Warprize (46 page)

Marcus spoke as Prest moved into position. “Joden is a good man, Lara, valued for his wisdom. He is heard in senel, although he holds no rank, and even by the Elders when he appears before their councils. He will make a great Singer once he is recognized as such.”

Prest drew closer, preparing to transfer me to his horse. I was trying to figure out what Marcus was trying to say.

“If you can’t confide in anyone else, you can confide in a Singer. Words spoken to a Singer are held to his heart, where they can not be pried free. Talk to Joden, Lara. Please.”

With that, they transferred me to Prest’s horse without breaking stride, and Marcus faded back and away into the crowd.

Prest is a full head taller then Marcus and easily twice as broad. I rather dreaded riding with him, since I could not see over his shoulders. Which meant that my stomach would be upset by the time I left his horse.

Prest also isn’t much of a talker, which left me free to dwell on my miseries. If Atira were here, I might be able to confide in her, but she’d been left in Water’s Fall, under the care of Eln. Her leg would heal true, but the break would not let her travel. Even surrounded by thousands of warriors, I felt terribly alone. Keir had been absent now for two days, and part of me feared he’d decided that this Warprize no longer interested him. Maybe I could talk to Joden, confide in him. Joden had helped me so much when I’d been taken to the camp. He’d been the one to figure out that I’d been lied to by Xymund, my late half-brother. But I felt so very stupid and silly. Like a spoiled child with a broken toy.

Just how could I tell anyone how miserable I was? Firelanders already had a fairly low opinion of soft city folk, and if I started complaining it would only reinforce their ideas.

It wasn’t so bad when Keir was with me. For some reason I could sleep in his presence. Well, truth be told, I could sleep in his arms. But he had duties and had to travel from one end of his army to the other, and it spread out for miles. So there were some nights when he wasn’t in our shelter, and I had not seen him at all for the last two days.

Firelanders could sleep in the saddle. If I tried that, I got sick. Firelanders, in the saddle, could repair tack, or sharpen blades or argue or, Goddess help me, talk.

Which was another thing. We had horses in Xy. I’d been taught to ride as a child, and have ridden many times. But in the city I rarely bothered. By the time a groom had saddled one for me, I could be half way to where I was going. You had to worry about tying them to things and leaving them for long periods. I’d never been really enamored of the beasts; they were a form of transportation and not much more.

But I’d learned fast that Firelanders had relationships with their animals. Horses were treated like small children, acknowledged and admired. One of the worst insults imaginable was ‘bracnect’, which meant ‘killer of foals’. Now that I knew what the word meant, I was more careful in how I used it.

And just like proud parents are wont to do, they talk about horses. Constantly. Obsessively. They’d discuss the details of ears and mane and gaits until I wanted to scream. They have seventeen words for a male horse and can talk for HOURS about saddles. They love to modify saddles with hooks and protrusions and supports, and talk out that the advantages and disadvantages. Their world is very dependant on their animals and its fascinating for about the first day. After that, I tired quickly of horses and horse talk.

And that was another thing. All this talk was out in the open where everyone could hear. They have no sense of modesty or privacy that I could see. I’d had one rider come up, and start to discuss the state of his bowels without a qualm, in the middle of a moving mass of warriors. You couldn’t really talk to anyone without being overheard.

So here I was, Warprize to the Warlord of the Plains, acclaimed before my people and his, praised and admired for my willingness to journey to a new and strange place, to be a bridge between his people and mine. What would they think, to find out that I was sick to my stomach, hungry, exhausted, dirty, and alone and certain that the Warlord had lost interest in me?