The Book of Horses and Unicorns Read online

  How many steps to home? wondered Zushan. For the first time she began to fear that with the burden of Hari in her arms, she wouldn’t make it safely back to camp.

  She had to keep her sense of direction. That was the greatest danger in the snow. The sun had been on her left. Now it should be on her right but the sun was nearly hidden by the snow; only a bright patch of whiteness low on the horizon showed where it was.

  That way … it had to be that way … Zushan plodded on through the whiteness.

  At least there were no streams between her and the camp; often the ice would collapse as you walked over them. That’s if she was headed in the right direction …

  Zushan glanced up at the horizon again, but now the last of the sun’s brightness had vanished. The world was a featureless white all around.

  In a white-out like this she might walk right past the camp and miss it. She would have to call and keep calling, and hope that someone heard her, that their voices might guide her …

  But there was no point calling out yet. Zushan had no way of telling time or any way of counting her steps but she had a clear sense of how long it had taken her to come this way, and a clear sense, too, of how long it might take to get back. No use yelling till she was nearer camp. She would just exhaust herself, and she and Hari needed all her strength now.

  Another step, another — her legs were screaming as she pulled them through the snow; her arms and back ached with Hari’s weight. But at least the front of her was warm where his small body pressed against hers. That meant he was warm too. If only they could make it home, they would survive. ‘Here.’ Zushan reached into her pouch and pressed a blob of fat and berry between Hari’s cold lips. She took a mouthful herself too. The food would help … for a while.

  It was an effort to lift her feet now. The fresh snow sucked at them, and weighed them down. It was ankle-height already.

  A dark shape loomed in front of her. A tree. She changed course to avoid it, then carefully tried to find the right direction again. If she bumbled into a tree, its weight of snow might fall on her, might suffocate them both.

  The cold had seeped through her clothes, her flesh, her bones. Hari must be even colder …

  Another shape grew out of the whiteness — another tree. But this shape moved.

  Zushan blinked. The fur of her hood had kept most of the snow from her face, but her eyes felt frozen, and there was snow on her lashes too. She blinked again and tried to see through the whiteness.

  The shape moved again. A white shape in the thicker whiteness, long and lean, with dark eyes that gleamed through the snow. Something growled, almost too low to hear.

  Wolf!

  The wolves must have heard her … they must have tracked her, even in the blizzard.

  Zushan looked round frantically for a weapon. A fallen branch, a bone — anything! Wolves were naturally timid and rarely attacked humans, except when they were starving in mid-winter and hunger drew them out, even in a blizzard, except when the humans were alone and tired in the snow.

  The wolf growled again. Another moved behind it.

  Zushan screamed, but the snow swallowed the sound.

  If she flung herself on the ground, over Hari, perhaps they would just take her, not him. But no, only starvation would bring the wolves out now. They’d take what they could find and even if they didn’t, Hari would soon die alone here in the snow.

  The wolf stepped closer, his nose low, his eyes watchful. Zushan yelled again, her arms tight around Hari.

  But this time her cry was answered. A long whinny sounded through the trees. Hooves thundered through the snow, and a gold body reared through the whiteness.

  The hooves lashed down, just missing the wolf, which ducked hurriedly away. The hind hooves lashed out as well, and the stallion reared again. The wolves dissolved into the snowstorm, and were gone.

  The stallion paused and looked around. Dimly Zushan could see the shapes of other horses — mares — but they kept their distance from the human.

  The golden stallion stepped closer.

  ‘Sunlight?’ whispered Zushan.

  The horse whickered softly. He turned to go.

  ‘Sunlight, please, no. You have to help us.’

  The horse stopped at the sound of her voice. He faced her, the dark eyes blinking off the snowflakes, the nostrils wide as he remembered her smell.

  ‘I can’t carry Hari back,’ whispered Zushan. ‘Not through the snow. I’m not sure I can even find my way back. Please help us.’

  The golden horse gazed at her, proud and wary. This was no young foal, romping with his playmate. This was a stallion, leader of his band of mares, a wild horse who did as he pleased.

