Horses

The next day was a dark and cloudy day outside. It made me happy. I had offered my sister the room I had woken up in but she had ended up taking a room down the hall. No one was around when I looked out my door. I was curious if I could get to the dining area without running into anyone.

Well, I made it to the door. The dining room already had my brothers and my sister in it. From the looks of the room, she had spent the morning showing one or more of the newly awakened slaves how to cook something other then tact.

"Good morning, Mir." She smiled as I entered. The messenger had been waiting for me by the door as well, but I didn't count him. He had slept in the room right next to mine, which was a small room. I couldn't think of why our lord would have had it built next to the main room like that, but there was another room of the same size on the other side as well. I knew he could sense everything within my room so I didn't count him waiting as running into anyone.

I bowed, "Good morning, sister. I hope you slept well."

Her smile didn't falter as she finished what she had been working on. "It was quieter than where I normally sleep. I almost feel jealous of the women we talked about before, but with 20 of them it might not stay so quiet here."

"No, it probably won't stay so quiet." I grabbed a roll off one of the trays on the counter. I wandered how they had cooked them, there didn't seem to be a fire anywhere.

"Are you ready to go or did you want to eat something first?"

"We can leave when you are ready, sister. I imagine the messenger will be coming with us?"

"Yes, I will. To make matters worse, our lord doesn't want the trip to take all day so he has sent over horses."

"Sounds like you don't like horses."

"Not really, they have minds of their own and they tend to disfavor special servants of our lord."

"Didn't our lord, tame the first horses?"

"Sure, but that doesn't mean the creatures like him. Unless he had put in the effort to raise the creature from it's birth it will panic if he tries to get near them. They take flight easily."

I stuffed a bit of food down and made sure my brothers knew what I expected while I was gone. We then headed outside. There was another messenger in the street, he held the reins of four big horses.

I had seen big animals before. Nothing that looked quite like a horse though. I reached out my hand towards the first horse which seemed to be snorting at the messenger that was with me. I noticed the messenger that was holding the reins was weaker then Hose.

The horse focused on me when my hand made contact. The horse was simpler then the humans I had spent all my time with since discovering my new sense. I smiled as the horse was straight forward and in the present, it could learn things but it just wanted to be safe. It could feel the black fire from the other two men. One it knew brought good things but the other was stronger and that was scary. I didn't look the same as them as it did to me, I was green, like grass, but not grass, I smelled like a man but I wasn't a man. I added a thought to the horse, I was friendly and so was the bigger black flame both of us were like the small black flame that brought it sugar and carrots.

I felt the horse nudge my hand. I looked over at the other messenger, "Do you have sugar?"

He looked surprised but he pulled out a cube. He handed it to me and started to tell me how to feed the animal without getting bit, but I had just seen it done, hundreds of times. The animal nodded at the thought that I was a friend but it still didn't seem sure I was right about the other one. I smiled and reached out to the other two. They didn't seem afraid or scared of the new connection. They were skittish of almost anything else but sometimes the black flames can connect with them if not more then one at a time. They knew each other and had habits for how to act around each other.

I had to pull my mind back to the messenger as he talked to me. "No, I think this should be great. We shouldn't be out that long anyway." I moved beside the horse and mounted as I had seen from the animal. He didn't like the way I was sitting so I shifted to match what he expected.

The other messenger nodded, "You haven't ridden before have you?"

"No but," I asked the horse for the sounds the man used when talking to it, "Night here knows what I should be doing."

Both of the messengers got huge eyes. "What? He can hear them and he isn't as strong as you."

"Strength has nothing to do with hearing. The ability has never been found in anyone who has lasted in the arena. No matter how favored."

I frowned, but then shrugged. The eldest of Estro was watching me. She climbed up onto the smaller horse with some help. The horse didn't seem bothered by her. Normal humans were safe enough, if often clumsy when first learning to sit on a horse. The animal just waited. Hose didn't have any problems mounting. It wasn't his first time on the animal. This one had known the man was ok but it still didn't like the black fire. "Hose."

The messenger raised an eyebrow at me, "Can you pull your focus in?" I frowned, "I don't really know the words I want. The fire bothers the horses."

Hose frowned at me, shrugged then I noticed the flames pull into him. The horse he was sitting on turned to look at the man. It knew it was the same man but it felt more at ease with the fire muted, it wasn't gone. "I feel half blind when I do this but is this what you are talking about?"

The woman was looking at Hose like she was trying to see a difference, "Yes, I think you will find the horse much nicer if you can maintain that." I looked at the woman who was watching me again, while the other messenger was shaking his head and giving her instructions. I was listening to the man but I was pretty confident of getting my point across to the animal I was on.

When the messenger was sure the woman understood he let us go on our way. Hose lead us to the only above ground entry into the capital city. The stables were kept there and you had to pass by quite a few messengers to get to the inside gate. Clearly everyone knew who we were and that we had permission to pass. The inner gate closed behind us still before the outer gate opened. You would think people attacked the capital all the time from how it was constructed, but I didn't know of any time that the vampires had been so brave as to mess with the city of our lord. I wasn't done reading the history book, but it just seemed like it would be a bad idea.

My sister took the lead as we stepped out into the cloudy morning. The horse picked up speed but they kept the pace to something I could have run at. We passed a few houses and turned off the main track. We didn't ride overly long through the wide fields before my sister turned again. There was a flat looking wide house the way we walked. There was an older woman and a priest standing out front carrying on a rather loud conversation. There were quite a lot of kids around in the fields clearly trying to stay out of sight while they worked. "Woman, you must be touched. You are going to end up with nothing! Then how will you take care of the little ones you profess your craziness for?"

"Get off my porch, priest! The law isn't broken here, you won't be stealing my girls today!" The older woman was holding a broom and she shook it at the priest. I was down before I considered what I was going to do.

"I know you have-" I didn't get to hear what the man was going to say but I didn't need to. My hand caught the handle of the broom before the woman could try to brain the priest that wouldn't shut up and had underestimated the danger he was in.

The woman was breathing hard and it took a minute for her to realize someone had interfered with her swing. She tried to pull back and while she was strong my hand didn't move much. The woman and the priest both spoke at the same time, "Who the hell are you?"

"Mir?" You didn't have to see my face to know it was me, my size and coloring made me stand out.

I turned and looked at the priest without letting the broom go. "I believe this woman asked you to step off the porch of this dwelling, unless you know the law has been broken."

The priest turned white at the look I was giving him. He stepped back and almost fell off the porch. He turned and walked down to the path leading up to the dwelling, but he didn't go farther than that. Hose and the elder of Estro had just rode up, with Hose leading my horse. "I am trying to find out for sure. What business could you possibly have with this crazy lady?"

The eldest of Estro frowned at the priest, "My business, not that it matters to you, priest."

I held up my hand that wasn't on the broom. One of the horses stamped a foot and huffed. "How many sons does she have in the arena, priest?"

"Four, I get complaints all the time because they fight once a month and send any winnings back to her. Which is probably why you are aware of the other three men in the area.