| Well, someone’s jumpy, Zohar thought, eyeing the boy’s dagger as she moved closer to the fence. It was not a judgemental consideration, but more of a sympathetic one. The months Zohar had spent with her sister Mohana training to be a librarian at the Conservatory had taught her always to keep a wary eye cast over her shoulder. While she’d been there, she’d sometimes wished she was a horse, so she could see both backwards and forwards at the same time. Once the other students had realised Zohar was a magic-user, she’d quickly learned never to turn her back on any of them. The faculty had done nothing to support her when she’d been tripped or had her possessions stolen, and any time someone turned a match to her books, she was blamed. Well, the unsmiling professors had told her, what do you expect? Fire is dangerous.
Shaman, at least, had taken the edge out of life. Magic was common and no one who used it was discriminated against. Zohar hadn’t been attacked once since she was here. She smiled reassuringly at the young man, rubbing his horse’s shoulder.
“He’s so handsome.” Zohar answered, preferring not to get into a disagreement over which horse was the best in the world with someone who was very quick to draw their weapon. “That’s Tempest,” she turned to gesture at her irascible pegasus, who was browsing the forest floor nearby with his back turned pointedly towards them, “and I’m Zohar.”
She drew back a little from the fence as the young man scaled it, hopping over onto the other side to connect with Hero. It was very evident that not only had she and Tempest ruined the moment, but they were also intruding on what was clearly some very personal time. Zohar may have written abysmal essays, might struggle with and detest reading and may have flunked out of the Conservatory as a result, but what she lacked in academic smarts she made up for with emotional intelligence. Zohar had always been the one who waited and watched her sister, keeping an eye on Mohana’s subtle movements in order to establish how her twin wanted them to mutually conduct themselves. Reading a situation was the one thing she had always done better than Mohana.
That and magic, obviously.
“Well,” Zohar dipped her hands in her pockets and shrugged as the boy climbed atop his horse, “it was nice to meet you both.”
She took a couple of steps backwards and turned towards Tempest, just as he verbalised his thoughts. Her hand resting on Tempest’s flank, Zohar frowned slightly, ticking the words over a couple of times in her head. She glanced back over her shoulder, looking a little wary for the first time.
“Can you read my mind?” She demanded.
Zohar
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