The King's Horse (Shioni of Sheba Book 2) (8 page)

A
s the hours meandered
by on the up-valley route, the flanking ridges seemed to grow together from either side until they loomed ahead like a great, round-shouldered barrier intent on impeding a traveller’s access to the mountain fastness beyond. Having travelled this route once before, Shioni knew this was only the beginning–once they ascended to the brow of the ridge, they would be confronted by a further series of peaks leading up to the mighty peak called Ras Dejen. There the high passes lurked, waiting like dragons ready to pounce.

Tari
ku was convinced that the storm front would catch them before they reached the pass.

But this time she was more prepared.
She was not riding alone into the unknown. And she was pleased to have a mentor who was mountain-born–chosen, naturally, by General Getu. How strange that in her, the General’s life had turned full circle. She recalled one of Hakim Isoke’s recent lectures with Annakiya which had covered exactly this idea of the circularity of history; that if lessons were not learned, then past mistakes would inevitably be repeated. Oftentimes, she had said, past wrongs were only put right out of guilt.

Perhaps the General saw
in her a chance to right his past mistakes? Did he even like her? Was she a replacement daughter? Or was he simply helping her to sop his guilt, and to finally lay his sorrow at the death of his ferengi love and his daughter, to rest?

She wished she could have had a mother and a father like other people.
Many of the slave-girls knew their parents, who were also slaves–part of the slave class in Sheban society that Hakim Isoke so openly despised. But Shioni didn’t even have that. Only a record of ownership, a small scroll kept by Princess Annakiya, which declared her name, price, and owner. Was it childish to hope that one day she might find her parents? She might start searching amongst the Archives in Takazze. They would know the merchant who had sold her to the King. And he might…

Shioni exhaled
gustily. She might as well chase the wind.

She saw a he
rd of zebra grazing peaceably at the edge of a juniper forest ahead of them. That was where the real climb began, she remembered; there among the giant, twisted trunks that rose to eight or ten times the height of a man. The juniper trees had a pungent, distinctive odour, like smelly old warrior sandals.

Shioni frowned as she
spotted movement beside the first juniper, a fantastically gnarled beauty whose trunk turned almost completely back on itself before stretching for the skies. No, it couldn’t be… that was…

“What’s that moving up there?” asked Tariku, squinting.

“Talaku, unless I’m badly mistaken,” she said, surprised that the warrior was unable to see clearly. Were his eyes that bad?

In a few minutes they pulled up near Talaku, who had been leaning against that
crazy juniper trunk. Siltam, his great axe, was slung crosswise on his back. He carried a tall staff in his right hand, and a worn, cut-through blanket covered his shoulders in place of a cloak. From his fur cap to his enormous thong-tied sandals, he looked prepared for the mountains.

“Morning,” he rumbled.
“Just about, anyhow. May I join you?”

Tariku glanced up
at the ridge, then behind them at the looming wall of cloud, and sniffed the air. “I fancy I smell the General’s work even out here,” he said.

“Maybe so,” said Talaku, patting Star’s nose.
“I just wanted to stretch my legs. The castle is growing a little small for me. Morning, Shioni.”

She smiled up at him.
He was still more than a head taller than her, even though she was seated on the pony. “Did you pass the night well, Talaku?”

“I’m well, God be praised,” he said, curiously formal.

“Did you grow a bit?” Shioni clapped her hands to her mouth in horror as the question slipped out. She could hardly believe her stupid tongue!

But Talaku
’s face just broke into a big, easy smile. “Some. Three fingers–three of
my
fingers–since we arrived at Castle Asmat. Bread, anyone?”

“We’ll take a short break,” Tariku decided.
“Shioni, will you take our mounts for a drink? No horse, Talaku?”

“I’m as strong as any horse,” he said.
“And I’m too heavy, Tariku. That poor creature I rode up from Takazze… well, I won’t be doing that again. I’ll keep up on foot.”

Their voices faded as Shioni led Star and Hoplite
across to the river. It branched in two here, with a much larger flow hidden somewhere further away, on the far side of the valley, she knew. The scouts said the water flowed from a cave concealed within the forest. Where its true source lay was a secret hidden in the ancient roots of the Simien Mountains. She chomped her bread–Mama’s thick sesame seed bread, which was baked in a clay oven in round loaves so large she couldn’t have put her arms around one–with vigour born of annoyance. So they wanted her out the way for a manly talk, did they? She kicked a stone, but only stubbed her toe. Maybe Tariku thought he was babysitting? She’d show him!

Would
it be dangerous, travelling with Talaku? Her wrath faded as she threw the men a long, level stare. What if he had another crazy episode, as Zi had called it? Might he attack someone? Even his companions? And what was he really looking for in the mountains? She didn’t buy his pat answer about the castle ‘growing too small’. Tariku was right; she could smell the General’s work too, even if his son wasn’t admitting it.

Rumours
about Talaku had been circling for weeks now, especially amongst the slaves. She had observed a couple of young mothers pulling their children out of his path. Her heart softened. Was being a giant so different to being a ferengi? Both produced a bad social odour–Mama’s words this time. He must be lonely. Maybe they could be friends? If he even wanted friends…

She was scared
. As cowardly as a hyena. So what was wrong with playing safe? He was a mad giant. Mad giants… well, what did they do in the stories apart from breakfasting on naughty children and crushing peoples’ huts with their clubs?

