“He hails from Brennfield,” Athan said as he walked back from another departing traveler rolling away on a rickety wagon that creaked loudly each time one of the large wheels jutted into a puddle. “A town far southwest of here.”
The look in his eyes said much, and she almost didn’t ask. “Bad news?”
He swept a hand through his hair before pulling up the hood of his cloak as the drizzle returned to dampen all it touched. “More burnings, north of Haden’s Crossing at Four Corners. About a dozen farms, he said. First time the blight burnings have been seen so far north.” He cursed under his breath. “You’d think that crowned fool would’ve figured out by now that burning the fields doesn’t do a damn thing, except make a bunch of already struggling families homeless right before planting season begins.”
Dnara assumed ‘the crowned fool’ meant King Eldramoore. Having only Athan’s words to go on, she wondered if the king was simply as desperate as his people, trying whatever he could to stop the blight even if the fires didn’t seem to work. Still, her keeper had said once that only the truly foolish do the same thing over and over expecting different results.
‘You’ll remember this,’ he’d said.
‘I remember everything, Keeper,’ she’d replied. ‘Everything but what came before.’
‘There is no before,’ he’d huffed. ‘Pay attention, girl! There is only now... and now I need to piss. Cursed aging. Stay here. And don’t touch anything. And no reading!’
‘Yes, Keeper,’ she had replied, but left alone in a room full of books, how could she not?
“Dnara?” Athan touched her shoulder and she startled. “Sorry. You just had this far off look for a moment, and you stepped right in that puddle.”
Dnara looked down to her feet, now ankle deep in muddy water. ‘Pay attention, girl!’
“Oh!” She hopped out of the water and tried to shake her feet dry, her sandals squelching with each step.
Athan chuckled as he steadied her wobbly flailing with a hand on her elbow. “Careful, Lady Thorngrove. Some of these ruts are deep enough to drown in. Perhaps if you-” His words cut off as Treven nipped at his cloak hood and gave a gentle yank back. “Oy, stop that.” Treven did not, and instead yanked harder. Athan stopped walking, his hold on Dnara’s elbow making her do the same. “What is it, Trev?”
Treven stamped once with a front hoof, his muzzle nodding towards the rising slope in the path ahead. Dnara thought it odd and opened her mouth to ask, but Athan held a finger to his lips. His head tilted to listen at the distant hill as her mouth clamped shut, all while Treven’s withers twitched and his ears flipped back to front and back again. Silence surrounded them on the road, broken only by the lightly falling raindrops and a distant rumble of thunder.
As they stood in the rain, the thunder grew louder, then it gained a rhythm. The puddles at their feet echoed rings with each beat. The pounding felt without end. The louder it grew, the closer it came and the less it sounded like thunder.
“What is it?” she asked on barely a whisper, afraid to disturb whatever force trembled the earth.
“Trouble.” Athan moved quickly then, guiding her to the dark alleyway between houses. Treven back-stepped into the alleyway after them, and Athan wrapped the mule’s reins over a nearby post, giving the appearance of an animal parked right where it was supposed to be. Standing silent in the shadows, Athan pulled a rolled blanket from Treven’s saddle and draped it over them, pressing her against a brick wall as his finger rose to his lips once more. She nodded and breathed deep to settle her nerves, not understanding his reason but trusting him to have one.
The thunder stormed into a bone-rattling cacophony, taking on an oddly metallic cling and clank with each rhythmic thump. Tremors shook the ground beneath her feet and the wall at her back, hammering the world in sync with her heart. Athan removed the finger from his lips and pointed to a break between the folds of the blanket before lifting it just enough to give a glimpse of the storm as it passed.
Dnara sucked in a gasp. The storm was made of men and horses, both dressed in shining metal armor and richly tinted cloths of crimson and gold. The horses wore helmets adorned by red feather crests. The men were armed, some with swords sheathed in lavish scrollwork, and others with axe-topped pikes from which flew embroidered banners. On the banners, a red dragon perched proudly on a grey rock overlooking a sapphire sea. Behind the dragon, a sun acted as a halo, and through the sun, a sword framed by the dragon’s raised wings.
Athan leaned in, his breath a whisper in her ear. “King’s Guard.”
Intently marching, they passed; rows of men and horses, wide enough to take up the whole road. Their numbers felt endless as the squadron filed by the hidden alleyway, the count going beyond thirty rows before the last one passed, followed by a single rider atop a mountainous stallion. His armor, different than the others, spoke of title and authority, of battles won and commands given. The wind blew through the drizzle, spattering his armor and soaking the red plume of feathers topping his helmet, but he paid it no mind.
Then, the dark brown horse beneath him stopped with a powerful twitch
