She’s huge.
“You are going to ride her, Gifford,” Padera said with admiration, as if he’d already done so.
Gifford looked up at the towering animal. “No, I’m not.”
“On the back of that animal, you’ll run faster than any man in history.”
“How will I stay on?”
“You hang on to the mane,” Malcolm said. “Lean forward, lie low, and just hang on tight.”
“The gods made your arms strong for a reason,” the old woman told him.
“How will I make it go the way I want?”
“With this.” Malcolm came over then, holding a piece of metal with straps and buckles tied to it. “It’s called a bridle. Slip this metal piece between her teeth, slide it all the way to the back of her mouth, then buckle it around her head. These long straps will make it possible to turn. She’ll go where she’s facing.”
Malcolm put it on the horse. Then Roan hurried back to the worktable, grabbing up wads of cotton padding.
“Relax,” Padera said. “The horse is the least of your worries.”
Frost waved for Gifford to bend over as if he planned to tell him a secret, then he wrapped the string around his head. “Fourteen and a half.”
“Fourteen and a half,” Flood repeated.
“Why they doing that?” Gifford asked.
“The hard part will be getting past the elven army,” Padera explained. “You have to ride across the Grandford Bridge right through their camp. They’ll know you’re trying to carry a message, and just like when they destroyed the Spyrok, they’ll want to stop you, too.”
“They’ll kill me.”
Padera nodded. “They’ll try.” She might have been smiling. “According to absolutely everyone, what you’re about to do is suicide. That’s why you have to do it. Don’t you see? It’s perfect. You have nothing to lose.”
“My life. I could lose my life.”
“Like I said, nothing to lose.”
Gifford didn’t have an answer. He knew he ought to, but he didn’t.
“Don’t look so miserable,” she said with a grin, that one eye glaring at him. “I’m not sending you to your death. You won’t die. I know it. Your mother knew it, too. Now pay attention, Roan has a present for you.”
He looked over to see Roan and the dwarfs carrying over a suit of armor. All silver, the thing looked like sunlight on a lake; so shiny, he could see his face looking back at him.
“I fashioned this from iron,” Roan said. “But it’s not iron. This is a new metal, something I’ve been working on. I made it using a new percentage of charcoal—a better mix. It’s harder, lighter, tempered. And I polished it. I figure the smoother it is the less chance a blade will catch.” Frost, Flood, and Rain all nodded.
Malcolm stepped in and lifted the big plates hinged together by leather straps over Gifford’s head. One plate covered his chest, the other his back, and the straps rested on his shoulders. Then Malcolm and Roan swung shoulder plates over the top and began buckling them on.
“The best part is”—Roan took the matching helm and turned it over, revealing a series of etched markings—“all of the metal has been engraved with the Orinfar runes. So, not only will swords glance off, but magic should, too.”
Padera grinned so that both eyes were squeezed to slits. “You’re going to make your mother proud, boy.”
* * *
—
Roan struggled with tightening the helmet straps. She punched a new hole, having underestimated the size of his head. He tried to make a joke about it, but Roan, who was always too serious, was downright grave. She refused to look him in the eye as she set the helm on his head with a ceremonial formality as if he were a chieftain—or sacrificial lamb.
“Dammit!” she cursed and pulled the helm off again. “Still too small. You said fourteen and a half. It’s more like fourteen and three quarters.”
“Woan?”
“Yeah?” she said, turning back to the worktable and pulling the buckle out.
“I want to tell you something.”
Padera had kept him breathless for the last hour, but as the dwarfs painted the Orinfar markings over the white horse, and Roan continued to work the armor to fit, Gifford had a moment to think. It had never crossed his mind to refuse. The old woman was right. He would go. He would ride across that bridge, not for mankind, or even his mother, but to save Roan. Already he’d thanked Mari five times for even this slim chance to do something. All his life he’d watched others play, run, fight, marry, have kids, build homes, hunt, farm, raise sheep, and dance. Gifford never did anything but make cups and look foolish. In an emergency, he couldn’t even run for help. He’d always been a burden, always a mouth to feed with the labor of someone else’s work. His pottery was a way to give something back, which was why he worked so hard to make it the best it could possibly be, but it wasn’t really needed. Gifford had never been needed by anyone.