Shioni clucked
to Star. “Come on, girl.”

Tariku’s hors
e threw her a startled look. “A talking two-legs?”

Star nickered derisively, as if thumbing her nose at the larger horse’s ignorance.

“What name do you prefer, boy?” asked Shioni. “What’s your true name?”

“Truename?” he said.
“No human will ever know that. Call me Hoplite. Hop Along is demeaning.”

Shioni scratched
her head. Truename? Whatever did he mean? There was so much to learn about communication in the animal kingdom! She filed it in her memory for something to ask Shuba and Annakiya.

As she
hurried back, the cold breeze snapped around her heels like a playful puppy, tangling Annakiya’s cloak around her legs. Thunder growled in the distance and the wind began to freshen. She fastened the toggles at her throat and huddled deeper beneath the thick material. Brr!

Tariku was
looking as unhappy as the weather. He swung into the saddle. “We’ll need a cheetah’s legs to outrun this storm now,” he said. “It’s coming in much faster than I thought. There’s a cave over the top of the ridge. Let’s take shelter there.”

“From a little rain?”

The warrior arched his left eyebrow. “Trust me, Talaku. Or you can wave that little woodchopper of yours about and see what the lightning does to you.”

Tariku set a
brutal pace up the loose, rocky slope. There was no longer time to track the King’s horse, although Shioni did spot one or two marks in passing. Glancing back over her shoulder, she could see a grey mist leaching down from the clouds, obscuring the land beneath. That was the rain. Strange how they had emerged for a few hours into bright sunshine, but now the clouds were swooping down as though intent upon bludgeoning the travellers into the mountainside.

Talaku’s massive strides ate up
the ground. He seemed to have no trouble at all keeping up with Tariku, but Star, full of years for a pony, was blowing hard. Shioni leaned in close to her neck, scanning the ground in an attempt to guide the pony across the best terrain. It would be all too easy to break a leg on the loose scree. But despite her best efforts, they were steadily losing ground to the two men.

The thunder
kept grumbling away behind her like a monstrous, sullen dog guarding a choice bone. Looking up, Shioni saw that the leading edge of cloud was already outpacing her. She could feel the first drops of moisture on her neck now.

As she crested the ridge, Shioni found herself
catapulted onto a stretch of open moorland, a carpet of smooth greenery more moss than grass, blotched with islands of spiky heather. Tariku and Hoplite were well ahead, angling for a small outcropping poking like a rocky pimple out of the otherwise stark expanse. Talaku galloped after with a bounding stride that reminded her of a speeding walia ibex.

Perhaps that was the cave Tariku had spoken of?
“Come on, Star! Just a little farther.”

The instant she spoke, a
deafening peal of thunder shook her world. God must have clapped his hands overhead. Wow! Shioni held her ears. But now a strange hissing noise was growing behind her. She half-turned in her seat to see a curtain of iron rain sweeping across the moorland, faster than any horse could run, and in a blink it swallowed her up like a dog bolting a tasty scrap of meat.

It was like standing under
neath her favourite waterfall; only, the whole world was a waterfall. This rain cared nothing for clothes; it lashed right through the layers. It cared nothing for breathing, for if she opened her mouth she choked on water. And it veiled the way ahead as effectively as if Shioni had been blindfolded.

Shioni reassured Star, who had shied at the thunderclap, and eased her into a walk.
No point in diving like a bushbuck into a patch of heather, was there? She’d just have to head in what she thought was the right direction. She wiped her eyes, not that it helped any. The rain was sheeting in diagonally on a blustering wind, and Star was already plopping through puddles as deep as her fetlocks.

She
had never seen rain to compare to this! The raindrops were so fat and cold, they struck her head and body like tiny fists pummelling her all over. Would the castle be washed away? No, that was a silly notion! It had withstood how many hundreds of years of storms? No wonder General Getu had been shouting at the engineers yesterday! And maybe now the well would finally have some water. Good.

The pony plodded on
through the twilight-like dimness. Peal after peal of thunder reverberated between the peaks, making her feel as though the ground itself were trembling in fear, cowering beneath the blows of a great, loud bully. Lightning burned streaks across Shioni’s vision. She needed to find that shelter, and fast. Being in the open was dangerous…

Shioni shrieked as a disembodied hand appeared out of
the rain and grabbed her knee!

“O
h, Talaku!” She had
to shout to make herself heard above the storm’s roar.

His
mouth, plastered with strands of lank hair, grinned as though he had rather enjoyed scaring her half to death. “This way.”

“Thanks for coming to find me!
”

Talaku led her around to her left for a minute.
After sliding Star down a short descent, almost down on her haunches, Shioni suddenly found the rain was no longer driving nails into her head. A massive, overhanging slab of rock sheltered her from the storm’s primal fury. The shelter went deeper too, disappearing into blackness behind a clutter of boulders, as though they had stopped in the outer chamber of some grand hall hidden down a passageway.

