Pegasus Page 15

  But she couldn’t think about unimportant things like her court clothes when she was focussed on flying. They had explored the countryside in every direction, up to almost half a night’s flight away, and there had been one or two terrifying near-dawn returns. Sylvi had learnt the rota and schedule of the Wall guards at the very first, so that they could fly over a bit whose sentries were at the other end of their span; the same pegasus seen flying regularly over the Wall at night would be taken note of, and Ebon was black, which was an unusual colour in pegasi, and therefore would be recognised too easily as himself. That he was known to be flying at night for a project he was doing as part of his apprenticeship was some help, but they wished to take no more chances than they had to.

  Spring and autumn were the best seasons for their expeditions, when the nights were longer than they were in the summer, and warmer than in winter. Summer used to be my favourite season, Sylvi had said to Ebon as they snatched a quick midsummer’s flight between late and early twilight, in the first year of their friendship. I used to love the long days and short nights.

  Even Ebon could not fly very far carrying a passenger; they set down once, twice, maybe three times in a long night’s flying, to let him rest and stretch his wings: Sylvi had learnt where to rub and dig in her thumbs along his shoulders, especially the thick heavy muscles that were the beginning of his wings. Mmmmmmh, Ebon would say. Harder.

  They discovered which villages had nervous dogs that barked at everything, and which villages had easier-natured dogs who, once they’d met you and sniffed you thoroughly, never bothered you again, except perhaps for petting. (Sylvi began to seek out dogs at the fêtes they went to, as a form of pre-emptive security—and she watched any accompanying palace dogs for their reactions to those they met.) They discovered which meadows were nice and flat for landing and taking off, and which had nasty hollows and hummocks that didn’t show up properly when there was only moonlight to steer by—and which, once or twice, had short-tempered bulls in them.

  There were a few very alarming occasions when it had seemed that Ebon wasn’t going to be able to get aloft again with Sylvi’s weight on him. This had never quite happened, but the worst night was when he’d had to gallop down a road through a village. Not only did this make them conspicuous to any insomniac who might choose to look out a window at that moment or any light sleeper who might be awakened by an odd, not-quite-horse-sounding half thud, half patter of galloping hooves—and while Sylvi wore black clothing, she was still far too visible—and even with Ebon’s wings spread, the pounding was very hard on his legs as well as making too much noise. It was, furthermore, a bad road, with the worst of the ruts carelessly half filled with rocks and rubble. Ebon took no harm of it, but he did admit to being a little stiff the next day. About six months later they were invited to a fair at that village and Sylvi arranged for it to be pointed out that the road in and out of their village was in sad repair which should be remedied.

  What had made them both extremely stiff—although Sylvi more than Ebon—for much of the first six or eight months of their adventures was learning to land. Sylvi’s mother had become seriously worried that her daughter had developed a strange bone or muscle disease which would explain why a twelve-year-old creaked out of bed some mornings like a little old lady. As an emergency measure Sylvi had considered deliberately falling off her pony, but in the first place, on top of the bruises she had already from (obligatory) falling off Ebon she could not face this with equanimity; also she guessed it might worry her mother more rather than less. She put up with being cross-examined by Nirakla nearly weekly, and prodded by a series of healers…. She balked at being prodded by magician-healers, but allowed Minial to touch her; Minial, like Nirakla, could find nothing wrong—beyond the bruises.

  “Child, what are you doing to yourself?” said the queen. “If Lucretia—”

  “It’s not Lucretia! Diamon says I’m not ready for Lucretia yet!”

  “Or Diamon—”

  “Diamon’s on my side! He’s not going to get me in trouble with you!”

  The queen laughed. “Very well. But what is happening?” She ran her finger lightly along Sylvi’s purple forearm, and Sylvi bravely managed not to wince. Her bruises weren’t usually so conspicuous, but there’d been a lamentably ill-placed rock two nights ago in one of those lumpy fields. At least there hadn’t been a bull. “It’s true that physical stoicism is a very useful attribute in a soldier, but it’s not something I recommend practising in advance. The world will take care of it. And you’re not going to be a soldier anyway; you’re going to be a negotiator like your dad.”

