Rudiger winced as Fra-Mecatl whipped his hand with her stick. “Wrong! You are not paying attention.” She leaned over the table at him.

“I’m trying,” Rudiger said. “Honestly. But there’s just so much to take in.”

She whipped his hand again, and he bit back the words of anger he wanted to say.

She began to pace about the communal room. “Very well, we will return to the basics. The sacred animals, name them.”

He must have answered this question about twenty times already, but at least he knew he could avoid another hand-whipping. “The jaguar for Ninussa. The serpent, or sometimes feathered serpent, for Sestin. The quetzal for Frana. The bat for the Dark Lady.”

“Sacred colours?”

“Green for Ninussa. It represents royalty and power. Yellow for Sestin representing magic. White for Frana representing nature and the common people. Blue for the Dark Lady representing death.”

“They will never accept him,” Fra-Tepeu said.

“There have been male priests before,” Fra-Mecatl said.

“Outsider men?” Fra-Tepeu said, easing himself into a chair.

“Nothing specifically prohibits it.”

Fra-Tepeu laughed. “That makes no difference. They won’t allow it.”

Fra-Mecatl slapped her brother with her stick. “And you have a better idea?”

“Wait for Zandrue.”

“She was supposed to be back in under two weeks. It’s been three. Either she’s run off, or she’s dead. Either way, he’s my only choice now.” She jabbed her stick in Rudiger’s arm. “Or would you have me use the one in the cellar?”

“I would have you abandon this plan and start making new plans.”

Fra-Mecatl shook her head. “No. I’ve put too much work into this. It is too late to give up. It can still work.”

Their argument went on for several more minutes, but Rudiger tuned most of it out. His mind wandered back to Zandrue. Three weeks. She really wasn’t coming back. Had he driven her to it? He shouldn’t have argued with her. Shouldn’t have got angry.

Or maybe she was dead. He couldn’t shake the memory of her stumbles and the thought that she was ill. In that case, he should have gone after her, made her listen, insisted she let him or someone else help her. He couldn’t stand the thought of her body lying forgotten and undiscovered somewhere.

There was a thud as a book slammed onto the table in front of him. “Read,” Fra-Mecatl said. “We will resume tomorrow.”

Rudiger picked up the book. It was thick—thicker than his arm—and leather-bound. “All of it?” But Fra-Mecatl was already leaving the room and didn’t answer.

“Best read it all,” Fra-Tepeu said. “Just in case.”

Rudiger looked at the cover and wasn’t even sure what the title was. He was doing pretty well with spoken Ninifin, but he hadn’t paid any attention to the written form. It didn’t even have the same script as Arnorgue. He had no idea how he was going to read this.

“Yeah, I’ll do that.” Rudiger stood up and tucked the book under his arm. He should probably tell them he couldn’t read the book, but at the moment, he just couldn’t bring himself to. “I better check the horses first, though.”

The old man just nodded.

Of course, knowing his luck, Fra-Mecatl knew full well he couldn’t read it and this was some sort of test to find out how he would react, or how well he could deal with a difficult situation, or something like that. At the moment, though, he couldn’t bring himself to care.

He stashed the book in his room and headed out to the barn.

He was getting sick and tired of doing nothing day in, day out. He didn’t mind tending the horses, but it wasn’t accomplishing anything. Nearly three months and they’d made no progress finding Corvinian. Was there any point any more? The poor kid was probably dead, and even if he wasn’t, the trail was so cold by now, there was no likelihood of picking it up again.

This resistance he had somehow found himself part of also wasn’t doing anything other than waiting. Even the ones who were tired of waiting were still waiting. He had decided to take a risk and agree to support Acat, Kianto, and Ses-Patli, but he hadn’t even been able to tell them that as he hadn’t heard from them in nearly three weeks.

And there was no Zandrue. No Borisin.

Part of Rudiger just wanted to collect Jorvan and sneak away in the dark of night. They could find a way to scale the wall—Jorvan could just fly over it—and they’d be away from Ninifin forever. Except he doubted Jorvan would do it. Plus, any time he put serious thought into it, he worried Zandrue would come back the day after they left. So he always ended up choosing to wait one more day.

The horses were eager to get out of their stalls. Mulac and Nelli wasted no time hurrying outside, and Tepin was only a short distance behind them. Xoco decided to be contrary and just stood in her stall when Rudiger opened it. When he threatened to close it again, she pushed past him and out into the field.

