‘Now, today we’re just going to try out the saddle. Just a little weight on your back, nothing you can’t handle, with how strong and lovely you are.’
‘Complimenting the raphon, I see,’ Kinlear said aloud.
Ezer closed her eyes and sighed.
Gods, he was obnoxious. She missed her silence with Six.
‘I promise it won’t hurt,’ Ezer said. ‘I won’t even buckle it.’
‘You most certainly will,’ Kinlear said, ‘unless you wish to spook her more when it slides from her back and gets tangled in her paws.’
At that, Ezer spun to face him.
‘Enough.’
He chuckled. ‘Brave, Raphonminder. And curiouser, each time I’m near you, you seem to forget your place.’
‘Oh, I know my place quite well,’ Ezer said as she exited the cell. ‘And it is here.Alone. Just me and Six.’
The saddle was light, at least, as she hoisted it over a shoulder. Kinlear made no move to help, just sat back and watched like a proper palace cat.
The second she entered the cell, Six skittered backwards, sending a wave of shavings towards her boots.
‘That’s enough fear out of you,’ Ezer told the raphon. ‘It’s leather and buckles, and it’s oiled black to match your feathers and fur. At least they got the color right. Imagine if they dressed you in white, like him.’
Six’s tail twitched twice again.
‘If you don’t put this on,’ Ezer said, ‘thenhewill stab me. I’m assuming that’s what the punishment will be.’
She glanced back over her shoulder at the prince who stood watching and waiting.
‘Not even close,’ he said, and coughed into his sleeve.
Ezer looked back at Six. The beast had lowered herself down to a sitting position. And once again, she twitched her catlike tail twice.
‘Six,’ Ezer tried. ‘Please.I’m not up for a battle today.’
She plunked the saddle into the shavings, earning a gasp from Kinlear, who probably liked his tack as nice and neat as his clothing.
Ezer lifted her hand out, no longer afraid. And when she touched the raphon’s scarred beak, a vision sucked her under.
A fish caught in a net, washed ashore as it struggled to breathe.
Now the vision shifted;she saw a tiny bird caught in a cage, flapping its wings to no avail.
She felt the dread like it was her own, even as she broke the moment and the vision fizzled out. Six’s dark eyes held hers, wide and panicked.
‘I’m sorry,’ Ezer whispered. ‘But I will be right here with you.’
Two tail flicks.
‘Six.’
The raphon turned away from her.
And laid a pile of waste on top of her boots.
‘Now, that’s justrude,’Ezer growled and called her a terrible name.
