True Heart Read Free Page A

the half candle.
    She hadn’t practiced even once since they left Joseph’s forge.
    She had promised Tibbs she would.
    And what the rude woman had forced her to read made her wonder. It had sounded as though there was a Royal House of Avamir somewhere—that it was
real
.
    But where was it?
    Heart opened the book carefully, looking for the page with the design of the rearing unicorns.
    She stared at the perfect drawing.
    The woman in Yolen’s Crossing had read aloud to her. Her books had said the lords had hunted the unicorns in the forests.
    Had they killed all but two of them?
    Heart glanced up at Moonsilver and Avamir.
    Were they the only unicorns left?
    Heart looked at the words below the design.
    She sounded out the words silently, then readthem aloud. “The Mountains of the Moon,” it said beneath the drawing.
    Heart took a deep breath and focused on the next line. “‘The an … an …,” she began. Then she frowned.
    It was a strange, long word.
    It was the one Zim hadn’t been able to read.
    The word that followed it was odd too. Heart couldn’t sound either one of them out.
    She turned the page.
    â€œâ€˜And so the off … offer was hon … hon …,” she read aloud, then stopped again.
    Heart tightened her hands on the book.
    Why couldn’t she just
read
it?
    Heart tried turning more pages. There were so many words. They seemed endless. And so many of them were long and complicated.
    This book was much harder to read than the one the rude woman had carried.
    Heart’s candle flickered.
    A little breeze was stirring.
    She rested the book on her chest and looked up at the sky.

    There was no moon.
    The stars glittered.
    Kip stretched, then snuggled close.
    Heart pulled her blanket higher.
    The breeze blew out her candle.
    Heart thought about lighting it again. She knew she should practice reading. Then she closed her eyes.
    She was so
tired
.
    Her dreams rushed forward.
    She dreamed she was running up a canyon. It was dark until the moon rose, wide and steady, filling the sky overhead.
    Its light turned the mountains silver gray.

CHAPTER FIVE
    â€œH ow much longer?”
    â€œJust hurry and stop complaining!”
    The shouts jolted Heart awake. She sat up straight, startled out of a deep sleep.
    Kip scrambled to his feet.
    The men’s voices were coming from the road, beyond the plum thickets.
    Heart was afraid. What if they stopped to argue? Would they see the unicorns through the leaves?
    Kip growled. Heart took his muzzle in her hand. “No, Kip. Don’t bark.”
    Avamir was wide awake, her head lifted, her nostrils flared.
    Moonsilver sprang upright. His horn shone inthe early sun. Avamir stood more slowly, her eyes rimmed in white.
    Heart picked up the book and her candle and shoved them into her carry-sack.
    She kept glancing at the trees, her pulse quick.
    The unicorns’ white coats were as bright as spring snow.
    If the men looked back and caught a glimpse of them through the branches …
    Kip bared his teeth without making a sound.
    â€œStay out of the cakes,” the first voice said angrily. “Can’t you walk a little faster?”
    â€œYou be still,” the second voice scolded. “It’ll go on for a week. How often is a new lord crowned?”
    â€œOnce in a lifetime,” the first voice admitted. They were passing, and their voices were fading. “But it isn’t a real lord, anyway,” the man was saying. “The uncle will …”
    The voice went on, getting too far away to hear. After a moment the whispery sighs of the forest were the only sounds. Then Heart heard another voice—a woman’s this time.
    Heart rushed to buckle on Moonsilver’s armor.
    Her hands were trembling.
    When the unicorns were ready, she stopped at the edge of the road and looked left and right.
    Heart could see people in
both
directions.
    She stepped forward, her pulse speeding up