[Chapter 3.]

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My mind was spinning with all that had occurred. I had a thousand questions; I was dying to know who “the dark agents” were, and why on earth they were hunting me. I also wondered who this person behind me was, and where he could have come from.  His hands held the reins on either side of me; somehow, speeding through unknown places on into who-knows-where, I didn’t feel afraid. Compared to him and his calm strength, I felt little and helpless, like a tiny child; but a child who had been made to feel safe, and could now rest in peace. And through it all, this sense of absolute strangeness hung about me. How odd. How completely odd this was! What could possibly happen next? And what could possibly go right? Part of me dreaded the fearful things that must be ahead, and wished to avoid all excitement of any kind. But another part of me, the part that always seemed to get me into trouble, couldn’t wait.

I didn’t have to wait long. Right out from behind a flat-ish hilltop nearby sprang a stream of black horses. They had been lying in wait until we came up, and now pounded helter-skelter in our direction; on the back of each was a rider identical to the attacker who had threatened my life. They charged at us with deadly speed, eyes flashing, faces threatening, weapons raised, whipping through the still air towards us.

In an instant reaction, Mudge sprang hard to the left. She lost her stride for a moment, but, regaining her footing with a free and easy grace, our speed was instantly tripled. Had I thought our pace fast before? We flew now. Up until that moment I hadn’t known the meaning of speed. At the time, all I could do was yell “Faster, faster!” through whitened lips and gritted teeth, but it was quite unnecessary. Before two minutes had passed we left them all in the dust reeling from the race and plunged in failure, the horses’ mouths foaming as they came to a halt far behind us. We sped on, our hearts keeping pace with the drumming beat of hooves.

It would be impossible now to portray the wonder, terror, and curiosity that filled me as we rode on into the hills. Two attempts on my life, and two miraculous escapes? I wondered how I could possibly be the victim of such attempts. Who was this angel behind me, and how had he happened to come just in time to save me? And, just as importantly, where was he taking me? I didn’t dare ask; he had had enough trouble keeping me alive as it was. I tried to assist him in his efforts towards my survival, realizing that I hadn’t breathed for over a minute; slowly I caught my breath, and closed my eyes in an attempt to calm down. And, as surprising as it may seem under the circumstances, my efforts must have been extremely successful, for it wasn’t long before I went to sleep, swaying back and forth to the motion of Mudge’s stride, and leaning almost completely against the shoulder of the boy behind me. The name Alan, as well as Mudge, flitted through my troubled dreams, but my disconnected mind had hardly learned to associate the name with the face of my rescuer.

Alan, Son of Bronyn, was exhausted from three days’ worth of hard riding. He and his horse Mudge had had only a small nod of sleep through it all, and, though both amazingly resilient, neither could go on much longer without a rest. They needed food, sleep, and above all, water. There hadn’t been much of that necessity recently; as you recall, their time spent by the forest’s spring was not conducive to quenching thirst, or filling up water skins. They had had to flee instantly, and, doing so, they left behind the only source of water for miles. Finding water was the first thing to be done, and Alan scoured his mind for the exact location of its nearest source. He knew the streams flowing from Memric Lake were somewhere close by, but the only map he had of this area was a mental one; thinking a bit harder, he soon remembered that the stream was farther to the south, and that, crossing this stream and going straight on for a few miles, you would come to a cliff wall broken by the mouths of many different caves, large and small. His mind was made up. We would come to the stream, fill our water skins, travel along the stream bed for a mile or so, and then circle back to the cliffs. This would throw any pursuers off our trail, and provide us with a safe place to conceal ourselves for the night. I wonder now that he considered any place safe, in that wild territory.

