Page 16 of The Stallion & The Tigress
“Ha.”Aleksi burst into laughter while Saharwatched them both, saying nothing.“Her daughters are no better.Nothing and nobody can please them.I swear the heavens could rainnectar down on them and they would complain it was too sweet.”Heeyed Anya, a still handsome woman with sad grey-blue eyes whoseyouthful good looks would have no doubt raised Theodesia’s ire.“Was she why you left?”
Anya nodded, slowly, thoughtfully, herserious gaze on his.“She was one of many reasons,” she said.Thenshe glanced at Sahar and her expression brightened.“It was for abetter life that we came here to this city, and here it was wefound it and lived it until my Yuri passed from this life threeyears ago last winter.”
“I am sorry,” Aleksi said.“He was a goodman?”
“He was, and his son, our son, Arman, is muchlike him.”
CHAPTER 4
Winners and Losers
Zolotoy was not in his stall when Sahararrived to ready Lasair for her morning training session.It wasthe day before the first race, and she and Ratter had decided togive Lasair an easy run this morning and let her rest thisafternoon.Yesterday, when Sahar had shown for Lasair’s afternoonsession, she had been surprised to find Zolotoy in his stall, asAleksandr usually trained him then.She had crept into thestallion’s stall and peeked into the antechamber, where she hadspied a sight that still made her grin.Aleksandr, sound asleep onthe cot, that shock of hair fallen over his forehead, those fulllips she could still taste slightly open, little Kiska snuggledunder his chin.He had looked so young and boyish and carefree,something she had learned he had not been for many years.
Though she probably should have leftAleksandr and Anya to their conversation last night, Sahar hadstayed and listened intently to every word spoken between them inthe kitchens.In doing so, she had learned more about Aleksandr inone night than she had in the three days previous.He had been bornand raised as a prince, his father’s pride and joy, and then had itall taken from him through no fault of his own.A son andlegitimate heir had been born, and the golden boy made a stableboy.A motherless stable boy who had taken refuge with horses andcats, who was fiercely loyal to his two friends, Pyotr and Serge,for whom he had accepted a sack of food from Anya, and who wasdetermined to return home a self-made man with a string of fast,leggy, desert broodmares and a wife.
When Anya had teasingly asked him if he had awife picked out yet, he had answered that he had his eye on acertain young woman and then had winked at Sahar, a wink that Anyahad not missed.He had boasted about winning all three races withtheir purses of one hundred and thirty- three gold pieces, as wellas breeding rights for Zolotoy, in order to further his plans.WhenAnya commented on how sure he sounded about winning, he told herthat was because he was the best rider in their land, and then hehad added, with another wink at Sahar, that the best steppe riderwould always beat the best desert rider, man or woman.
Sahar had openly scoffed, but secretly shewas not so sure he was wrong.She had watched him trainingZolotoy—every rider had at one point or another—and she hated toadmit it, but he rode as well as any man she had ever seen, and shehad grown up amongst the best riders in the known world.He rodewith a strength and skill and sureness matched only by the goldenstallion beneath him, moving as one as they churned up earth withpowerful, league-eating strides and soared over jumps with ease.And whether holding Zolotoy to a tight rein or giving him his head,the Northern Steppes man rode with a combination of completecontrol and wild abandon that both thrilled and irritated Sahar.Intruth, the more she saw of Zolotoy, the more she was inclined toconsider the stallion as a breeding partner for Lasair.A foal withher speed and his strength would be near impossible to beat in anyrace.
Sahar simply had to win the races.That wayit would be her choice, not Aleksandr’s.
Shaking her head as if she could shake bothstallion and man out of her thoughts, she peeked into the emptystall’s antechamber and found Kiska sleeping in a box Aleksandr hadfashioned for her, curled up in the middle of one of his tunics.The warm, musky male scent of the tunic’s owner came to herunbidden, and she turned heel and hurried over to Lasair’sstall.
“I was checking on the kitten,” she said to acurious-eyed Ratter, who handed Lasair’s reins to her.
The mare was already saddled and tossing herhead, anxious to get out on the racing track.Born and bred to run,she was one of those rare horses who truly loved it, and riding herat a full gallop, the wind whipping through both their manes, wasone of Sahar’s greatest joys.
“Come, my beauty,” she laughed as she ledLasair out of the stables.“Let us go stretch your lovelylegs.”
It seemed every man entered in the racetomorrow stood along the fence rails watching them train, and shecaught the worried expressions of more than one rider, as well as afew disdainful frowns or ogling leers, as she walked Lasair pastthem cooling off the mare.Sahar pressed her lips tight and satstraighter in her saddle.They should be worried.She had everyintention of beating each and every one of them, especiallyAleksandr, who doffed his nonexistent cap to her as she reached thegate and dismounted.
As Sahar led Lasair to the stables, Yagostopped her.He wore a spotless tunic and had not one oiled hairout of place, despite the brisk, autumn breeze.
“Princess,” he said with a courtly dip of hisblack head.“Would you do me the honor of sitting beside me as wesup this evening?”
