“You may care for him, of course,” he said, after a minute. “Keep his stall clean, make sure he’s fed. Jilly will teach you how, and how to groom him. But there will be no riding stallions, young lady!”
Anthea never thought she would feel this way, but she was decidedly put out at her uncle’s refusal to let her ride Florian. Uncle Andrew wanted her to learn to ride, and she had apologized for hiding from him, and had shaken hands in a very adult way. Then she had proposed that they compromise by having her learn to ride on Florian. Somehow, touching a horse didn’t seem so horrible, if it was Florian.
But Uncle Andrew was being completely unreasonable. How could he claim he was delighted that she had found Florian, yet not let her ride him? How could he applaud her mature decision to stop hiding and take riding lessons and then tell her that the very reason for her willingness was unacceptable?
“Not even Jilly rides stallions,” Finn said.
Anthea snorted. Everyone stared at her. Jillian made an indignant noise.
“I—I am sorry,” Anthea said. “I didn’t mean—”
“You think because I don’t have the Way—” Jillian began.
“What?” Anthea looked at her cousin in growing horror. “I didn’t mean … I just meant … Florian and I have a special bond. If you had a bond with a stallion … do you have a bond with a stallion?”
Anthea closed her mouth before she could continue to babble. It was only a few hours since she and Jillian had made peace, and now Anthea had ruined it with her pleading to ride Florian.
“No, I don’t,” Jillian said stiffly.
“Jilly, you know what she means,” Finn said. He frowned at Uncle Andrew. “Don’t you think, in light of the situation …?” he asked enigmatically.
“No, I don’t,” Andrew said.
“But, sir,” Finn said, raising his eyebrows.
“Finn,” Andrew said, lowering his.
Anthea and Jillian watched the two talking as if it were a tennis match. Anthea had never heard a young man challenge his elder like this. Nor had she ever seen a mature man give so much weight to a few words by a boy. She would have to ask Jillian later why Finn was allowed to speak to Uncle Andrew this way.
“She hasn’t sat on a horse since she was four,” Uncle Andrew said to Finn.
“That’s true,” Finn said thoughtfully.
“I beg your pardon, Uncle Andrew,” Anthea said. He looked at her, somewhat quizzical. “But I happen to be sitting right here.”
“I know you are,” Uncle Andrew said. “And I’m sorry to be talking over you, but this is a serious matter.”
“Am I not a serious person?”
“Yes, but you see, Finn and I—”
“I’m so sorry, Uncle Andrew, but I really do find it very odd that you allow Finn to make decisions about my life, but will not listen to me.”
Finn looked down at his plate. He took his fork and started to draw lines on the tablecloth with it. Anthea felt a little bad for hurting his feelings, but really, who was he to decide what horse she could ride?
“Finn is a magTaran,” Jilly said.
Anthea just looked at her in confusion.
“A magTaran,” Jilly said again, with greater emphasis. “King Taran—”
Uncle Andrew held up a hand to stop his daughter. “Well, there’s really no other way to say this, and he’s too modest to do it himself,” he rambled. “So I’ll just go for it. Finn is the king.”
Anthea burst out laughing.
Finn’s face slowly turned red, but he kept on making lines on the tablecloth.
“I’m sorry,” Anthea said, and gasped, her mirth subsiding when no one else joined her. “But … the king of what?”
Jillian dropped her fork with a clatter. Uncle Andrew put his down more deliberately.
“The king of Leana,” Uncle Andrew said.
Now it was Anthea’s turn to drop her fork. Finn continued to study the table, while Caillin MacRennie kept on eating as though Andrew Thornley had not just calmly spoken treason over the dinner table.
“There is no king but King Gareth of Coronam,” Anthea said.
Jilly snorted. “Does Kronenhof not exist then? Radij? Tendu?” She plucked at her sleeve. She was wearing a green silk Tenduhai robe and trousers tonight. Anthea didn’t think her cousin actually owned a skirt, the layers of transparent tulle she draped herself with not being actual clothing.
