“Blacksmith!”
I ignored Duke Pravolo’s strident call. Ringing blows rained down on the glowing silver, completing the rosette I’d attach to a decorative bridle. I wiped my arm across my sweaty brow.
My throat was parched, so I disregarded the arrogant popinjay in favor of guzzling lukewarm water from the bucket. Alone among the humans with only whispered rumors to guide me, I longed for the cool meadows of my homeland, but I was on a mission.
“Blacksmith!”
Humans like him plagued me. They sought me out for the magic I could weave into metal, never divining my true purpose searching among their stables. I finally stepped outside to endure his newest demand after he sent two men to bang on my doors, the incessant sound too loud to say I couldn’t hear. I swayed at the sight, nearly destroying weeks of effort in a single moment of desperate shock. Behind the human is his fatal mistake.
“Shoe it in gold.”
The unicorn’s proud neck bowed under the weight of an iron cage encasing his luminous horn. His hoof pawed the ground as I stared into those crystal-blue eyes as I approached. Two of the nobles men-at-arms held ropes to the cage, holding them taut to control the still dangerous mythical creature.
Damn humans and their need to bind all Beings.
“Easy.” Our bond flares in my chest like an ache I’d never been able to ignore, and time stilled when I finally touch him again. I’d begged him to remain safely behind before I left, but he followed me anyway. His muted magic showed me all he’d endured during our harrowing separation—but he also learned where the humans hid the foals.
“What are you waiting for?” Pravolo demands. “Shoe my new pet.”
Pet?
I tore the cage away, agony stealing my breath as my hands burned from contacting the metal without my special gloves, but I would endure that and more to free the innocents. More than my own pain echoed in the bond, but we both endured with one goal in mind. I pivoted, drawing the horn sheathed along my spine. As one, we stepped forward, his head lowered with horn ready as I lunged, one leg behind me to balance perfectly as I leaned forward so that, together, we speared through Pravolo’s despicable heart with matching strikes.
“We will never be human pets,” I snarled.
The men-at-arms gaped at us, and that gave us the opening we needed. I drew a blade from my waist and leapt onto the broad back offered me. Innately linked, my body flowed with his as he spun and kicked one man while he thrust his horn at another. I swayed with the back and forth play of his muscles, using his momentum to gain more heft behind my throw.
My blade, razor sharp as always, sliced through the heavy twined rope holding up the gate’s counterweight nearly at the top of the wall.
“Go!” I demanded.
We barely beat the spikes before they rushed down to thud with a dull thwack into the castle firmament. The humans would struggle to open the gates again anytime soon. The unicorn’s hindquarters bunched as he wheeled and sang out a ringing call of rage and triumph. He reared up, his front hooves striking the air.
“They still have arrows,” I hissed.
He wheeled again, turning on his back legs before dropping down and galloping flat out across the open meadow surrounding the duke’s walls. His mane slapped against my arms, the silvery hair fine and soft, and I looked behind us to see his tail streaming out as we outran the archers poor attempts to avenge their master’s death.
“Avoid the road,” I said, turning back.
‘You don’t have to tell me that’ he thought. ‘How do you think I followed you?’
“Then how did you get caught, Londe?” I slipped the horn back in the sheath along my spine. I started to take stock, cursing at some of the things I wish I’d had time to grab before we left. I’d made some premium weapons with that brigand’s metal, but at least without me to renew the spellcasting, they’d crumble within a week.
I’d not be guilty of leaving weapons in the hands of humans to use against Beings.
‘Let myself get caught. I’d found some information and knew I needed you.’
We entered the trees so Londe slowed, slipping between the branches without leaving a trace of his passing. No one could move swifter or more silent than a unicorn, so maybe I should believe him… “Yeah right. Oof, hey, stop that.” I caught myself with one hand on his withers.
‘Stop insulting me. It won’t work. Spirits curse them, are you okay?’
He must have caught the pain before I could muffle it. Trust me to forget to catch myself with the hand I hadn’t iron-kissed and left huge weeping blistered welts across.
“I’ll be fine. Can you find us a safe place? Are we close to where they have the foals?”
‘No. Two day’s run. We’ll need help too. A troll, at least, and maybe a river dryad. There’s a cave and a river near the human’s settlement. I’m thinking maybe we can go around, under, or through. If they can get us close enough.’
Considering our options, I had the best idea. I grinned, knowing Londe would hate it. “We need to head north.”
‘The foals are west,’ he protested.
“The help you want us to get is at the Bleating Banshee. We have to stop there first.”
‘What? I hate that place. Grif always hangs— No! You don’t plan on using her do you?’
“Bleating Banshee. It’s two hours, if that, and we can be on our way before nightfall. I’m owed favors. We’ll need them, Londe, to save the foals. Sure, Grif is a pain in the seat, but a better rock hound never existed.”
‘Fine,’ Londe sighed. ‘But I’m not carrying her bodies again!’
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