“I had not thought to…” She glanced over hisshoulder and caught sight of Aleksandr’s steady stare.“Thank you,Prince Yago,” she said.“I accept your kind invitation.”
He lifted her hand and placed his cool, drylips on the back of her fingers.“I await this evening with eageranticipation,” he said, smoothly returning her hand.
Sahar glanced over at Aleksandr, whose glareemitted more heat from ten paces than the Wolf’s courtly lips onher skin.With a shrug of her shoulders and a saucy tilt of herhead, she turned on her heels and gave him her back.
“Easy, Z.”Aleksi patted the dancingstallion’s straining neck as the horse pranced and pawed at thestarting line.“Soon I will give you your head and we will showthese desert horses and their riders a lesson they will notforget.”
He held Zolotoy’s reins in a tight grip,watching the flag flap in the brisk autumn air.It depicted a blackstallion and a snow-white mare against a green field under a bluesky.A horse’s high whinny and the shouts of men turned hisattention to where Yago’s black stallion, Tor, reared and pawed atthe air, while the gelding next to him broke from the line, abloody gash on his ear.The gelding’s rider brought the frightenedhorse under control and inspected the bleeding ear, loudly cursingYago and his “black demon of a mule” for biting his horse.Aleksishook his head.Horses were not inherently mean-tempered creatures,yet he had seen more than one made so by their masters.
The gelding’s rider declared him fit to raceand resumed a place in the starting line away from Yago and Tor, asdid the other riders, keeping their horses at a safe distance fromTor’s teeth and hooves.Aleksi glanced over at Sahar, who wasspeaking softly into Lasair’s ear.She had not spoken one word toAleksi since the evening before last, when they had been in thekitchens with Anya, though he had found her contributions of aboiled egg and pieces of unseasoned fish to Kiska’s growing larderyesterday morning and evening.
Probably for the best they hadn’t spoken.Thesight of her sitting beside Yago at supper last evening, at herlaughing and blushing at his slavish attentions still had Aleksiseeing red.Her father had not seemed amused either.He’d worn afurrowed brow through most of the meal.Aleksi understood thenecessity of maintaining politeness and royal manners well enough,but what he did not understand was Sahar’s inability to see what aworm the Wolf was.Her mind was as quick and sharp as her bladehand, yet she not only tolerated, but encouraged the man’s fawningbehavior.
The horses back in line and at the ready, theking held the flag high, and then slashed it down.
Aleksi gave Zolotoy a quick squeeze with hisknees and hugged the stallion’s barrel sides as the horse surgedforward.He leaned over the stallion’s bunching withers as theythundered past the other horses, glancing behind them to see thebulk of the racers dropping further behind.That morning, they hadall been given the opportunity to walk the course with theirmounts, which ran in a looping circle from the palace gates downinto the city and along the waterfront and back up to the palacegates where the starting line became the finish line.The city’swide, main road had been cleared and laid every hundred paces or sowith jumps of varying heights that the riders were required totake, and spotters were set at each jump to disqualify those whothought to cheat.Aleksi grinned.Zolotoy hated to lose a racealmost as much as Aleksi did, and needed no tricks or crops toovertake any horse running ahead of him, which, as they neared thecity, was only one long-legged blood bay mare whose rider’s shapelyseat Aleksi would recognize anywhere.
They turned into the city to the roar of thecrowd watching along the roadside, and Aleksi glanced back over hisshoulder and growled low in his throat.Yago’s black charger was nomore than four strides behind them.Zolotoy picked up speed as theroad straightened out along the waterfront, eager to close thethree strides between them and Lasair, and Aleksi gave Zolotoy hisfull head.They closed the distance to two strides.The first jumpwas coming up, and Aleksi slowed Zolotoy’s breakneck speed andcrouched higher and tighter in preparation for the jump of stackedlogs.Lasair sailed over the jump without even breaking stride, andZolotoy followed, though the big horse did not land as smoothly asLasair had, and they lost the stride they had gained on thestraightaway.
And so it went, Aleksi and Zolotoy nipping atLasair’s hooves along the straightaways and falling behind againeach jump.When they made the road leading back up to the palace,Zolotoy was only two strides behind Lasair, and Tor was only two tothree strides behind Zolotoy.Aleksi urged Zolotoy on, but Lasairheld on to her slim lead.The mare truly could fly, and Sahar wasas good and fearless a rider as Aleksi had ever seen.He swerved tomiss a rock in the road and heard Yago’s muttered curses behindhim.Gritting his teeth, he willed his strength into Zolotoy andfelt the horse’s burst of energy, but it was too little too late.Sahar and Lasair won the race by a head, and Yago and Tor finishedthird by a stride.
The crowd erupted into cheers as they slowedtheir horses down to a cooling trot and the other racers trickledin.Sahar walked Lasair to where her father, the king, held thewinning purse of three gold pieces, her face split in two with agrin for which Aleksi felt no rancor.The king handed Sahar herwinnings with a grin to match his daughter’s as chants of“Princess, princess” and “Lasair, Lasair” filled the air.