Outside, there was activity back by the house. A large group of people had arrived with a covered wagon and several horses. Some sort of delivery? While Fra-Tepeu preferred his trips into the city, he did occasionally have things delivered. Though this seemed bigger than what Rudiger would expect for a delivery.

He walked a short distance towards the house to get a better look, but he couldn’t go far as he still had to keep an eye on Fra-Tepeu’s horses. Though Mulac was already wandering in that direction anyway. Rudiger was about to whistle to bring the horse back, but paused. One of the horses with the new arrivals was much larger than any of the others—a huge roan horse looking in his direction.

It couldn’t be, could it?

The horse continued to look at him. If it was Borisin, they were too far apart for communication. Rudiger wanted to head straight over there to find out, but he couldn’t leave the horses. He could take them with him, though. A little walk across the field for some exercise. It would be good for them.

Instead of whistling to Mulac, he whistled to the other three and they began the trek across the field. The closer they got to the house, the more the big horse looked like Borisin. After a minute, they were within range.

Took you long enough, Borisin said.

Took me long enough? You’ve been gone for months!

Figured you must have forgotten me, the amount of time you just stood over there gaping.

This is how you greet me after all this time?

Borisin turned his head to the side with a snort.

Rudiger broke into a run, which drew an excited whinny from Mulac. He leapt the last couple of feet and threw his arms around Borisin’s neck—as much of the neck as he could manage, at any rate.

Okay, now you’re just embarrassing me, Borisin said.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“Oh come on, you’re happy to see me and you know it.”

If that’s what you choose to believe.

The fact that Borisin wasn’t pulling away from him was all the confirmation Rudiger needed.

“What is this? Rudiger, what are you doing?”

Rudiger loosened his grip on Borisin, but didn’t let go entirely. He turned to face Fra-Tepeu who was coming over to him. “Sorry, Fra-Tepeu. This is my horse I told you about. It’s been a while.”

Your horse? I think you mean you’re my human.

“Yes, I gathered that,” Fra-Tepeu said. “Just don’t lose sight of my horses.”

“Don’t worry, sir,” Rudiger said. He took a quick look around. Mulac was mingling with the horses hitched to the wagon, while Nelli was approaching Lucinda. Tepin had stopped to graze, and Xoco was standing to the side pretending to ignore everything else.

“You’re speaking Ninifin now. You’ve adjusted well, it seems.” Eleuia was standing a short distance away, arms crossed.

Ses-Izel, Borisin corrected.

Right. Rudiger knew that’s what he should be calling her, but for some reason, he couldn’t help think of her by the name Eleuia. Maybe because so many other people referred to her that way. “Haven’t had much choice,” he said aloud.

“I must admit, I expected to find you dead,” Eleuia—Ses-Izel—said.

Rudiger shrugged. “Guess I’m harder to kill than you thought.”

“I doubt that.”

“To be honest, it’s been easier than you led us to believe.”

Eleuia laughed. “Yes, you’ve got Fra-Mecatl as a patron. How often have you left this ranch?”

“Fair point,” Rudiger said. “But we didn’t exactly have it easy getting here. You’re here earlier than I expected. I got the impression from others you weren’t due for a while yet.”

“Came back early at his insistence.” She walked over to Rudiger and Borisin and placed a hand on Borisin’s snout. “He’s quite the...ah...”

“Handful?” Rudiger said.

“You could put it that way.”

I’m no handful. You lot are either lazy or incompetent.

“Yeah, he’s definitely quite the handful,” Rudiger said. “How did you get past the wall?”

“Came through the gate, of course,” Eleuia said.

“Wait, if you could just take him through the gate, what was the big fuss about?”

“No, I couldn’t just take him through the gate.”

“Then I don’t get it.”

She sighed. “Look, officially I’m a merchant. I have a very difficult-to-get pass that lets me through the gate twice a year, once in each direction. So I have to be very picky about when I cross. There was no way I was going to cross back that early. On top of that, horses are not an item that I am licensed to trade in. So I have to have the exact same number coming back in as I had going out. In the case of your other two horses, I was able to sell two of mine, which I then replaced after getting back inside. Borisin was tougher.”

“Couldn’t you just sell a third horse?” Rudiger asked. “You’ve got four hitched to the wagon.”

