First Rider's Call

“Mmm . . .” She sank deeper into the bath water, up to her chin. In the dream, she looked into the lake to see her reflection, but it was not her face she saw. It was a woman with leonine features and wild tawny hair . . .

“Karigan,” the reflection said.

The knocking grew more insistent. Karigan cracked open sleepy eyes. The reflection was still there in her bath water.

“Karigan!” it said with Mara’s voice.

She yelped and slapped the bath water, sloshing it over the brim of the tub. Heart hammering, completely coherent now, she realized the reflection had been just a lingering image from her dream. It had to be.

“Karigan, am I going to have to get the men to break down the door?”

Definitely Mara.

“What is it?” Karigan asked.

“Captain wants you to run some errands for her.”

Karigan groaned. That meant going out into the rain again. She sighed and glanced at the wet heaps of muddy clothes she had dropped onto the slate floor. She asked Mara to find her a dry set, and while she waited, she hauled herself out of the tub. She had been in long enough to wrinkle, but the bath did wonders for her muscles.

By the time she toweled dry, Mara arrived with a fresh uniform.

“Osric told me you got it pretty good from Drent this morning,” she said.

“I always do.”

On Karigan’s way out, she paused in the common room. Justin and Yates still sat hunched over their game of Intrigue—Justin had lost half of his infantry already. Osric was gone, and Tegan now sat in his chair, gazing into the fire, her expression bleak.

Karigan wondered what was eating at her when Garth burst through the door, sopping wet. His hair was plastered down his face, and rainwater dribbled off his chin. He shook water from himself like a drenched bear.

He slicked his hair back and sloshed into the common room. When he espied Tegan, he pointed at her and roared, “You!”

Tegan’s eyes went round and wide.

“Sunny and fair, eh?” Garth demanded. “Thanks very much, Rider. I have ridden hours in the rain without my greatcoat because you said sunny and fair.”

Justin and Yates snickered, believing Tegan had pulled off yet another very fine—and funny—practical joke on her favorite target.

When Tegan was in residence, she was much sought after by other Riders because of her special ability to sense and predict weather. It allowed the Riders to head out on errands well prepared for the weather.

Her ability had emerged, as it so often did for Riders, in time to save her life. She had been on a midwinter errand when her ability warned her of a devastating blizzard that would soon descend. She was able to seek safety in a Rider waystation just as the first snowflakes swirled down from the heavens.

Though Garth might believe she had provided him with misinformation for the sake of a practical joke, Karigan wasn’t so sure. Tegan had blanched at Garth’s arrival, and all her ordinary buoyancy was lacking.

“If this is how you treat fellow Riders when they go out on the king’s business,” Garth said, “I will never trust you again.”

Tegan put her hands over her face and ran from the room, sobbing. Garth, mired in wetness and anger, seemed not to notice or care. Justin and Yates simply shrugged and resumed their game, probably attributing her behavior to it being “that time of the month.”

Karigan drew the hood of her greatcoat over her head and walked out into the rainstorm, believing that what she just witnessed was very wrong.

A LIGHT IN THE DARK

Lightning flashed across Captain Mapstone’s face, highlighting her features in harsh planes. Rain drummed on the slate roof of officers quarters and a downdraft stirred the flames in the fireplace, scattering sparks and ashes onto the stone floor.

Karigan stuffed the documents into a message satchel to protect them from the weather, and pulled up her hood.

The captain sat slumped over her work table, her chin propped on her fists. She gazed down at some papers, a fresh cup of tea Karigan had brewed for her steaming forgotten at her elbow. Karigan wasn’t sure what it was the captain read, if she even read at all.

A cascading roll of thunder heralded another flash of lightning.

“I’m off to the castle,” Karigan said. “Anything you need from there?”

Captain Mapstone looked up, as though surprised to see her still standing there. “No, I don’t need anything. Just those requisitions sealed, and the reports dropped off.”

Karigan hastened from officers quarters into the deluge, which had turned the castle grounds into a sodden quagmire. She clutched the satchel close to her and splashed through flooded pathways.

Lately the captain seemed more distant than usual. Karigan had heard pieces of the stunning news out of D’Ivary Province, and she wondered if this is what preoccupied the captain. Being in the king’s inner circle, she was privy to any plans he might carry out against Lord-Governor D’Ivary. No doubt the captain was playing a role by advising him in the matter.

Lightning streaked across the sky, followed by an ear-splitting peal of thunder.

That was close! If Tegan had indeed predicted a sunny and fair day, she couldn’t have been more wrong.

That gave Karigan pause. Could it be she wasn’t the only one who had experienced difficulties with her special ability? She made a mental note to speak with Tegan as soon as she finished Captain Mapstone’s errands.

Lightning ripped down from the heavens in a jagged blue-edged bolt that exploded on the tip of a castle turret that bore the Sacoridian banner. Karigan winced at the blast and squeezed her eyes shut, still seeing a crooked blue after-image of the bolt. Her hair fairly stood on end and a prickling sensation traveled all the way down to her toes. It stirred within her, awakened something, but the sensation passed quickly. ns class="adsbygoogle" style="display:block" data-ad-client="ca-pub-7451196230453695" data-ad-slot="9930101810" data-ad-format="auto" data-full-width-responsive="true">