Nine White Horses (32 page)

“There was nothing for it, my brother thought, but to take
that gift from me. To claim it as his own. To become a legend, and to cause my
part in it to be forgotten—for if the rest of the priests had known what I had
done, they would have buried me under the earth. Nor would they have troubled
to take my life first.”

Sparrow shuddered. Priests still did that to people who had
done terrible things, things too appalling for any lesser punishment.

“So you see,” the Grandmother said a little wryly and not
too bitterly, “how my brother took a truth that was less than endurable, and
made it into a legend.”

“It’s still a lie,” Sparrow said.

The Grandmother sighed, a bare whisper of breath. “Sometimes
lies have to be. Men especially—they need them. Just as they need to believe
that the stallion is the lord of the herd. Their spirits have little strength
to bear the truth.”

“That’s not fair,” Sparrow said.

“You are young,” the Grandmother said. “Now go. Let me
rest.”

Sparrow intended to obey, but not before she had seen the
Grandmother wrapped as warmly as possible, and fed a trickle of milk. The
Grandmother was failing: she did not try to fend Sparrow off. Already her body
was growing cold, though her spirit lived in it still, like an ember in a heap
of ash.

She wanted to die in peace. Sparrow meant to let her; but it
was hard to leave, harder than she had thought it would be. The Grandmother had
been mother to her when her own mother died, had raised her when no one else
would, and taught her most of what she knew. Sparrow had learned things from
her that women were never supposed to know: arts and magics, prayers, powers
over the world and its creatures.

A woman could not be a shaman. It was forbidden. And yet the
Grandmother was a shaman, and perhaps more. To most of the People she was only
the Grandmother, the eldest of the tribe, granted no such power or presence as
the elders of the men were given, and accorded respect only insofar as she was let
live when she could have been left on the steppe to die. And she had permitted
it, because, she said, it was better to be ignored than to let the men know how
much more power she had than any of them.

“You, too,” she said now, as Sparrow steeled herself to go.
“You have power. You are like me. The gods speak to you.”

“No,” Sparrow said. “No. They never do that.”

“Don’t lie to me,” said the Grandmother. Her voice was
remote, as if she spoke already from the far side of the sky. “I knew when you
were born, what you would grow to be. You are of my blood, child. You are the
gods’ own.”

“The gods don’t speak to women,” Sparrow said.

“The gods speak to whomever they choose.” The Grandmother
sighed, almost too faint to be heard. “Ah, child. They will test you—torment
you. Have a care to be strong. And remember. Men cannot bear the weight of the
truth. If you must lay it on them, do it gently; or veil it in a lie.”

“And if I won’t do that?”

“Then the gods defend you,” the Grandmother said.

Sparrow left her then, for she could see that there was little
life left, and no strength to bear anyone’s presence but her own. When she came
back, the Grandmother would be dead.

She grieved, walking out into the bitter cold and the
advancing dark. And yet she was glad.

The Grandmother would wake on the other side of the sky.
There she would be young again and beautiful, and strong as she had been when
she was a girl. And if the gods were kind, and certainly if they were just, she
would stand born anew, and a shape of light and swiftness would come upon her:
a shape that was the mare whose gift she had received, but had been forced to
give up. It would all be given back to her, all that the prince had taken.

Then she would mount, singing for the joy that was in her.
And the mare would turn, wheeling as the stars wheel, and bear her away, riding
swifter than wind over the undying grass.

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We hope you have enjoyed this sample of
Lady of Horses
by Judith Tarr
Copyright © 2000 Judith Tarr

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