for me. (A ladies’ mare, too, gold and white stripes, the sign of an engineered temperament; what a humiliation that would have been.)
“Jewel,” said the stable boy, giving me her name a bit distrustfully. Quince grinned, the wicked glint in his eyes clashing nicely with his bland smile.
He’d poked that stick at me purposely. There was something in Quince’s style that reminded me of Adrian; perhaps they were some sort of distant cousins? I needed to do more research on the kinship networks around here.
A man came out of another set of buildings on the opposite side of the stables, bearing a hooded bird on his arm. I’d heard about
