Dark Prince by David Gemmell

you?”
    “Age, my boy,” answered the Theban, controlling his temper. “But if you don’t want to talk to me, I won’t press you. I will see you this evening.”
    Mothac found his anger growing as he walked from the house and up the long hill to the western pasture. For more than thirty years he had served Parmenion as both servant and friend, but these last five years had seen the Spartan become more distant, more secretive. He had warned himagainst marrying Phaedra. At seventeen the child was too young even for the ever-youthful Spartan, and there was something about her … a coldness that radiated from her eyes. Mothac remembered, with an affection born of hindsight, Parmenion’s Theban lover—the former whore, Thetis. Now there was a woman! Strong, confident, loving! But, like his own beloved Elea, she was dead.
    He paused at the brow of the hill, watching the workers clear the dung from the first pasture. It was not a task his Thessalians enjoyed, but it helped control the worms that infested the horses. While grazing, a horse would eat the worm larvae in the grass. They would breed in the stomach and develop into egg-laying worms, the new eggs being passed in the droppings. After a while all pastures would be contaminated, causing stunted growth or even death among the young foals. Mothac had learned this two years before from a Persian horse trader and ever since had ordered his men to clear the pastures daily.
    At first the Thessalians had been hard to convince. Superb horsemen, they did not take well to such menial tasks. But when the worm infestations were seen to fade and the foals grew stronger, the tribesmen had taken to the work with a vengeance. Strangely, it also helped to make Mothac more popular among them. They had found it hard to work for a man who rarely rode and, when he did, displayed none of the talents for horsemanship so prized among their people. But Mothac’s skills lay in training and rearing, healing wounds and curing diseases. For these talents the riders grew to respect him, viewing even his irascible nature with fondness.
    Mothac wandered on to the training field where young horses learned to follow the subtle signals of a rider, cutting left and right, darting into the charge, swerving and coming to a dead halt to allow the rider to release an arrow.
    This was work the horsemen loved. In the evenings they would sit around communal campfires discussing the merits of each horse, arguing long into the night.
    The training was being concluded when Mothac approached the field. The youngster, Orsin, was taking a two-year-oldblack mare over the jumps. Mothac leaned on a fence post and watched. Orsin had rare talent, even among Thessalians, and he sailed the mare over each jump, turning her smoothly to face the next. Seeing Mothac, he waved and vaulted from the mare’s back.
    “Ola
, master!” he called. “You wish to ride?”
    “Not today, boy. How are they faring?”
    The youngster ran to the fence and clambered over it. On the ground the boy was ungainly to the point of clumsiness. “There will be six of the stallions to geld, master. They are too high-spirited.”
    “Give their names to Croni. When will the new pasture be ready?”
    “Tomorrow. Croni says the lord is home. How did the stallion behave in battle?”
    “I have not had time to ask him. But I will. There is a Persian trader due in the next few days. He seeks five stallions—the best we have. He is due to come to me at the house, but I don’t doubt he will ride out to check the horses before announcing himself. Watch out for him. I do not want him to see the new Thracian stock, so take them to the high fields.”
    “Yes, master. But what of Titan? There is a horse even I would be glad to see the back of.”
    “He stays,” said Mothac. “The lord Parmenion likes him.”
    “He is evil, that one. He will see his rider dead, I think.”
    “The lord Parmenion has a way with horses.”
    “Aya! I would like to