“I mean there can’t be another king in Coronam,” Anthea said, trying to sound reasonable and not lose her temper with Jillian. “Leana is Coronam. You might as well say that I’m the queen of Bellair or Keth is the king of Travertine.” She stopped to breathe a little. “And saying that he’s the rightful king … where does that put King Gareth? Do you understand what you just said?” she asked Uncle Andrew directly.
“Saying Finn is the king of Leana,” Caillin MacRennie said. He calmly took another bite of potato. “Is not the same as calling Keth the king of anything.” Caillin MacRennie pointed one finger in the air, and then dropped it down to point at the floor once he had Anthea’s attention. “This is Leana. The country you’re standing on. The one that was, before the Coronami came.”
Now Anthea, who had just picked up her fork, dropped it again. She sucked in a breath and looked at Caillin MacRennie, and then at her uncle, waiting for him to say something. And then at Finn, who surely wouldn’t allow his name to be used in such a way. But all three of them were eating as though treason were not being committed over their plates of fish.
Well, Finn, in his defense, was not so much eating as now toying with his fork and a chunk of potato. She could tell that Andrew was watching her out of the corner of his eye, to gauge her reaction. Jillian was watching her with open honesty, waiting for Anthea to reply. Instead she stood up.
“This is treason,” she said with a shaking voice.
“Anthea,” Uncle Andrew said. “Anthea, sit down.”
“No!”
“It’s fine,” Finn mumbled.
“It is not fine!” she stormed.
“It’s not treason,” Caillin MacRennie said. “It’s plain truth. If the Coronami hadn’t come with their army, young Finn would be the king of Leana.”
Anthea felt much as she had when Uncle Andrew had told her that her mother was still alive. How many more perfectly good dinners were going to be ruined by the disclosure of shocking information? She waited a moment, wondering if this at least was some sort of test of her patriotism. But everyone was just looking at her.
“Finn should be the king?” she said at last, tentatively.
“Yes,” Uncle Andrew answered her.
“Of Leana?”
“Yes.”
“You’re saying there was something here before … Coronam …?”
“Yes.”
Anthea could not comprehend any of this. But for Florian’s sake she was going to try.
If Finn was the king, that meant that there had been a country—Leana—before Coronam. Instead of a wilderness with a few people in huts, no government, and horses running wild everywhere bringing disease and death. The Crown had to take over this land because the horses were so dangerous—the Crown saved those people from ruin and showed them a better way to live, with brave princes leading the people, their Rose Maiden wives and sisters supporting them.
But not one of Anthea’s history books, not one of her teachers or relations, ever mentioned that the people of Leana had their own king. That they had a Way that allowed them to communicate with horses. Or that the horses were actually beautiful, soulful creatures. No one had ever told her that a horse could be as wonderful as Florian.
It made her head ache to think of it.
“I want to ride Florian,” was all she said.
“All right,” her uncle said, much to the shock of everyone, and not just Anthea. He held up one finger. “But first, you have to learn how to ride. Children learning their alphabet are not asked to write a poem in praise of the king right off, unless
things are vastly different at Rose Academies today?”
Anthea shook her head.
“So, you are going to learn to ride a very nice mare named Bluebell, and then, when you have shown that you can ride Bluebell with as much skill as Jilly can ride Buttercup, we will talk about Florian.”
“If she gets to ride Florian, I get to ride Caesar,” Jilly put in.
Her father gave her a dire look. “If I see you go near Caesar, you won’t back a horse for a month,” he said.
“Yes, Father,” Jilly said, with obviously false meekness.
“Very well,” Uncle Andrew said. “Let’s all get some rest. Anthea, I’m sure you have a lot to think about.”
“I do,” she admitted, dropping her napkin and moving away from the table.
“Meet me at the stables after breakfast,” Uncle Andrew said. “I’ll have you excused from morning lessons tomorrow. I want to get you started on your riding and other horse duties. Before you try to slip away again.”
Anthea nodded, then walked out carefully, doing her best not to jostle her head, which felt entirely too full.
