Shadows and Light

moonlit road, alone, with one of the Fae?
    “So now you have to decide, Baron Liam,” Padrick said. “Are you going to risk riding with one of the Fae on the night of the Summer Moon, or are you going to take your chances and ride north alone, or back to the city, and hope you don’t meet anyone who wants to finish killing you? I’ll ride north with you to help you get home. Or I’ll keep riding west.”
    It wasn’t a hard choice when there really was no choice. “If I’m going to be riding with one of the Fae tonight, shouldn’t it be a fair maiden who gives me a come-hither look?” Liam asked. Relief swept through him when he saw a glint of humor in Padrick’s eyes.
    “You’re stuck with a man, and I save my come-hither looks for my wife.”
    Liam grinned. The sickness was still there, and the worry about his family and what might happen in the council tomorrow, but he felt a little boyish excitement, too. “Let’s ride.”
    Turning his horse, Padrick held the animal to an active walk.
    Liam chafed at the slower pace, then realized it was a chance to ask a few questions. After all, he’d never met any of the Fae before.
    “You’re riding a Fae horse. That’s why I couldn’t hear it on the streets.”
    Padrick nodded. “A Fae horse has silent hooves, unless it wants to be heard.”
    Liam admired the gelding. “I’ve never seen a finer horse. Well, maybe I’ve seen as fine.”
    “Oh?” Padrick said, giving Liam a long look.
    “When I bought my stallion, Oakdancer. There were some ‘special’ horses that weren’t for sale, and I saw them only at a distance. Oakdancer’s light on his feet, but not like your gelding.”
    “Where did you acquire your stallion?”
    “From a man named Ahern.”
    Padrick nodded. “He must have seen something in you to sell you one of the half-breds.”
    “Half-breds?”
    “An animal bred from a Fae horse and a human horse. He raised the finest horses in Sylvalan. But that was to be expected, since he was the Lord of the Horse.”
    “The—” Liam’s jaw dropped. “Ahern? The Lord of the Horse?” He thought back to the days he’d spent at Ahern’s farm when he’d gone to buy the stallion—and the odd way Ahern had gone about choosing the right horse for the rider... and the right rider for the horse.
    “So you’ve already met the Fae, laddy-boy, even if you weren’t aware of it,” Padrick said.
    Who could have guessed that gruff old man was Fae, let alone the Lord of the Horse? “I heard he died.”
    “Yes,” Padrick said softly, grimly. “He died helping a young witch escape from the Inquisitors. Come along. We have a fair amount of road to put behind us tonight.” He urged his horse into a canter.
    Touched a wound, Liam thought as he brought his horse alongside Padrick’s. Maybe it wasn’t just his own people and the witches who had reason to look hard at the Inquisitors. And maybe that was a good thing. “Do you think the Fae will help us?” he asked, raising his voice to be heard.
    “I can’t say what the Fae in the rest of Sylvalan will do,” Padrick replied. “But I can tell you this—if the Inquisitors come to the west, they’ll die.”

    Liam judged they’d been riding for an hour, taking farm lanes and going cross-country at times before they reached the north road. A few minutes after that, he saw the cart up ahead, overturned in the middle of the road. He saw the downed horse and the blood turning the road black in the moonlight—and he saw the man’s body.
    He kicked his horse into a gallop to cover the remaining distance. It slid to a stop when it scented the blood, throwing him heavily against its neck. He slid out of the saddle, but managed to keep a firm grip on the reins. Not that it would do any good. The horse wouldn’t stand. Not with the scent of blood so strong in the air.
    “Give me the reins,” Padrick said. “I’ll see to the horse.”
    Liam handed the reins to Padrick, then stumbled toward the man in the road. Falling to his knees, he turned the man over gently, saw the cross bolts, heard the wheezing rattle of breath.
    It wasn’t his groom. It was Kayne, the upper footman.
    Kayne opened his eyes, stared at Liam. “They killed me,” he said, gasping with the effort to speak.
    “Hold on,” Liam said. “We’ll find some help for you.” Hollow words since he knew they couldn’t reach anywhere fast enough to save the man.
    “They killed me,” Kayne said again, sounding baffled. “I was