The Black Beast Read Online Free PDF

she accepted sun and rain.
    â€œWe have seen a strange beast,” Tirell told her, “black, like a horse, but with a horn and wings. Do you know anything of it?”
    â€œIt lives in the grove and peers from between the trees,” Mylitta answered in a soft, rhythmic voice almost like a chant. “There is no harm to it, as far as I know.”
    â€œNo creature would harm you,” Tirell said, “but it seemed eager to harm me.”
    â€œI will speak to it,” the girl said.
    Tirell nodded and touched her brown hand; he could not have meant more in a hundred gallant posturings. “Till tonight, then, all peace,” he said softly. We rode away together.
    â€œShe is a child of the goddess,” I said when we had topped the slope.
    Tirell turned to me with a rare smile. “I am glad you like her.”
    â€œI do, I like her very much. But liking is the least of it. I mean she is a very daughter of Eala who is Vale. Are her folk anything like her?”
    â€œNo, they are ordinary peasants, flattered and frightened of me. Mylitta comes and goes as she will, and pays them little heed.”
    â€œAnd what will she do about the black beast?”
    â€œI don’t know!” Tirell shrugged, half laughing at himself. “All I know is that the birds sing before her without fear and the butterflies light on her hands.” He gave a sudden whoop and sent his horse leaping forward, leaving me in his dust.
    â€œThat’s not fair!” I shouted, urging my plunging chestnut after him. We raced along, but the chestnut galloped as if the air were water, and the white kept the lead all the way to Melior. Tirell was laughing, a sweet, ringing laugh from his heart with not a bit of scorn in it; I smiled just hearing him. Tears lay on his cheeks as we pulled up by the castle gates. It was to be a long year before I knew such laughter or such tears from him again.
    We came to order and entered the courtyard at a seemly pace. But we had no sooner sent the horses to stable than a servant approached us. “The King sends for you, Prince Tirell,” he said, bowing low. “All day he has awaited your return.”
    â€œMighty Morrghu!” Tirell muttered in dismay. Rarely did the King wish to see him, and it was very ill luck that the notion had taken him on this day, when we had been absent so long. He was likely to be in one of his cold passions from waiting.
    â€œShould I wash, think you?” Tirell asked me distractedly.
    â€œIt would take too long. You had better go straight away, before it gets any worse,” I decided. “I’ll come.”
    â€œHe did not send for you!” Tirell protested.
    â€œHe never does! And he will take no notice, you know that. Come on.”
    â€œBut it makes him angry, just the same—”
    â€œWhy? Who should have a better right to come before the King than his own son?” I argued perversely. “I am his son too, am I not?”
    Tirell seemed to have no answer. “Well, come on, then,” he muttered, and we set off toward the audience chamber. I had no good reason for wanting to go along, risking the King’s wrath at such a bad time. I just wanted, like a young fool, to see what was afoot.
    Servants and courtiers stood clustered by the great carved doors, frightened and fascinated, like birds around a snake. They scattered before us, and we strode past and entered. I felt my step falter in surprise. Mother was sitting beside the King on her gilded chair that was scarcely less ornate than the throne. Rich hangings set the royal couple off on all sides: Adalis plucking her three apples, the white horse Epona, Eala and the dragon. Vieyra stared down from the wall behind Abas, holding the lotus emblem of Vale. He sat before her on a high throne with bodiless metal heads staring from the arms. More heads, twenty of them, stared from his huge circular brooch, the perquisite of his sacred office and