Behind the Lace and the Lies

1 - Horses of the Wind

In the land of Kabron, the tall grasses rustle with a sound like the whisper of angry spirits and the summers stretch endlessly on. In the bright blue sky dance ripples of heat rising from the ground and even gusts of wind offer no relief from the sun. There were rumors that the scorching would come soon – there hadn't been a summer this long in which it didn't.

In a hut woven of tall prairie grass, almost invisible against the endless swath of prickly dried grass, lived a young woman and her mother. The mother had grown weaker with the passing of time and relied on her daughter to secure the means of living. And so, every day, the young woman woke before sunrise to feed grain to the crested chickens, to swept the dust from the hearth, and to check the cydonia tree behind the house for fresh fruit. Drained of life from the heat and the lack of water, the cydonia tree was stunted and twisted; its buds rarely became fruit before their demise. Yet the young woman went to the tree every day before beginning her long march to the nearest village to fetch water.

In the afternoons, when the light would fall blue-golden across the sea of grass, the woman liked to stop on her path home from the village. She would sit on a cluster of rocks and watch the wind-horses gallop by – their manes dancing on the breeze, flickering in and out of sight along with the rest of their bodies. They would appear for a moment, a mighty horse of flesh and muscle, and then canter upwards, vanishing in a gust of wind.

Sometimes, if the woman would sit there long enough, she would feel as they galloped through her, disheveling her clothes and sending her hair flying. She wanted nothing more than to become them. To run with the freedom of the wind, to chase every whim, to race to the distant blue-purple mountains without the tiredness of the physical form, the endless thirst, and the complaints of her mother.

Slowly, she began to return home later and later, first an hour before dusk, and fortnight later, an hour after the sun had vanished. While her mother groaned, and the chickens squawked, and her feet ached from the miles of walking, all she could think of was the wind horses and their journey into the endless expanse of blue. She wanted to join to them.

And so, when a single bud of cydonia blossomed into fruit, she hid it from her mother and brought it to the wind horses instead. Once she placed it on the ground – a glistening oval of purple among the golden grasses – the wind-horses stopped. They became beings of fur, twitching ears, rippling flanks. Just as she reached out to touch one, they vanished in a gust of wind so strong the woman fell backwards.

On the second day, with the bloom of the second cydonia, she returned to the wind-horses, this time with a large bag of woven grass. Once again, the horse stopped in their endless gallop to consume the violet cydonia. She flung the bag over a horse, but with a mighty exhale, it turned to wind and vanished from between the gaps in the loosely woven bag.

On the third day, with the final cydonia the tree could bear, she went to the wind-horses with her last offering and cloth bag. With the horses materialized to eat the cydonia, she flung her bag and caught a horse. It swirled around inside, sending the bag spinning in the dust, but the woman clutched the bag tight and so the wind-horse was trapped. Holding the wind-horse in the bag in her palm, the woman realized this was not the answer. She could chain the horse but doing so wouldn't free herself.

And so she released the bag and the horse joined its brethren in the sky.

When she returned home that evening, heart aching with the same force as her tired feet, her mother was waiting for her. "What have you done with the cydonias?" she demanded.

The woman placed her empty bag on the table. "That doesn't matter."

"They weren't yours to take. I wanted to eat them, that runt of a tree hasn't produced any good ones in years," the mother continued, arms crossed. "When I saw you had taken them, I thought you would at least return with a gift for me."

The woman sighed and sat down at the table, resting her head in her hands. She didn't have the energy to tolerate her mother's snide comments and constant complaints. "I feed them to the wind-horses."

There was a moment of the silence. "The wind-horses!" Her mother shrieked, "those pests don't deserve one bite of a cydonia! I want you to go get me three more cydonias to replace the ones you wasted."

The woman shook her head. "The tree won't give any more this season. Not until the long summer is over. Assuming the scorching doesn't burn everything down."

"Then go to the village and find me some," the mother ordered.

And so, the next morning, the woman travelled to the city at the edge of the water.

She found the first cydonia clutched in the hands of a young child wandering the streets. He eyed her with suspicion, clenching his cydonia tightly with both hands, but before he could vanish into the chaos of the busy street, the young woman grabbed his arm.

"Please, I'll give you anything for the cydonia," she asked.

He tore his arm free and studied her with careful eyes. "I want your necklace," he demanded.

The woman's hands flew to the necklace around her neck. "No, it's the only gift my mother has given me. Anything else."

The boy grimaced. "Do you want it or not?" he asked, waving the cydonia around. "But fine, give me all your food and you can have it."

And so, the woman acquired the first cydonia. She found a second one in the basket of a noble's servant as she scurried down the street. The young woman once again plead for the cydonia and the servant grumbled in annoyance, but at last gave up the cydonia in exchange for the woman's fine leather boots.

The woman wandered the streets of the cities, two cydonias tightly held in her hands, tight enough to guarantee they would never escape but not so tight that their skin would break. Dirty water soaked into her socks and a headache began to pound from behind her eyes. There was not another cydonia in sight. Two would not be good enough for her mother, she needed all three if she wanted to return home. The air stunk of filth and salt from the sea, blue skies vanished between tall leaning wooden buildings, and at every moment there was loud clatter of people, of selling, and begging, and shouting, and warnings about the all-consuming fire.

Then, a flash of purple.

The woman chased after it, finding herself in a small shop. An old woman placed the cydonia on the table as she entered, the young woman close behind.

"Please, can I have the cydonia? I'll trade you anything for it?" The young woman pleaded.

The old woman studied her. "And why do you want it? You already have two."

"I need it. My mother, she wants three cydonias."

"Why?"

"Because I feed three cydonias to the wind-horses and so I must replace them," the young woman explained.

The old woman sat at the table and beckoned for the young woman to join her. "And why did you feed the cydonias to the wind-horses?"

The young woman was silent for a moment. "I don't know. Because I wanted to be free like them, I hoped they would invite me to join them."

"You are free. You're free to do anything at this moment," the old woman said.

"But I want to become the wind." It feel foolish, saying it aloud. The young woman stared at her feet.

The old woman took her hands, they were rough and callused at the fingertips. "I can tell you the secret to becoming the wind, but I want your silver necklace in exchange."

The young woman felt everything become aglow, as if she was truly living for the first time in her life. She hesitated. "But the necklace is important, it's the only thing my mother has given to me."

The old woman shook her head. "You can't be as free as the wind if you are still holding on."

And so, the woman removed her necklace and handed it the old woman, who leaned in the whisper the secrets of the wind and its horses.

The young woman returned home to the grasslands, where the sun beat down, the grasses waved in their eternal dance, and the fires had begun to spread. She called out to the wind-horses and offered her gift of two cydonias. They came with their familiar gusts of wind.

And when they galloped away into the endless cerulean sky, the young woman had vanished with them.