would never venture, in the neglected field that was the demesne of the blue dun stud.

The stallion that was a killer, that hated everything alive. Mad creature that he was, the horse disdained to step on cats. Trionn basked, protected, under a warmth of beasts and autumn sunlight. No one would look for anyone here, far less the most

 tongue-tied of Silverdown's kitchen staff.'There he is!' someone shouted.

     Trionn started in alarm. The cat on his back was dislodged onto the turf where, with arched spine and crooked tail, it glared at him in feline displeasure. Had apprehension not held Trionn rooted, he might have laughed at its injured dignity. But the voice that had raised the outcry was the new Lord's own, and for any man of highborn stature to go beating the fields for a scullion bespoke worse than a cook's irritation.

    Trionn levered himself up on one elbow and peered over the grass tips. He dared not spring to his feet, whatever the Lord's displeasure; did he rise, the cats might leave, and the vicious dun would take note that a man had invaded his turf. His ears would flatten, and his nostrils flare warning, just before he thundered into a charge.

    Fear of the stud saved Trionn an embarrassment, since the Lord intended a different errand altogether. He was leaning on the fence in his velvets. Combed blond hair tousled in the wind as he conferred with a balding companion, less finely dressed, a leathery appearance to him that bespoke hard living. Both men watched the horse, which spied them and bowed up his neck. He blew a snort in challenge, his nostrils a flash of scarlet linings against the seal black of his muzzle. Then he flagged his tangled tail, struck once at the air, and galloped.

    Trionn flattened himself against ground that shook to the impact of hooves. His peril promptly compounded as the stud's rampage upset the cats, who bounded away through the grass. Caught in the open, he risked getting trampled to a pulp. The sick fear inside him no longer for the pig, he crawled on his belly toward the fence. He escaped under the bottom rail, just barely, but his troubles did not end outside the pasture. Silverdown had never been kept like a manor, until now, when even the weeds that flowered in the hedgerows were unwelcome. The new Lord had ranted and waved his whip and found fault until servants set

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