the terror of watching her husband get pulled down to his death, past the sudden and brutal shock of the recognition of the son she did not know she had. In that moment in the mud, looking up at the corona, feeling the love of Elbryan all about her, Pony sought a different perspective. She forced away her rage at Lady Dasslerond and instead whispered a thanks to Dasslerond and the elves for saving her life and for saving Aydrian. She forced away the pain and resentment, pushed past her fear of the monster Dasslerond had created, and looked at Aydrian in a new context. He was her son. He was in great pain.
Great pain had brought him to this pinnacle of disaster. Great pain had fostered his resentment toward his mother. Great pain and Marcalo De'Unnero.
Pony let go of that name, as well, as soon as it had occurred to her. She had no room for rage at that moment.
And perhaps it was more than De'Unnero, the woman pondered, and a shiver ran up her spine. She considered again the circumstance under which she had lost Aydrian, in the midst of a spiritual battle with Father Abbot Markwart and with a creature quite beyond the scope of the frail old monk.
For the first time in so long, Pony felt that old spirit rising within her, the same fires that had carried her to Mount Aida to battle the dactyl demon, the same fires that had sustained her through her ordeal at the hands of Markwart and the loss of so many she had loved, the same fires that had bolstered her courage throughout the rosy plague and shown her the truth of community and the way to the shrine of Avelyn.
She considered Aydrian again, and the errant monster he had become, and she admitted to herself that she did not have the heart to fight against her own son.
But Pony pushed past that, and confirmed within her heart that she did indeed have the heart to battle Marcalo De'Unnero.
Without further ado, with the name of the false and discredited monk filling her body with determination, the woman pulled herself from the ground and moved beside the patient Symphony. She stroked the horse's face lovingly, communicating her gratitude, then brought her face up against the side of the great stallion's neck, feeling his warmth. With a whisper in his ear for him to take her home, Pony climbed up on Symphony's back and took hold of the thick black mane.
Off leaped the horse, running as no other animal in all the world could run.
He carried her tirelessly across the Moorlands and into the forests where the leaves had fallen thick upon the paths. He charged up every hillside and gracefully and carefully descended the back slopes, moving ever eastward.
In short days, Symphony galloped through fields of caribou moss, like white powder rising up the stallion's hooves and muffling the sound of Symphony's thunderous passage, and when she recognized the rolling moss- strewn fields about her, Pony knew that she was almost home.
She leaned forward over the horse and whispered a new instruction, and Symphony knew her desire and certainly knew the way. One day about twilight, the horse pulled up near a diamond-shaped grove.
Pony slid down, only then realizing that the song of Bradwarden was thick in the air about her, blending, as always, with the harmonies of nature.
Bolstered by the music, and by the presence she felt in this special place, the woman moved into the copse of trees, to a place before two stone cairns.
"I'll bring back your sword, Mather Wyndon," she promised. "And Hawk-wing for you, my love. All that we worked to achieve will not be lost in the wayward designs of our son."
"Yer words're music sweeter'n anything me pipes have ever blowed," came the voice of Bradwarden behind her.
Pony smiled and turned about.
"Ye seen the elf lady?" the centaur asked.
"Dasslerond and I did not part as friends," Pony admitted. "But we are allies in this, of circumstance and not choice."
"Ye put yerself out to fix the errors o' the Touel'alfar?"
Pony gave a resigned little shrug. "Someone has to."
The centaur broke into a great bellylaugh then. "And once again, it falls to yerself. Ah, but what a life ye've known, Pony o' Dundalis! Pony who fought the demon in its hole, and fought it again in the body o' Markwart."
"And who might yet do battle with Bestesbulzibar," the woman said solemnly, and Bradwarden stopped his laughing