Thunder, but there is no lightning in the sky. The rain has eased, and in the absence of one noise, I hear another. Soon the horse and I fall silent and still. Surrender provides my only chance - a slender one, fraught with risk, and my Sight will not reveal the outcome. Should I continue to flee and my Enemy to chase, none of it will save my poor Beloved. I am almost near the end of my journey, but the Goddess has spoken: there is no further use in running. My pursuers would say I was casting a spell on the poor animal but I know it is only the opening of one's heart to another creature, the unspoken sharing of calm - a true calm I must look deep within myself to find. I collect myself and give his wet neck another stroke. The stallion senses this and, distressed, increases his pacing. In that instant, I want to weep, hard and bitter as the rain hard, so very hard. 'You are a fine horse, and they will take you where it is warm and dry, and feed you. His coat is cold and soaked from sweat and rain, but underneath, the muscles emanate heat. 'They will not hurt you,' I tell him softly, and stroke his neck as he whinnies in protest. We have fled our enemies this long why, now, do we wait for them? He shivers, but not from the autumn chill, and rolls his great dark eyes to look questioningly back at me I can see terror in the whites. He is sensitive, my steed, in the way most animals are, though he does not possess the Sight: he cannot see those pursuing us, but he can sense the Evil residing in one particular heart.

He is exhausted, gasping from the long, strenuous run even so, when at last I rein him in, he fights me, rearing his head.Īs he slows reluctantly, lifting strong, graceful legs to pace sidelong, I put one palm flat against his shoulders and feel the muscles straining there. They pierce and sting, and though it seems right that this moment should be physically painful, I feel a welling of pity for the stallion. Hard as the rain: in the flash, it appears long, jagged, crystalline - a hail of icicles, of small, frozen lightning bolts. Rosemary brings memories roses are not without thorns stones are hard. My galloping mount's coat gleaming like onyx, his wet mane whipping like a Medusa's crown in the angry wind see, too, the road to Carcassonne before us, studded with stones, brambles of wild rose, and bushes of rosemary that yield their astringent fragrance as they are crushed beneath the horse's hooves.

Fast, malignant clouds shroud the moon and stars, and the softer velvet black of the night sky profound darkness veils all, save for those instants when lightning illuminates the distant mountains, and I see:

The burning times jeanne kalogridis