The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [316]
“A mark of the breed,” Wylie replied, pushing open the door that led to the main stable. “They are the most amiable of horses, though a gentle disposition does not impair their intelligence, I do assure you. This way, Mrs. Fraser.”
By contrast with the brilliant day outside, it was pitch-dark in the stable; so dark that I stumbled over an uneven brick in the floor, and Mr. Wylie seized my arm as I lurched forward with a startled cry.
“Are you all right, Mrs. Fraser?” he asked, setting me upright again.
“Yes,” I said, a little breathless. In fact I had both stubbed my toe viciously and turned my ankle; my new morocco-heeled shoes were lovely, but I wasn’t used to them yet. “Just let me stand a moment—’til my eyes adjust.”
He did, but he didn’t let go of my arm. Instead, he pulled my hand through the crook of his elbow and set it solidly, to give me more support.
“Lean on me,” he said, simply.
I did, and we stood quietly for a moment, me with my injured foot drawn up like a heron’s, waiting for my toes to stop throbbing. For once, Mr. Wylie seemed bereft of quips and sallies; perhaps because of the peaceful atmosphere.
Stables on the whole are peaceful, horses and the people who tend them being generally kindly sorts of creatures. This one, though, had a special air, both quiet and vibrant. I could hear small rustlings and stampings, and the contented noise of a horse champing hay close at hand.
So close to Phillip Wylie, I was aware of his perfume, but even the expensive whiff of musk and bergamot was overcome by the stable smells. It smelled of fresh straw and grain, of brick and wood, but there was a faint scent as well of more elemental things—manure and blood and milk; the basic elements of motherhood.
“It’s rather womblike in here, isn’t it?” I said softly. “So warm and dark, I mean. I can almost feel the heartbeat.”
Wylie laughed, but quietly.
“That’s mine,” he said. He touched a hand briefly to his waistcoat, a dark shadow against the pale satin.
My eyes adapted quickly to the dark, but even so, the place was very dim. The lithe shadow-shape of a stable cat glided past, making me wobble and set down my injured foot. It wouldn’t yet bear weight, but I could at least put it to the floor.
“Can you stand for a moment alone?” Wylie asked.
Without waiting for my reply, he detached himself and went to light a lantern that stood on a nearby stool. There were a few faint chinks of flint and steel, then the wick caught and a soft globe of yellow light ballooned around us. Taking my arm again with his free hand, he led me toward the far end of the stable.
They were in the loose-box at the end. Phillip raised the lantern high, turning to smile at me as he did so. The lantern light gleamed on hide that shone and rippled like midnight water, and glowed in the huge brown eyes of the mare as she turned toward us.
“Oh,” I said softly, “how beautiful,” and then, a little louder, “Oh!” The mare had moved a little, and her foal peered out from behind her mother’s legs. She was long-legged and knob-kneed, her tiny rump and sloping shoulders rounded echoes of her mother’s muscular perfection. She had the same large, kind eyes, fringed with long, long lashes—but instead of the sleek hide of rippling black, she was a dark reddish-brown and fuzzy as a rabbit, with an absurd little whisk broom of a tail.
Her dam had the same glorious profusion of flowing mane I had noted on the Friesians in the paddock; the baby had a ridiculous crest of stiff hair, about an inch long, that stuck straight up like a toothbrush.
The foal blinked once, dazzled by the light, then ducked swiftly behind the shelter of her mother’s body. A moment later, a small nose protruded cautiously into sight, nostrils twitching. A big eye followed, blinked—and the nose vanished, only to reappear almost instantly, a little further this time.
“Why, you little