11
BRIDLES, BLUEBELL, AND BRUISES
“This is Bluebell.” Uncle Andrew took the reins of a dappled gray horse from one of the grooms, and the man grinned at Anthea as he ducked out of the paddock.
Anthea was glad to see him go. She wanted as few people as possible to watch her first riding lesson. She knew that she was going to humiliate herself somehow, and the fewer people who saw, the better. Once the groom was gone she returned her attention to Uncle Andrew, who was waiting patiently alongside Bluebell.
“Bluebell will be your responsibility from now on,” Uncle Andrew informed her. “You will ride her, groom her, clean her stall and tack.”
“Tack?”
“Saddle, bridle, et cetera. If you have questions, Jilly or Keth can advise you, but you need to do the work yourself. If I find out you’ve neglected any of these chores …”
She gave him a sly look. “You’ll send me to my room?”
“No, I’ll make you muck the manure out of all the stalls for a week,” he shot back. “It’s the standard penalty for anyone who neglects their duties.”
Anthea shuddered.
“Exactly,” her uncle said. “But for now, let’s just get you up on her back, and teach you how to sit.”
“Teach me how to sit?” Anthea eyed the horse. She could just see over her back, and her head was even higher. “Are you sure you want me riding one this big?”
She fluttered her fingers at one of the far paddocks that held some horses that looked much less menacing from this distance. Their brown and black hides looked solid and reassuring, whereas Bluebell was thundercloud gray, her mane and tail a mix of dirty white and black that made her look even more stormy.
“That’s Leonidas, Domitian, and Theodorus,” Uncle Andrew said as though their names explained everything.
Anthea merely blinked at him.
“They’re stallions,” he clarified. “All the stallions are named after kings and warriors from old legends: Constantine, Gaius Julius, Marcus Antonius. They’re all battle trained.
“The mares are not trained to fight. They’re named for flowers: Bluebell, Blossom, Daffodil, Marigold, Campanula. Jilly’s horse is Buttercup.”
Anthea was offended. Did the mares have to have such silly names? Buttercup? And “Campanula” sounded like a skin disease. But the stallions were all given noble appellations and trained to battle? She couldn’t see any difference between Bluebell and the three in the other paddock, except for the color. But she bit back an acid remark since she supposed it really was better if she stayed away from the stallions. Except for Florian. Was Florian trained to fight?
Before she could ask, Uncle Andrew arranged the reins on the horse’s neck and then laced his fingers together, holding out his cupped palms to her. “Put your knee in,” he said.
“Beg pardon?”
“Your knee. The left one. Put it in my hands, and I’ll boost you up.”
Anthea hesitated. She’d seen some of the men mounting their horses from her window, but they usually just gave a jump and a sort of swing and were up. She’d seen Jillian in the saddle, too, but never noticed how she got there. How could her uncle holding her knee get her in the saddle?
Bluebell shifted and sighed, and Anthea caught a thought from her. Something about hay, and a feeling of boredom. She was boring the horse? Bad enough that Anthea had her uncle and the rest of the brigade to judge her, but the horses as well? That was too much!
She put her knee into Uncle Andrew’s cupped hands and he heaved her into the air. She screeched and leaped backward out of his hands, barely managing to land on her feet.
“Sorry, should have explained more,” her uncle said, giving Bluebell a comforting rub on the neck. “Now, grab hold of the pommel with your left hand—that’s the front of the saddle. Good. Now hold the cantle—that’s the back—with your right. When I lift, move your right hand and swing your right leg over.”
“Oh. I see.” She nodded sagely even though she didn’t understand any of it.
“Let’s try it again.”
He cupped his hands and she put her knee into them, grabbing the saddle at the same time. Her uncle heaved, she pulled, the horse’s ears went back, and she was suddenly hanging from the saddle with her legs held stiffly above the ground by her uncle.
“Pull yourself up,” he grunted, raising her a little more.
“I’m trying!”