Mudge slowed to a trot as we neared the stream. The choppiness of her new gait jogged me awake, and I looked about me to find that the day was drawing to its close; it was cooler now, and the sun had begun its descent to the west. It had been a long and tiring day, and I was just realizing how terribly thirsty I was when we came over a rise in the ground and looked down below to find what we were all longing for: water. The stream spread out before us, shimmering and snaking its way through the valley, long sedge growing green by its babbling water. We were soon down beside it. Mudge especially had been dying of thirst; she bent down to the water and drank in a way that only a horse can. After we had quenched our thirst and filled our water skins, we mounted up again and rode Mudge slowly and carefully upstream. Then, according to plan, after we had gone about a mile out of our way Alan guided us up the little bank on the other side, and we turned back towards the cliff.

 In less than an hour we arrived at the cliff wall, and soon found a good place to encamp. Alan chose a little cave that was just large enough to shelter us for the night, and just small enough to assure us that nothing besides ourselves was hiding in its unfamiliar recesses. The horse’s saddlebags couldn’t hold much, but the few things we needed were soon laid out. Necessities like matches, our newly filled water skins, a blanket or two, and food in the form of flat cakes, nuts, and a pouch of dried fruit; any other foods would have spoiled. There were two daggers as well, and an extra quiver of arrows for the long bow Alan wore behind him.

We had a running conversation while he made the camp ready, and while I made friends with Mudge (yes, I felt rather useless, but sometimes the truth must be met square in the face: I was). I learned that Alan been charged with bringing me to an important counsel of some sort. My mind was all question marks here. I also learned that the hordes of dark agents lurking about were sent to prevent me from reaching this counsel, which apparently was to be held at some sort of a walled fortress. I asked about the fortress, but learned nothing more than that its walls were impenetrable, and that, if we managed to reach it, we would be safe inside. I didn’t know where this fortress was or whose it was, but all of a sudden I wanted to get there very, very fast.

Soon a fire was built at the mouth of the cave, and just in time too, for the warmth of the day had waned with the sun; the air was chill and nippy. If we’d camped anywhere else we would have been unable to start a fire, but, as Alan carefully explained, in this case we were able because any traces of a fire would be masked by the cliff walls behind us. They towered up to dizzying heights, and prevented the possibility of our smoke being seen at any distance.

We soon sat down to our small meal; it is impossible to describe how good it tasted. They say hunger is the best spice, and they are certainly right; that tiny meal tasted like a king’s banquet to our famished appetites. Alan was selfless and gave me the larger portion. I meant to take the smaller, but somehow, when I saw the food in front of me all my good intentions went out the window; I ate every particle. Afterwards I felt guilty, but tried to justify it to myself by saying that I was girl, and therefore entitled to… more food… It wasn’t working. Oh well.

Sitting there with my back to a rock wall, and a rough and capable yet kind young man tending the fire in front of me, moments from various adventure books I had read started coming into my head. At this point, the man would have started singing, with a soulful, plaintive voice, some old ballad of love and regret. He didn't though. Instead of singing, or talking, or doing anything interesting at all, he sat down a few feet off and closed his eyes. He was much more tired than I was, and needed a moment of rest, but I couldn't help myself. Bursting his silent reverie, I suddenly asked "Can you sing?" "What?" He asked, peering across at me as the firelight flickered on our faces. "Can you sing?" I repeated, a little less imperatively this time. He looked dog tired and slightly confused. "No, I don't sing. I've never been able to hold a tune to save my life. Even if I did, I don't know any songs worth singing."

 Myth destroyed. Apparently I had been wrong in thinking that every half-decent looking boy with a good head of hair could sing well. "Oh. I thought you could." I said. He looked puzzled. Trying to save it, I went on "I mean, you look like the sort of person that would... be able… to sing." My voice faded off. That had sounded strange. And probably awkward. What on earth was he thinking? I looked over at him again, and his face had spread into a sort of half grin. "And what does the sort of person who can sing usually look like?" "Well, I evidently don't have the slightest clue." We both laughed, and lapsed into silence again as a wolf howled in the distance. I warmed my hands at the fire, and by the time I had leaned back against the rock and nestled into my place again, I looked across the fire to see Alan stretched out face down, fast asleep.

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