  There was a silence. Sylvi knew this silence; the queen wasn’t going to go away till she got an answer she found acceptable. Sylvi should have been prepared for this moment, but she wasn’t. Then she thought of something Ebon had said, the night of their binding. It wasn’t a very good excuse, but it was better than blaming anyone at the practise yards—or telling the truth. And it would help provide an excuse for the concomitant sleepiness. “I—I’ve been sleepwalking,” she said. “Since—since Fthoom.”

  The queen let out a long sigh. If she hadn’t been a colonel of the Lightbearers, thought Sylvi, she’d’ve drooped. “Oh, my dear. Well—”

  Sylvi said hastily, “I never go far. I bump into something and wake up. But sometimes I bump kind of hard. And sometimes it’s hard to get back to sleep again.”

  The queen looked at her and Sylvi stared back, trying to look like the king staring down a miscreant. The queen began to look a little amused. “And you’ll flatly refuse to agree to someone sleeping in your room with you, won’t you?”

  “Yes,” said Sylvi in her kingliest manner.

  “Well, I don’t blame you,” said the queen. “I’d refuse too. And there’s always someone outside your door—you know that, yes? Your father said you weren’t best pleased not to have been told. Very well. But if this goes on much longer we’ll have to think again. I could ask Nirakla if she has anything for sleepwalking.”

  She didn’t, but she gave me some liniment that your shaman-healer gave her the recipe of—she said it was better than the stuff she’d always used before—you don’t have to rub so much. I thought that was pretty funny.

  It’s for flying bruises, said Ebon. The first few years you’re flying you go through the stuff by the lakeful. Maybe some of us more than others. I was maybe one of the mores.

  She and Ebon finally began getting this sorted out just before the queen made a real fuss, and the danger passed. The experience had a further interesting effect however. Sylvi had always had to fight for her time at the practise yards; everyone kept telling her to wait till she’d grown a little—even the queen, who had introduced her there in the first place. She was thirteen when she was finally allowed her first mounted lessons—and Diamon said that she fell off better than any student he’d ever had. “Anyone would think you’d been riding with the horse-dancers,” he said.

  Everything was an adventure, at night, when you were where you shouldn’t be, even if it was somewhere you could go perfectly well in daylight, and it was then only ordinary. The scrumped apples (they only stole a few) tasted better than the ones from the bowl in your study; the wind in your ears sang secrets it never whispered under the sun; even the dogs that came out wagging their tails were an adventure at night, and it wasn’t only because you were glad they weren’t barking at you. Everything was an adventure, at least when you could stop yourself thinking that you were defying your father’s ban.

  Everything was an adventure at night, but not every adventure was a good one. There were the bulls, and the big snarling dogs, and once they saw a magician walking swiftly down a little side street and knocking on a door before he slipped inside. Sylvi had just time to wonder what a magician in his official robes was doing in a tiny country alley before panic swamped her thoughts and she and Ebon spun round and headed for the deepest dark they could find�
�which happened to be a barn, luckily dog-free; a few of the cows glanced at them, and returned to cud-chewing.

  But the worst was the night that Ebon, gliding for a landing, suddenly changed his mind, lurched frantically in the air, nearly unseating Sylvi—Don’t fall off she heard—and clawed his way upward again while Sylvi clung on, slithering with every wingbeat and miserably aware that if he failed to get aloft again it would be her fault—but he banked clumsily as soon as they were clear of the ground and flew away faster than they’d ever gone. He didn’t stop till they were back over the Wall, and then he came down like a stone dropping, and when he fell on landing this time—neither of them had fallen on landing in months—it was a second or two before he got up again. Long enough for Sylvi to have taken a first running step toward him, shouting Ebon! in her mind and breathing his name aloud, as if mind-speech was not enough in this extremity.

