Fool’s Assassin

I hung on tight with everything I had, ankles, knees, and thighs, my hands gripping the front of my saddle as if I’d never before sat a horse. I heard myself keening and could not stop. There were shouts from behind us, and I heard something, as if a summer bee had suddenly buzzed past me. Then there were two more, and I knew that an archer was shooting at us. I shrank to a burr on my horse’s back and we rode on. The carriageway curved and I felt a moment of relief that the invaders at the manor house could no longer see us. We galloped on.

Then Perseverance fell. He went down from his horse, hitting the road and then rolling into the deep snow, and the beast galloped on. He still gripped Priss’s lead and she turned hard and nearly trampled him before she sidled to a sudden halt that flung me far to one side. One of my feet lost its stirrup and I hung there, half-off, before I freed my other foot and leapt clear of her to run to Perseverance. There was no arrow sticking out of him, and I thought for a moment that he had merely fallen and we could both be up and away on Priss. Then I saw the blood. The shaft had passed right through him, tearing through his right shoulder. Blood was drenching him and his face was white. He rolled onto his back as I reached him and thrust Priss’s lead rope at me. “Get up and ride!” he commanded me. “Run away! Get help!” Then he shuddered all over, and closed his eyes.

I stood still. I heard the hoofbeats of his fleeing horse, and other hoofbeats. They were coming. The invaders were coming. They would catch us. I knew I could not lift him, let alone get him up on Priss. Hide him. He was still breathing. Hide him and come back for him. It was the best I could do.

I tore the butterfly cloak free and spread it over him, tucking it round him. Its colors were adapting, but not fast enough. I kicked snow over him and then, as the pursuer’s hoofbeats grew louder, I led Priss to the other side of the carriageway. I leapt at her, clawing my way up to the saddle as she jigged and danced in alarm. I got on her back, found the stirrups, and kicked her hard. “Go, go, go!” I shrieked at her.

And she went, lurching into a terrified lope. I leaned down, holding tight, not using my reins at all but only hoping she’d follow the road. “Please, please, please,” I begged of the horse, of the world, of everything that possibly existed. And then we were galloping, galloping so fast that I was certain they could not possibly catch us.

The cold wind bit me and tears streamed from the corners of my eyes. Her mane whipped my face. I saw only the open road before me. I would get away, I would bring help, somehow it would all turn out all right …

Then, on either side of me, two huge horses appeared. They breasted Priss, and one rider leaned down, seized her headstall, and pulled us round in a tight circle. I started to fall off her, and the other rider grabbed me by the back of my jerkin. With one hand he pulled me off my horse and dropped me. I hit the ground and rolled, nearly going under his horse’s hooves, and someone shouted angrily as white lights flashed all around me.

There was a moment when I knew nothing, and then I was hanging, my mouth full of snow, my head lolling as someone gripped the front of my jerkin. I thought he was shaking me, and then it was the world shaking around me and then it was still. I blinked and blinked, and finally I could see him, a big angry bearded man. He was old, his hair between gray and white, his eyes as blue as a white gander’s. He was roaring at me, furious shouts in a language I didn’t know. He suddenly paused and then, in a thick accent, demanded, “Where other one? Where he go?”

I found my tongue and the wit to lie. “He left me!” I shrieked and I did not need to pretend my distress. I lifted a shaking hand and pointed where Perseverance’s horse had bolted. “He ran away and left me!”

Then I heard a woman’s voice. She was shouting remonstrances breathlessly as she ran down the long carriageway toward us. At a distance behind her, the fog man was coming. He was walking fast but not hurrying. They were quite a distance away. Still clutching my shirtfront, the gray-haired man began to walk back toward her, dragging me and leading his horse, while the other man followed us mounted. He held my jerkin front so tight I could scarcely breathe. We past the spot where I had concealed Perseverance. I knew the area only by my footprints in the snow. I did not look toward the spot. I lifted all my walls and did not even think of him lest somehow they know my deceit. I was his only chance, and the only help I could give him was ignoring him. I kicked feebly and tried to shout, hoping to keep the man’s attention fixed on me.