The next thing Anthea knew, her uncle had both his hands under her buttocks and was shoving her into the saddle. She pulled herself up as hard as she could, kicking her feet like a swimmer, until she was lying across Bluebell’s back. Then Uncle Andrew took hold of her right leg and threw it up and over the horse’s rump, and she was sitting upright.
“Oh,” was all she could say as waves of heat pulsed in her cheeks and she prayed that no one else had been watching. “So that’s why I’m wearing trousers.”
Jillian had flatly refused to help Anthea find a dress or skirt to ride in. Instead she had shaken her curls and told Anthea to wait and see. Anthea had compromised by wearing the trousers and boots with her own school uniform blouse, instead of one of Jilly’s men’s jackets.
“Put your feet in the stirrups,” Uncle Andrew said calmly.
She fumbled her feet into the metal things hanging from each side of the saddle, and then fumbled with the reins as her uncle handed them to her. He arranged them in her hands, she shifted them around, feeling awkward, and he put them back. She grimaced and held them as Uncle Andrew had showed her, and she tried not to panic when he started to walk away from the horse, unspooling a long lead line.
“Relax,” he told her. “Sit straight, but loose.”
She couldn’t relax, but at least she was already sitting straight. She had won several prizes for posture from Miss Miniver’s. She shifted her gaze from the back of Bluebell’s head to Uncle Andrew and back again. Her uncle was several paces away now, holding the end of the line, and Bluebell was beginning to anticipate … something. Movement, an action of some kind.
“Are you ready?” Uncle Andrew called to her.
“Will I ever be?” Anthea squeaked back.
“Good answer! Hup!”
Uncle Andrew twitched the lead and Bluebell started forward with a jolt.
Anthea dropped one of the reins and grabbed a handful of mane instead. She held on in terror as the horse rocked and jounced around the paddock. Anthea clamped down with her legs, afraid that she was about to slip sideways out of the highly polished saddle, and Bluebell started to go even faster, every step jarring Anthea until her teeth clacked together.
Now Anthea let go of the other rein and just clung with her legs and hands to the horse. This was not at all like her memories of riding, which had a dreamy quality far different from this horrible reality. Anthea was reminded of the little boat that Uncle Daniel had once rented during their
annual seaside holiday. They had only gone a few lengths from shore when Belinda Rose had screamed that she wanted off, and one of the younger girls was sick all over her shoes. Anthea didn’t remember which one; she had been too busy fighting to keep her own lunch in her stomach. Riding Bluebell was exactly like that, only Uncle Daniel had turned the boat around and gone back to shore, while Bluebell just went faster and faster …
“Whoa, there,” Uncle Andrew called.
And faster and faster …
“Whoa, girl!”
And faster and faster …
“Anthea, tell her to stop!”
And faster and faster and faster until Anthea squeezed her eyes shut and screamed for the beast to stop. Bluebell did, as suddenly as she had started, and the next thing Anthea knew she was on the ground, flat on her back a little in front and to one side of the horse, who was definitely laughing at her.
“Get up, quick now,” Uncle Andrew said. He seemed remarkably unconcerned about his niece, who had just done a somersault off a horse, as Anthea opened her mouth to point out. Andrew hauled her to her feet. “Get up, get on her back, now,” he said in a low voice.
“No! I failed,” Anthea said, taking a step back.
The soft earth of the paddock shifted under her feet, and she felt as though she were falling backward for a moment, and had to close her eyes again. She could barely catch her breath.
“Anthea, you must show her that you are in charge. She will let you ride her; she will behave as she has been trained.”
Anthea gaped at him. How the horse had been trained to behave? What about the way Anthea had been trained to behave? Being thrown into the dirt by a monster was not part of Rose Academy training! Anthea was on the verge of arguing with her uncle, but then Bluebell tossed her head and made a sort of chuckling noise.
A tide of rage rose in Anthea. She was not about to be laughed at by some filthy horse with a stupid name. She grabbed the reins and cocked her knee. Andrew scooped it with both hands, and this time she pulled herself up and into the saddle, awkwardly yet without any further humiliation.