Across the Green Grass Fields (Wayward Children, #6)(21)
It was rare to run into two unfamiliar concepts in one conversation anymore; they’d had long enough to talk about whatever came to mind that they seemed to have covered every subject two clever, eager little girls could cover. Regan blinked, leaning farther back, trying to find her way to the answer. Finally, she said, “A stranger in a red coat breaks into your house and leaves toys and puts walnuts and candy in your socks.”
“Oh. I guess we don’t have Christmas here because we don’t wear socks.”
“It’s hard to put candy in a horseshoe,” said Regan solemnly, and Chicory giggled, and everything was normal again, at least for a while.
Then, on the horizon, the shape of the Fair appeared. The tops of the tents were first, striped in bright colors and bedecked with flags and banners. They grew taller as the herd approached, looming more than twice the height of the tallest centaurs, and the structures around them began to materialize. There were smaller tents, wooden constructs that looked somewhere between temporary and permanent, and there were people. Centaurs like the ones Regan knew. More delicate centaurs with the lower bodies of graceful deer and the spreading antlers to match. Satyrs and fauns and minotaurs and bipeds with human torsos but equine legs and haunches, like centaurs that had been clipped neatly in half. It was a wider variety of hooved humanity than Regan could have imagined. She sat up straighter, gripping Chicory’s waist, and stared.
The herd continued at the same pace, neither slowing nor speeding up. When they reached the wide woven archway marking the entrance to the Fair, Pansy waved them to a stop and turned her attention on the girls. “Be careful,” she said in a low tone. “Don’t start anything you’re not certain you’ll be able to finish. Chicory, if anyone makes a grab for Regan, you run.”
Chicory nodded, suddenly solemn. Regan tightened her grip around the centaur girl’s waist, holding on as if she feared someone was going to snatch her off at any moment. Pansy nodded, face splitting in a wide grin.
“All right, kids, go and have fun!” she said. “The Fair belongs to you today!” She leaned over and slapped Chicory on the flank, startling the girl into leaping forward, crossing the boundary line into the Fair itself.
The whispers and pointing started immediately, as everyone who saw them stopped to stare at Regan. Some of them looked startled, some amazed, and a small few looked almost enraged, like they were looking at something obscene. One of the deer-centaurs started to cry, clapping her hands over her mouth.
“They’re just not used to how ugly you are yet,” said Chicory. “Once they get used to looking at your weird face, they won’t stare like that.”
Regan snorted, discomfort melting away in the face of familiar teasing. “You better be nice to me, or I won’t help you with your hooves anymore.”
“Will so.”
“Why?”
“Because you love me too much to let me split my hooves when you don’t have to.” Chicory trotted on, angling toward the delicious smells filling the air. “We can get roast nuts and baked apples and fish pies in the market square. Real good food, not that mush Rose and Daisy like to serve.”
Regan, who would have been willing to commit crimes for Oreos, made a noncommittal noise. Chicory laughed and kept going, ignoring the murmurs of the crowd behind them, some of whom had started to move closer before she started moving away.
“Why are they so surprised?” asked Regan. “None of you were this surprised.”
“Oh, we were. We just knew better than to show it. Pansy found you because you were meant to be with us—humans always wind up where they’re supposed to be, and that made you ours. And we didn’t want to scare you off. Even I know how important it is for a herd to have the honor of hosting a human. We’ll be remembered for centuries after you do whatever it is you’ve come here to do. You’ll save the Queen or change the world, and our descendants will be honored for things they had nothing to do with. I know the aunts are going courting, and it’s because you’re here.”
“Me? I thought it was because your mother said you needed a playmate.”
Chicory snorted. “It takes a year to have a foal, and they’re useless when they’re born. Even worse than unicorn babies. I won’t play with anyone who comes out of this courtship for a long, long time. Mama didn’t want another foal until I was old enough to work with the rest of the herd, and no one else could afford to go courting. Our flock does pretty well, but not that well.”
Regan was starting to realize that even what little she’d thought she understood about centaur relationships was wrong. She shook her head, trying to find the words she needed to unsnarl a confusing knot that was only getting worse the longer she let it stay tied. Finally, in a strangled voice, she asked, “They’re paying for boyfriends?”
“Is a boyfriend like a husband?”
“Yes.”
“Then yes.”
“But that’s…”
“How else is the stallion supposed to know the foals will be cared for? You have to show you can support the baby you’re hoping to have before you can go about getting one. And since it’s the mare who walks away with the foal, it’s only fair the stallion should get something out of the deal. So Mama and the aunts and anyone else interested in courting go to see the stallions, and some of them will come back with foals, and some won’t.”