  Zushan staggered towards him, Hari in her arms. There was no time to think or plan. No way to fashion a sled or reins or tether. All she could do was hope the memory of their friendship held.

  What had Blani said all those years ago? A horse is stupid … No, this horse was not stupid. The stallion knew exactly what she asked of him. Suddenly he whickered, and tossed his head at her. He stepped closer. Zushan felt his warm breath on her skin.

  She touched the broad gold back with her mittened hand. The horse started but he didn’t move away.

  Slowly, slowly, Zushan put Hari on the warm straight back, just as she would load furs onto the taller, stronger back of a reindeer. Then she lifted one leg over the stallion’s back as well.

  Her toes could just touch the ground. She was taller than the horse now, she realised. But he was much, much stronger than her.

  The stallion shifted uncomfortably. For a moment Zushan thought he was going to buck them off and gallop off into the snow, leaving them cold and alone. But suddenly it seemed as though the memory of weight on his back returned to him.

  The stallion began to move, slowly at first, as though he wasn’t quite sure how to move with the unexpected load, and then more confidently. The mares followed. Zushan could hear their footsteps, muffled by the snow, and the huff of their breathing.

  The world grew even whiter. The stallion lifted his head, his nostrils flaring. He changed direction slightly, and plodded on, head down into the snow.

  She could feel the warmth of the horse through her clothes now. It was as though a small fire burnt under the shaggy golden coat.

  What if he wasn’t taking them to the camp, wondered Zushan, but to a sheltered glade where the horses saw out the blizzard? What if he didn’t realise that she and Hari needed tents and the warmth of other humans to survive?

  ‘Hari?’ she whispered. The child whimpered in her arms. At least he was still alive, thought Zushan. ‘Don’t go to sleep!’ she whispered. ‘You’ll die if you fall asleep in the snow.’

  She had to keep him awake, she thought. She had to keep awake herself.

  But soon there was no room in her mind to think. All she could do was hold on to Hari, hold on to the dark tough mane, and try not to fall asleep in the cold that sapped her strength and her thoughts.

  Whiteness … whiteness … impossible to hear the mares behind now. Impossible even to hear the footsteps of the stallion. Even her own breathing seemed to vanish. Perhaps she had dissolved into the snow, and Hari too and all that was left was whiteness, silence and more white …

  Zushan shut her eyes. It seemed she dreamed, or perhaps it was not a dream. A young girl rode a horse, much as she was riding now. But this horse was larger and so tall her legs dangled at his sides, and brown not gold with no stripes along his spine and across his withers. The snow had gone, and in its place was grass, more grass than the world could ever hold, hill after hill of grass and the horse was galloping, pounding across the hills with the girl on his back and …

  ‘Zushan! Zushan! Hari!’ The voice was faint but clear.

  Zushan opened her eyes. ‘Over here!’ she called. ‘Over here!’ Hari cried out softly in her arms.

  The stallion stopped. He lifted his head and neighed softly. One of the mares neighed back.

  �
�What …?’ began Zushan, and then she understood. Slowly, stiffly, she slid off the broad back and gathered Hari into her arms again.

  ‘Thank you,’ she whispered to the stallion. The blizzard was so thick now she could only just see his eyes, dark and watchful above the golden nose.

  The horse looked at her. It was a long look, as though he knew that something had begun today that would change life for every other horse, and every human too. Then he lifted his head and called his mares and trotted off into the white.

  ‘Zushan! Zushan!’ There were more voices now and faintly the pungent smell of burning bones from the fire. The camp must be very close.

  ‘Here!’ yelled Zushan again. She began to plod through the snow with Hari in her arms.

  What should she tell them, she wondered. ‘I was saved by a horse and he carried me on his back.’ No, they’d never believe her. They’d think she’d been dreaming, dazed by cold and white. Perhaps she had.

  No, she thought. The memory of the warm gold hide was too strong. The smell of horse lingered on her clothes as well.

  It was no dream. The world had changed today, but no-one else could ever understand.