  But he was on his feet before she reached him. Sorry, he said, and that was all.

  Ebon—?

  After a long pause, he said, Norindour. I smelled it.

  Norindour!

  Norindour—so close to the palace. Just outside the Wall. Norindours didn’t come this far from the wild lands. Taralians sometimes. Never norindours.

  You’re sure? I—I wouldn’t know.

  We’re taught norindour, although they don’t like our mountains—oh, you don’t teach smells, do you? We’re taught taralian, and ornbear, and norindour—well, and human—and, he went on desperately, also stuff like if a drak bush is fruiting or not—it all goes on underground so you can’t see it, you have to know what it smells like because they’re poisonous if they’re fruiting, and they can do it any season although sometimes they don’t for years….

  Sylvi could hear how frightened he was—frightened and exhausted—so she didn’t say anything, but put her arms round his neck, and after he’d run through a little more pegasus botany he fell silent. At last he sighed and said again, Sorry. I’m so tired I can’t…. We’ll have to walk the rest of the way.

  Sylvi had not had a chance to think about how close inside the Wall they had come down; it would be a long walk, and not without its own danger of discovery. But they did it, Sylvi guiding them, both because she knew the grounds better, but also because Ebon stumbled along with his head down, barely noticing anything. She took him right up to the pegasus annex of the palace—as close as she dared. There was a faint flicker of candlelight through the trees, and she thought she could see a smudge of pegasus silhouette. She stopped.

  When she stopped Ebon stopped too, and raised his head and looked around. Oh—Syl, go away. We can see better in the dark than you can.

  Yes, it was an honour to do you a service, she replied.

  When he gave a little humming snort of laughter she felt better. Thank you, he said. Thank you, beautiful human of the bright wings and the matchless sagacity— He stopped abruptly. I’ll have to tell my dad, you know.

  Tell him anything you need to. Do you want me to say anything?

  No. They know I go out flying at night. I just have to figure out what I was doing out there over … over …

  Stonyvale, she said.

  Oh, but—rain and hail—do I know it’s Stonyvale?

  She thought a moment. Yes—we were there for a fête. The little girl with a spotted zurcat.

  Okay. Good. Thanks. But he didn’t immediately move away, and she could feel the tension in him. She put one hand to his face and rubbed his mane with the other, and he touched her temples with his feather-hands, and they parted.

  The next morning when she tried to get out of bed she made a little squeaking noise and fell back on her pillows.

  “Lady?” said the attendant who had just set the tea tray beside Sylvi’s bed.

  Sylvi lay motionless and then said calmly, “It’s only a bad dream. I’ll get up in a moment.” The attendant bowed and left. Gingerly Sylvi turned over and discovered that most of her left side was one long, angry, midnight-purple bruise. She hadn’t noticed last night: she didn’t even remember falling, only being afraid for Ebon.

  Well, I’m not going to be caught out, she thought. She’d just have to be sure neither her mother nor her attendants saw her undressed for the next fortnight or so; she didn’t think she could pass this off as the result of a sudden return of sleepwalking—or if she did her mother would insist on someone sleeping in her bedroom with her. If she didn’t tie her to the bed.

  Sylvi was (apparently) deep in her papers when the study door opened and Ahathin came softly in. She looked up, trying to smile as she always did. Trying to pretend that she didn’t know why Ebon was late this morning; he sometimes was late. Ahathin stopped a little inside the door and looked back at her soberly. Suddenly it was too difficult to keep the corners of her mouth turned up, and her smile disappeared.

  “Ebon has reported the scent of a norindour—possibly more than one—outside Stonyvale,” said Ahathin.

  It was easy to look shocked and horrified—she was shocked and horrified—but surprise was harder. Maybe shock and horror would do. “Oh,” she said faintly.

  “He was flying last night,” Ahathin went on, his eyes never moving from her face. “He flies somewhat regularly at night, I believe, but—I believe—it was something of a revelation that he flies beyond the Wall.”

