The Sword-Edged blonde by Alex Bledsoe Page A

to the Arentian border, where I made camp. That night I stared up at the stars and imagined a wide-eyed horse tumbling out of the sky, its hooves pumping madly as it plummeted toward the ground. I looked over at my stolid, arrogant horse, tied to a low tree branch. The absurdity of the idea made me smile.
    If you wanted to say anything was possible, it
was
conceivable that Rhiannon had fallen from the sky in the shape of a horse and then transformed into a beautiful woman. And I guess it was also conceivable that the fall could’ve knocked her memories from her head. But none of that explained how a horse got up in the sky in the first place. Or why Queen Rhiannon was the spitting image of Epona Gray, the Queen of Horses.
    Hell
, I chastised myself,
don’t be catty about it. Queen Rhiannon
is
Epona Gray
.
    Epona Gray, and Cathy Dumont, and Stan Carnahan and the mysterious Andrew Reese. I hadn’t thought of those names in over ten years. It was from a time in my life when I made foolish alliances far too quickly, and often found myself stuck with obligations I couldn’t fulfill. I’d learned a lot since then.
    They say too much introspection is as bad for you as too much drink. The folks who say this spend a lot of time introspecting, so I guess they’d know.
Forced
introspection can be even worse, because no one is ever compelled to contemplate the good things in their past. You look to history to avoid the same mistakes, not repeat the same joys. That’s why defeats are clearer than victories, funerals more vivid than weddings.
    I hated my past. Yet in it was my only clue to the disappearance of Phil’s son. The resemblance between Rhiannon and Epona Gray was too striking to be mere coincidence. But how had a woman who’d been dying when last I saw her traveled all this way, in both time and distance, to emerge as the sun-infused beauty I met in that tower?
    The trail to Epona Gray stretched back thirteen years, almost as far as the one to Phil and Janet. I seldom thought about that time in my life, but now I had to retrace not just my footsteps but my memories and feelings. Something, some miscellaneous detail,
had
to provide the connection. And if I knew why Epona had become Rhiannon—never mind
how
—I might know why someone hated her.
    So by day I headed toward Cazenovia, eventually crossed the bridge at Poy Sippi, and traveled throughthe dense forests to the hidden place that, long ago, had sheltered Epona Gray. And each night, I gave my thoughts renewed access to those days as well, hoping that some vital clue might shake loose from the memories. The past washed over me like the flood that hit Neceda, leaving behind the debris of pain, failure and death.
     
    T HAT FIRST NIGHT on the trail, my thoughts returned to the other time I’d skulked out of Arentia, after Janet’s death. I’d been sixteen, and sure of absolutely nothing except that I never wanted to see anyone I knew ever again—not my parents, not my friends, especially not Phil. As soon as my injuries had healed enough for me to travel, I caught a ride with a flannel merchant heading for the border, and spent the next three months drunk off my ass, fighting and whoring my way as far as my money took me. I wasn’t trying to burn Janet’s memory from my mind, or seeking death so I could be with her. I was creating a new Eddie LaCrosse, one who’d never been rich or brave or happy. Eddie version two was mean, selfish and took no shit from anyone.
    Finally, several months into my transformation, I awoke in some strange girl’s bed, broke and bruised and monumentally hung over. When the girl started screaming for her money, I smacked her, and knew I’d achieved what I wanted. I’d reached a point where no one else existed for me, where my own brutality was simply the way I operated. I was a bully and a jackass, and people better stay out of my way.
    Even a jackass needs a job, though, and what betterone than signing up for someone else’s