  Strangers on Horseback

  The strangers arrived in fog. The air was like grains of wheaten flour, drifting in long thin clouds along the cliffs above and forming a thick sea down in the valley, so that it was impossible to see the grapes or olive groves below.

  Only the yellow road that snaked through the fog to the big house was visible to Milon, as he limped around the endless circle, leading the white horse that pulled the harness which turned the stones and ground the barley into flour.

  The other slaves laughed at Milon for leading the white horse. Even the steward snorted and told him he was wasting his breath — why not sit with a whip and let the lash force the horse to do its work instead?

  But even though his leg ached, Milon found it impossible to strike the horse. Simon worked best when you spoke gently to him, when you walked with him, and Milon found comfort in the warmth of the horse too, as they walked endlessly together. Simon had been his only friend since his first weeks in the slavery. It was as though they were both slaves together. The other slaves were older and none remembered being free. At times it seemed to Milon that the horse also had his memories. Maybe he had once galloped in a real partnership with his rider, instead of being harnessed by a nose ring to a grinding stone.

  Simon worked best when Milon was with him and, as the steward said, a crippled boy wasn’t useful for much else.

  Sometimes, when no-one was watching, he even hugged the horse. Its size and strength were a refuge. For a while he’d even been able to cry into the horse’s white hide, but he hadn’t cried for a long time.

  Sometimes you got used to pain.

  The days all felt the same now. Only the work changed from season to season, as he led the horse while it pulled or ploughed or carried. Today they would grind the barley from the autumn harvest, and tomorrow they would grind the barley too, and the day after that, though the fog might clear by then, and he could watch for eagles on the cliffs above, or glimpse the other outdoor slaves down in the olives or vineyards.

  Even gazing at an empty road was better than watching his own thoughts or thinking about the pain in his leg; better by far than his memories. He could always dream that any moment now someone miraculous would ride out of the fog — his father, perhaps, somehow unharmed. That was the best dream of all, though it hurt as well. Or perhaps the rider would be an uncle, one that he’d never known, a traveller who had escaped the massacre and spent his life hunting for his nephew.

  ‘I vowed on my brother’s grave that I would never rest till I found you and set you free!’ he’d cry. He’d throw down gold at the Master’s feet and together they would ride off to … to somewhere else. Somewhere like the past, when there had been soft beds and more than barley gruel to eat, and laughter and dreams of years to come.

  The fog thickened slightly. The white horse in his harness plodded round and round the muddy track, leaning into the harness attached to the grind stones and Milon limped before him. No-one would come, of course. No-one would ever come …

  The fog shivered slightly. Milon halted and the white horse stopped too. Something was coming up the road that led to the big house.

  It was a cart drawn by two great horses, as white as Simon, with a high canopy hung with embroidered curtains, which gleamed gold and red in the thin white light. It seemed almost as though the horses chose which way to go. No hand guided them from inside the curtain.

  Behind the cart came a rider. No, several riders, six perhaps, or seven. Milon squinted through the fog.

  The horses and the cart halted at the gate that led to the house’s outer courtyard. One of the riders dismounted and hammered on the courtyard door. Milon watched as the door opened. A slave’s face peered out then disappeared, to be replaced by the Steward’s harsher features.

  Suddenly the courtyard doors were flung open. The strangers must be important, thought Milon, whoever they were. The Steward bustled out, gesturing to the slaves behind to take the horses to be watered, fetch the Master, fetch the wine.

  One rider stayed on his horse. He seemed to be asking a question. The Steward gestured up towards Milon. Milon hurriedly began to lead Simon again, limping round as fast as he could in the damp air, as the rider cantered up towards them. Lazy slaves were beaten — worse; Simon might be beaten too.

  The horse’s hooves echoed through the fog — a brown horse, with a slender man on his back. Milon blinked, and realised that the man was a girl.

  ‘Ho, boy! Which way is the horse pasture?’

  Milon stared. It was impossible not to, even if it meant a beating afterwards. He had never seen a girl on horseback before, or a woman either. Women remained in their quarters with their spinning wheels and kept their gazes lowered.