Tariku was tending Hoplite.
“You look like a half-drowned rat,” he joked. “Come get dry. I’m sorry, even I misjudged this one. Seen anything like this on the plains, girl?”

She shook her head.
“It feels like we’re right inside the storm here.”

“Take some straw and rub Star down.
This is one of our provisioning stations–a few basic supplies for warriors for just this situation. You’ll find wood, straw, blankets, and dried salted meat all stashed away behind those rocks back there.”

“What about thieves?”

Tariku was looking at Talaku, who had stripped down to his trousers and was hanging his shirt over a rock to dry. He whistled. “By all that’s holy, would you look at that? He must eat rocks for breakfast.”

‘That’ was Talaku
’s astonishing body. Tariku, being an Elite warrior and having trained for years, was strong, fast and fit. But Talaku had the girth of an ox, the muscles of a lion, and not a pinch of fat to soften his frame. Moreover, his every ligament and tendon was cut as sharply as if chiselled in wood. His veins crawled over his muscles like long, drawn-out worms burrowing beneath his skin, and every muscle was a taut bundle of sinewy cords rather than just bulging brawn.

“He looks like he’s outgrown his own skin,” Shioni whispered.

“He looks like an overstuffed sack,” Tariku said enviously. “That’s just not right.”

Talaku caught them staring.
A dark, brooding look twisted his mouth and he turned his back on them, deliberately.

“Ahem, thieves, yes,” said Tariku.
“Well, the warriors spoke to the villagers and we haven’t had a problem–”

“They threatened them,” grunted Talaku.
“Put the fear of Sheba into them.”

“That’s not very nice.”

“Not very nice?” Tariku mocked her. “What would you do–pick them flowers?”

Her cheeks were burning.
“They’re people like us,” Shioni muttered. At his snort, she added, “And you wonder that they don’t like Shebans?”

“Oh, and I suppose they like a
ferengi
more?”

A
n awkward silence oozed out of his words.

“You’re chattering like a baboon,” Talaku
accused the other warrior. “Shioni, see what you can do with this dratted knot, will you?” He tossed a bundle at her. She had to move smartly to avoid being smacked in the face. “My fingers are too thick.”

Tariku stomped off to dry his sword.

After an hour, the rain had eased off, but the wind was still whipping the purple-headed giant heather into a frenzy. Shioni was watching the clouds tramp by, ranks of grey elephants marching off to an unknown battlefield. After disappearing outside briefly, Tariku returned and declared that he wasn’t satisfied the storm was spent. So now they were sitting on rocks trying to dry off, chewing berbere-spiced and salted meat, and trying not to think how the deluge had washed the horse’s trail to oblivion and beyond.

“
Kolo?
” said Talaku, offering Shioni some roasted grain. It was often eaten as a snack by the warriors. “Found a sack back there.”

“Thanks.”

“Dried your weapons? Restrung your bow?”

She nodded.
“What hope do we have of finding the King’s horse now?”

Tariku was picking his teeth with a sharp stick.
He spat out a bit of wood. “It won’t stop on these moors,” he said. “No real forage here. Not for a horse anyway. There’s only one pass out of here, a saddle between two peaks. Once this storm blows past, we’ll head straight over and pick up the trail.”

Shioni had slowly become aware of a light pattering noise.
She peered at the ground. “What’s the rain doing now?”

“It’s hailing,” said Tariku.
“Frozen rain–”

“I know what hail is!”

“Well if you don’t believe in snow–”

“Will you get off my back about your snow?” Shioni
retorted hotly, regretting her impulsive question. But they all turned to gape as the pattering suddenly turned into a roar.

“Well,” said Talaku, holding up a piece
of ice that had rolled up to his foot. He tossed it to Shioni. “You wouldn’t want to be caught out in this.”

The hailstone filled her palm!

Ice was hurtling down from the leaden skies and battering the soil and plants in an awesome display of fury. Dagger-like chips and shards of hailstones flew about as ice smashed upon ice. In moments, a white carpet stretched as far as the eye could see. And then, as though an inaudible shout had lifted a siege, the hail stopped and the sun picked its moment to peer out from behind the departing clouds. The storm hurried off like a dog with its tail between its legs.

Tariku
slapped his hands on his knees and leaped to his feet as though he’d sat on a wasp. “Right, pack up! Let’s move out!”

“So this is what passes for the little rains in the mountains?”

“This was a bad one, Talaku,” he answered. “I can’t ever remember seeing such a fierce storm at this time of the year. It will make the pass challenging, never mind the river crossing on the far side. The only grace is that the King’s horse won’t be moving any faster than us.”

Shioni peered out
over the white carpet, feeling pensive about the horse’s prospects. Most of the pieces were much smaller than the one Tariku had handed her, and they were melting already. Did animals get hurt when it hailed so heavily? Where might he hide?

She
breathed deep of the cool air. The world smelled as fresh as if it had just stepped out of a shower, clean and fragrant. Gone was the throat-tickling load of airborne dust. Gone, the dry pollens and grittiness between her teeth. It felt like a whole new beginning. They would find the horse. She knew it in her bones.