  She could think of nothing to say.

  “Our king has already sent a company to investigate,” said Ahathin, and paused. Sylvi felt as if her bruises were glowing—that Ahathin would be able to see them too, even under two shirts and a tunic. They began to itch furiously, and she had to twist her hands together not to scratch.

  Ahathin took two steps forward and leaned over her study table. He put his hands over her knotted fists—his hands were barely bigger than hers—and said suddenly, urgently, “Child—both you children—be careful. No, don’t say anything. I don’t want to hear it. Because I stand at your elbow so often I think you, both of you, forget why else I am there, why else beyond that I am the princess’ tutor, because you do not need me.”

  “Ahathin,” she said, distressed, “we—”

  Ahathin shook his head. “That does not matter in the slightest, and I do not think it is rudeness. But it is carelessness. I am a Speaker, and perhaps I hear more than you guess. And if I hear anything at all, then it is possible that others may hear something too.”

  She wanted to shout at him, Would it be so terrible if we were found out? If it was known we went flying together? But she remained silent because she knew the answer: Yes, because it was forbidden. Yes because if they tried to claim that they had not been expressly forbidden to go flying together it would mean they were irresponsible children. And yes because everything about the unprecedented strangeness of their relationship was risky, because some people were frightened by strangeness. Because some people listened to Fthoom.

  There was a knock on the door. Ahathin stepped back from the table and became his normal self again, small, faintly rumpled, mild, ordinary, nearly invisible, except for the fact that he was tutor and Speaker to the princess. “Come,” she said, and one of her mother’s women entered, bowed first to Ahathin, and then a much deeper bow to Sylvi: “A change of schedule, princess, because of this news your pegasus brought….”

  CHAPTER 9

  They still flew after that, but less often, and it was increasingly difficult. More than once they saw a party, torch-lit, riding or walking swiftly with the unmistakable purposefulness of someone bringing news to the king, or going on the king’s urgent orders. Ebon had been forbidden to fly beyond the Wall—I nearly got grounded completely, Ebon said. I said it would spoil my project, and Gaaloo said I should have enough sketches—unless I was being negligent, I shouldn’t need to fly around at night any more.

  Oh no! This had been what she’d been afraid of.

  Oh yes. But I pointed out that it was a little unkind to ground me w
hen I’d brought them useful news.

  Once when she was younger—before Ebon—Sylvi had found a silver penknife that her father had lost, found it somewhere she was expressly forbidden to be. She had stood with the beautiful, treacherous thing in her hands, not deciding what to do—she already knew she would take it to him and tell him the truth—but nerving herself to do it.

  When she had done so he too had stood looking at his penknife with an expression, she imagined, very like the one she had worn when she found it: delighted, dismayed, baffled, unhappy.

  “What were you doing in the Hall of Magicians?” he said at last.

  Again she answered honestly; her father did not try to make you say things that would make it worse for you. He wanted to know.

  “Someone”—Garren, but she didn’t need to say that—“told me that the Hall of Magicians smelled of magic, and if I went there some time by myself when no one else was around, I would learn what magic smells like, and then I would always know.” He had also told her that on a sunny day you could see faint reflective ribbons of the enormous power used to maintain the protective magic of the Wall, dancing in the sunlight like dust motes.

  “And did you learn what magic smells like?”

  She hesitated. She knew, now, that her brother had set her up. She should have known immediately, because that was, in her experience, what brothers did; but she had badly wanted to know what magic smelled like—or some other way to recognise when magic was being used around you so you knew why you felt so queer. So she had ignored her common sense, and gone to the Hall. Where she’d realised she’d been played for a fool—she couldn’t see that the dust motes in the sunbeams were any different from any other dust motes either—and found the king’s little knife.

  “It doesn’t have a smell, does it?” she said. “Just when they use incense and things, it smells of incense. But … but it does something, doesn’t it? Because you do feel it, when you’re all alone in the Hall.”