Fancy pants's Arc

Chapter 2 of 4

The honey was still on Fancy Pants's fingers when the dogs started barking. A rider had come up the track to the cabin. He was not one of theirs. Thomas set down his cup and stood. The ginger princess stepped back into the doorway, quiet as she always went when trouble showed up. The stranger swung down before anyone waved him in. He was broad in the shoulder, dust to the knees, a long knife on his belt. He did not take off his hat. He looked at Fancy Pants first, then at the stag pen behind the cabin, then at Thomas. "Word travels," he said. "Five days riding the silver one. Every village between here and the coast is telling it." He smiled without warmth. "I've come for the trick of it. How you called him. How you held him. I'll pay fair, or I won't." Fancy Pants wiped her fingers on the linen. "He isn't a trick." "Everything's a trick if you know it," the stranger said. He stepped up onto the porch. His hand rested near the knife. "Tell me, or I'll wait here till you do. I'm patient." "So am I," Fancy Pants said. "I'm better at it." The ginger princess did not move from the doorway. She spoke low. "Get off the porch." The stranger laughed at her. That was the wrong sound to make. Thomas moved once. He crossed the porch, drew, and put his blade through the man's ribs under the raised arm. The stranger's knife hit the boards before his knees did. Thomas held him up by the shoulder until he was sure, then let him down. No one spoke for a moment. A rocking chair creaked where the ginger princess had brushed it. Somewhere past the stable, the stag stamped once and went still. "You said you wouldn't kill for me again," the ginger princess said. "I said I wouldn't promise it," Thomas said. He wiped the blade on the dead man's coat. His voice stayed flat. "He came for her. He would have come back for you." Fancy Pants looked at the body, then at the track the horse had come up. Her hands were steady. Her stomach was not. "There will be more," she said. "Every village knows my name. Every village knows the shape of him." "Aye," Thomas said. The ginger princess came out of the doorway. She knelt by the dead man and closed his eyes with two fingers. She did not look angry. She looked tired in a way Fancy Pants had not seen before. "We can't keep him here," the ginger princess said. She meant the stag. She meant all of it. Fancy Pants looked toward the pen. The silver stag watched her through the slats, waiting. The wish was not yet asked. And now the road to it had a body on it.