Flight of the Five Swans

Feathered Chapter 23

Raia heard Thaleia's warning honk alerting them to the presence of danger only a split second before the sound of cantering hooves echoed on the path behind them. Though the cadence told her that it was but a single horseman approaching, Raia's heart clenched with fear at the thought that one of Soran's men had at last caught up to them. It was the moment that Raia had been dreading. As she had feared, her sisters had taken up defensive positions at the sound of Thaleia's signal, circling together and hissing as they had been doing for the last week or so. Raia would have no time to herd her sisters into the underbrush before the cantering horseman was upon them.

She was ducking into the shadows herself when she realized an even greater danger: her sisters were standing in the very center of the path. 'They'll be trampled!' she realized in horror.

Raia had but a moment to act. She leaped out of the shadows and back onto the forest path, placing herself in front of her swan sisters just as a huge gray horse cantered around the curve with his rider. Raia threw her arms open wide to block as much of the path—and her sisters—as she could. She heard the startled shout of the rider and the frightened whinny of his horse, and she scrunched her eyes shut tightly, bracing herself for what seemed to her an inevitable impact.

The impact never came.

Raia opened one eye slightly, peeking out from under her eyelashes at the horseman. She let out a silent sigh of relief. The rider had managed to stop his horse mere inches from where Raia stood, and he was now trying to calm his mount. As the stallion reared in protest, Raia felt a small, unwilling pang of guilt for startling the animal so thoroughly.

"Easy, boy!" The rider soothed, his deep voice far gentler than Raia had expected to hear. "Easy!"

Raia's immediate instinct was to take advantage of the horseman's distraction and make her escape unnoticed. She lowered her arms and glanced around for somewhere to run. Then she hesitated, looking over her shoulder at where her swan sisters were still bunched together in their defensive circle. Her heart sank. Though she might make it alone, she would never be able to outrun the horseman with her sisters in toe. And she couldn't—wouldn't—leave without her sisters.

Raia turned to look once more at the horse and his rider, her eyes as cold as blocks of ice. She vowed silently not to make it easy for the man to return her to Soran. She flexed her fingers, preparing to scratch them deeply into the man's face as soon as he tried to grab her. She glanced quickly again at the group of swans, mentally willing them to help her attack as soon as the time was right.

'Bite him!' she thought fiercely, desperately hoping beyond hope that somehow, someway, one of her sisters at least would be able to read her thoughts and come to her aid should she require help.

The rider had regained control of his mount and had turned his attention to Raia.

"Well now!" he said, his voice soft and even, as though Raia had not just appeared from nowhere and startled his horse half to death. "You're not what I expected to see, I can tell you that much."

Raia straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin proudly. She flexed her fingers once more, hiding the action behind the cover of her skirts.

'Aim for the eyes,' she thought to herself, and felt a slight twinge of guilt at her sudden bloodthirstiness. Thaleia would be proud, she knew.

The man made no move to dismount, or even to approach closer to Raia and her swan sisters. He patted his horse on the neck affectionately. "Here I thought Undertow and I were the only ones to ever use this path. But it seems I was wrong. It wouldn't be the first time, I suppose—or the last."