Lady of Horses by Judith Tarr

Author:Judith Tarr [Tarr, Judith]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: prehistorical, horses, Judith Tarr, Epona Sequence, White Mare, Old Europe, Horse Goddess
ISBN: 9781611383836
Publisher: Book View Cafe
Published: 2014-04-29T07:00:00+00:00

33

When Old Woman came back, Sparrow was away from camp again, sitting on a hill while the mare grazed nearby. She had been flying in the spirit, following the kestrel, shaping herself to its shape: handsome sharp- beaked face, swift wings. It had struck her that this hawk was a hunter of sparrows, and that for Sparrow to hunt the kestrel was an oddity to make a god smile.

She was smiling at it as she returned to her body, a smile that lingered in spite of itself—even as she saw who stood in front of her, leaning on a staff. To the eyes of the spirit Old Woman was invisible.

“Tell me how you do that,” Sparrow said.

“What, walk the country?” Old Woman was not going to give her anything—unless she begged. And she would not beg.

Sparrow set her lips together. If Old Woman wanted to talk, Old Woman could talk. She would not trouble herself.

Old Woman stood without speaking, leaning on that length of smooth-rubbed wood. It had no ornament. The top of it was a burl, the base of the branch from which it had come, maybe, or the roots of the sapling it had been. It was much worn, with a sheen on it that spoke of long use.

It was a walking stick, a prop for her age, but there was something more to it. Sparrow reached to touch it. It did not writhe and turn into a serpent and bite her. It was wood, that was all, warmer than stone, denser than bone. Old Woman had grounded it in the earth.

It was long since parted from its roots, and yet it still remembered. It was still, in a fashion, alive.

“Looking for magic?” Old Woman asked her.

“Is there anything to look for?”

“Answer a question with a question,” Old Woman said. “Very good; you’ll be a great shaman among certain of the tribes.”

“Not my father’s tribe,” Sparrow said.

“Probably not,” said Old Woman. “Though once the real shaman is dead and his apprentices weakened with fear, who’s to say that some of them might not grow wise?”

Sparrow stiffened. “The real shaman? My father’s still alive?”

“For a while,” Old Woman said. “Until the dark of the year. Quite possibly longer, but his strength burns low.”

“How do you know that? How do you know him?”

“Why,” said Old Woman, “the same way I know you. I know.”

“Does he know you?”

Old Woman grinned, baring her few blackened teeth. “Do you think he does?”

“I think,” said Sparrow, “that even if he knew you existed, he wouldn’t believe you.”

“There,” Old Woman said. “You see?”

What there was to see, Sparrow could not exactly determine. Old Woman was like this: odd, elliptical, infuriating. She was less like a shaman than a trickster: one of those rare personages, quite hopelessly mad, who appeared sometimes among the tribes. The last one she had seen was a huge man, rampantly male, with a great brown beard and a pelt like a bear, who minced about in a fine deerskin tunic and insisted that he be called Flower of Perfect Beauty.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.