The Horsemasters Read Free

her stepmother.
    Olma frowned, muttered something about needing Nel’s help herself, but did not try to stop the child as she left the hut. Nel did not go toward Fali’s hut, however, but turned instead toward the river on whose shores the main homesite of the Red Deer was located.
    The Tribe of the Red Deer had dwelled in the area of the Greatfish River for as long as anyone could remember. The location was ideal for the exploitation of the reindeer and red deer which formed the chief staple of the tribe’s diet. The caves and huts faced east toward the river, in a place that was dry and sheltered from the wind, and on the opposite bank the heights of Deer Hill afforded excellent views of the surrounding territory. The river at this point ran in a series of fords and rapids, and immediately upstream from the homesite it converged with the Leza in a marshy area that was rich in both fish and fowl.
    Located thus, at the point where two rivers emerged from their narrow upland valleys into the foothills, the tribe was in excellent position to prey upon the herds of deer as they ascended into the upland pastures for summer feeding and then returned to the lowland pastures for the winter.
    This evening, however, Nel was not thinking of deer. She was thinking of the abandoned baby in the forest. Behind her, cookfires were burning cheerfully in front of all the huts, and the tribe was at supper. Only the baby in the forest would not be fed this night, Nel thought. She stared at the swiftly running water of the Greatfish River, and then, abruptly, she began to cry.
    A large wolf emerged from the forest upstream and began to lope with long loose strides toward the solitary child. Nel did not see him, and she remained in her place by the shore, weeping inconsolably. The wolf reached her, halted, and began to make small inquiring noises in the back of his throat.
    “It’s all right, Nigak,” Nel said in a voice that shook with grief. “I’m all right.”
    “What’s the matter, minnow?” The voice was familiar, and deeply loved, and, hearing it, Nel struggled to get herself under control. “N-nothing,” she gulped.
    “I am thinking it must be a very big nothing to make you cry like this,” Ronan said. He sat beside her and put an arm around her narrow shoulders. “What is it, Nel?” he asked. “You can tell me.”
    Nigak switched his attention to Ronan, extending his white muzzle to sniff at the boy’s clothes, Nel turned her head and buried her face in Ronan’s shoulder. “I h-heard the baby,” she said. “Crying in the forest. Oh Ronan!” Her skinny body was wracked with grief.
    “One of Mira’s twins,” he said softly.
    “S-sa.”
    “It will be dead by now, Nel,” he said. “It isn’t suffering any longer.”
    “Do you think an animal got it?” she sobbed.
    “Sa.”
    She continued to sob, and he continued to hold her. Finally, he said, “Come. You are soaking my shirt. You will have to re-scrape it for me, the buckskin will be so stiff.”
    She shuddered. “I don’t understand why they did it,” she said. “I will never understand why they did it. They say it is the will of the Mother, but how do they know that, Ronan? How do they know that the Mother wanted them to kill that baby?”
    “The Mistress told them so,” he said. His face was impassive.
    “Suppose she is wrong?” Nel said defiantly. “Suppose the baby was not a dark twin? Suppose the baby they kept is the dark twin, and they have killed the light one?”
    A little silence fell. Then Ronan said, “You are a dangerous thinker, Nel.”
    “So are you,” she flashed back.
    They looked at each other. After a minute, Ronan grinned. It transformed his face, that smile, transmuting all the dark arrogance into brilliant, beguiling charm. Nel smiled tremulously back.
    “I’m sorry about the baby, minnow,” he said. “It’s why I was looking for you. I knew you would take it hard.”
    It made her feel better to know he had been