while she did a faultless bow, she then took another step forward, close enough to put her nose to Sylvi’s cheek. A tiny, whispering, almost inaudible voice in her mind said, I’m not supposed to talk to you! Please come back soon! I miss you! The last two sentences were almost obliterated by a very emphatic silent ssssssh from Ebon, which made Sylvi smile as much as Niahi’s words did—it was, for a few seconds, as if they were together and all was well.
Niahi took a hasty step backward again, and made a little bob of a second bow—and Sylvi held her hands out, stretching the one farther than the other, so the bracelet of pegasus hair showed clearly beneath her topaz-studded sleeve. She just saw the wrinkle form across Niahi’s muzzle, and then she ducked her head and whisked after her mother.
Sylvi glanced at Ahathin, but if he had heard the exchange, he gave no sign.
None of the other pegasi spoke to her—but she had the answer to one of her questions with Niahi’s words: it was not only Ebon any more, even in Balsinland. Although she almost doubted again when Hibeehea was presented to her: his mind-silence seemed absolute, as if the mere idea of that communication was inconceivable, and he looked as forbidding as he had the night she had met him, her first night in Rhiandomeer, when she began her historic visit by offending the greatest of the pegasus shamans.
After he made his bow, he said aloud,“I am proud and honoured to be here,” very clearly and distinctly, and there was a murmur of astonishment from the humans. But to Sylvi’s ear he sounded strained, as if the effort to speak even a few formal words was almost too great to be made. And his limbs and wings and body were stiff; she could read nothing in gesture.
When the presentations were over, the human queen stepped forward and took the human king’s arm; Danacor stepped forward and took Sylvi’s—and squeezed it against his side. “Well done, princess,” he said, but Sylvi was too conscious of their two pegasi, standing behind them; as Danacor had come up to them, Ebon had dropped back, and Thowara’s forehead stayed near the nape of Danacor’s neck. “They’re always behind us,” murmured Sylvi. “They’re always behind us.”
They were slowly following the king and queen, who were flanked by Lrrianay and Hirishy. Sylvi wasn’t expecting an answer, but as they passed under the Great Arch and turned toward the Great Hall where the celebration for her birthday was being held, Danacor said, “If you want to give up building bridges in the mountains and go back to Rhiandomeer and negotiate a reciprocal visitation agreement, I’ll engage now to stand behind Thowara when our time comes. But you will have to build a road.”
Then the first of the senators came up to them to say something pleasant and flattering and meaningless, and they spoke no more about it. Shortly after, they parted, and then it was just herself and Ebon—and several hundred party-goers. And Ahathin. And Glarfin, neither of whom let themselves be elbowed more than an arm’s-length away, however bad the crush. Sylvi kept wanting to drop back and put an arm over Ebon’s back, or twine her fingers in his mane—as she had done so easily and so often for three weeks—and she had to keep stopping herself. But she spoke politely to everyone who spoke to her— including a few pegasi, meticulously translated by Ahathin, while she half listened to the human words and did not try to hear the pegasi themselves. Niahi came and stood with them for much of the time, and Senator Grant and Lord Broughton, both of whom Sylvi knew had eleven-year-old daughters, asked as if idly if this was the king’s daughter, and was it true that she was still unbound. And when Glarfin brought her food and a glass of wine—and two pages brought a great platter of grasses and fruit for her companions—they all ate and drank.
And while, with Ebon with her, she enjoyed her birthday party that evening far more than she had enjoyed anything about the previous week without him, there remained a strange formality between them, and her pleasure in his presence felt too much like missing him had felt during the last week. I’m still missing him when he’s standing right next to me, Sylvi thought.
Her original plan that the party for her sixteenth birthday should have equal numbers