  This girl rode like a man. She was dressed like a man too, or a strange foreign man anyway, in linen trousers embroidered down the leg, and a fur-trimmed tunic. Her hair was fine as cobwebs and red as flame, with a soft round cap that was embroidered too. A gold brooch like a snake held her cloak, gold snake bracelets pushed high up on her arms, and she wore a single earring like a crescent moon.

  ‘The horse pasture!’ repeated the girl impatiently. Her accent was strange, like music, as though her words followed a tune.

  Milon gathered his words together again. ‘There is no horse pasture,’ he said, feeling his tongue too big in his mouth.

  The girl frowned. She was Milon’s age, or perhaps a year younger. ‘Where does your horse graze at night then?’

  ‘With the sheep,’ said Milon, feeling even stupider.

  The girl sighed theatrically. ‘Then perhaps you’ll tell me where the sheep pasture is? I can’t see anything in this fog.’

  ‘It’s just above us. You’ll hear the sheep before you see them, but you can’t miss it, even in the fog.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said the girl carelessly. ‘I want to have a look at the pasture before we put the horses out.’

  ‘It’s good grazing,’ said Milon. ‘At least at this time of year.’

  ‘Good,’ said the girl. But she didn’t leave. She gazed at him for a moment and then at Simon, plodding in its endless circle. ‘That’s cruel,’ she said abruptly. ‘A good horse shouldn’t be treated like that.’ She gestured to the ring that was through the horse’s nose. ‘A horse like that shouldn’t be forced to walk in a circle to grind the grain, either. What are donkeys for?’

  Milon shrugged. ‘He was lame when the Master bought him, the same time as he bought me. That’s how the Master got him cheaper than a donkey.’

  That’s how he got me cheap too, he could have added, because I limped like Simon. He said instead: ‘But he refused to work in harness till the Master ordered him to have a ring.’

  ‘That’s even crueller then. A horse should work for love of you, not because he fears pain if he stops.’ The girl lea
nt across and stroked Simon’s white neck. He whinnied at her softly, and for a moment Milon felt a tug of jealousy. The horse was his friend, not hers.

  ‘He’s a good horse,’ said the girl. ‘There’s no sign of a limp now.’

  Milon shrugged. Every day he was afraid the Master would notice the horse was no longer lame and take him for a riding horse, or worse, sell him for far more than he had paid.

  The girl hesitated. ‘You’re a thrall?’

  ‘A slave,’ said Milon shortly. A thrall was sold to pay a debt and worked till the debt was paid, but a slave was … just a slave. Always a slave.

  The girl examined him. It would have been unbearable if she’d looked at him with pity. But she simply looked curious.

  ‘You don’t look like a slave,’ she said at last.

  Milon almost smiled. He gestured at his rough chiton, his bare feet with their callouses, the hair untrimmed for two long years

  ‘I don’t look like a slave?’

  The girl shook her head impatiently. ‘You’re dressed like a slave. But your expression, the way you talk …’

  ‘Sometimes I forget,’ said Milon.

  ‘Forget what?’

  ‘How to be a slave.’

  ‘Ah,’ said the girl.

  ‘Sometimes I think the horse forgets too,’ said Milon impulsively, before he realised what he was saying. ‘Sometimes he gazes down the mountain, as though he remembers running free, just him and his rider …’

  The girl stared at him. Milon flushed.

  The girl slid off her horse suddenly, stepped over to the white horse in its harness and stroked its nose. ‘How long have you been a slave?’

  ‘Two years.’ Since the massacre, since my family died, since the spear stabbed my leg, since they took me to the slave market to stand while passers-by stared at my scars or offered money … but he didn’t say that.

  The girl absently stroked the swollen flesh around the horse’s nose ring. ‘My name’s Zanna,’ she said abruptly.

  ‘I’m Milon. Son of Milon,’ he added, for the first time in two years. What did it matter who a slave’s father was? But suddenly he wanted to claim a family now. ‘And this is Simon.’ He stroked the horse’s white neck. Simon whickered gently in his ear.