“He refused to pull the wagon,” Eleuia said.

Rudiger rolled his eyes. “You couldn’t just pull it for a short time?”

Look at that thing. Look at those poor horses hitched to it now. You really think I was going to let anyone hook all that up to me?

“You couldn’t have compromised just a little?”

“It wouldn’t have looked right anyway,” Eleuia said. “There would have been all sorts of questions about why I purchased a stallion to pull a wagon. I couldn’t risk that much scrutiny.”

“So what did you do?” Rudiger asked.

Eleuia hesitated.

You’re not going to like this, Borisin said.

“What?”

“I got some help from Luana,” Eleuia said. “She provided me with a forged letter from Lord Elaster of Nallin.”

“What did it say?”

She turned to face him directly. “It says that Borisin is a gift from Lord Elaster to her Holiness, Queen Nin-Xoco as a gesture of goodwill from the people of Nallin to the people of Ninifin. That was pretty much the only thing I could think of which would get the guards at the gate to let me take an extra horse across.”

“Seems like it worked,” Rudiger said.

“Oh, it worked.”

“So what’s the problem?” He really hoped she wasn’t about to tell him she had to actually give Borisin as a gift to the queen.

That’s exactly what she’s about to tell you.

“Naturally, the gate sent word ahead. If I don’t—”

“Never mind,” Rudiger said. “He already told me you have to turn him over. And if you don’t, you’ll be arrested or something?”

“Much worse. I would probably be charged with stealing the Queen’s property and executed. Luckily, Fra-Tepeu’s ranch is on the way to the City, so I could stop here without drawing any questions. It’s something I would be expected to do.”

“So now what are we supposed to do?”

“Don’t ask me,” Eleuia said, turning away from him again. “I’ll turn him over to the Queen, and then he’s out of my hands. He’s your problem then.”

I figured we’d figure things out, Borisin said.

“My problem? You’re just going to wash your hands of the situation and walk away?”

She stopped and turned around. “Look, I never wanted to be part of this, okay? I’ve only done as much as I have because... You know what? I don’t even know why I did this much. I should have turned you and your friends away the moment I first saw you. No, I should have said no to Luana the moment she even mentioned you. So count yourself lucky that I’ve done as much as I have.” She looked at Borisin. “You stay out of this.”

Rudiger also looked at Borisin. “Why can’t I hear you when you talk to her?”

She can’t hear me when I talk to you.

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

Eleuia sighed. “Look, Rudiger, I’m not totally heartless, okay. I understand. Your horse is a pain in the ass, but he’s...”

She likes me.

“I understand why you don’t want to lose him, but there’s nothing else I can do, and I can’t risk myself or my operation. So unless you have some amazing solution, I really am walking away from this as soon as I turn him over to the Queen.” She stood there, glaring at him, and waited. “Well?”

He sighed and shook his head.

She nodded. “We’re spending the night here. You’ve got that much time with him. Maybe you can figure something out. But don’t try to run off with him. I won’t hesitate to kill you. Now, I’ve got work to do.” She walked back towards her wagon and the members of her band.

“She doesn’t like me much, does she?” Rudiger said, patting Borisin’s neck.

She doesn’t know you like I do. So where’s the smelly one?

“Smelly one?”

Zandrue. I’ve told you before she smells weird.

“There’s a big difference between weird and smelly.”

Nah, to me she’s smelly. So where is she?

“Wish I knew, buddy. Wish I knew.”

“Rudiger,” Fra-Tepeu called. He wobbled over to him and Borisin. “Gather up my horses and Ses-Izel’s. Make sure they’re all stabled.”

What? You’re running the stables here? Hallelujah! Good service at last!

“Yes, sir,” Rudiger said, trying to hide his smirk.

Fra-Tepeu peered at Borisin and walked slowly alongside the horse. “He’s a good horse. Obviously seen some combat. A bit of scarring, but in good shape. I can see he hasn’t been under your care for some time though. I’ll convince Ses-Izel to stay an extra day, so you can clean him up properly before he’s presented to her Holiness.”

Rudiger didn’t think his heart could sink any lower, but it managed to then. “You overheard that?’

Fra-Tepeu smirked. “The two of you were loud enough. Especially at the end. But don’t worry. I think I have a solution for you, one even Mecatl will have to admit is perfect. I’ll tell you later at the house once everyone’s settled. Now get to work.”