Wild longing filled Tai-shan to be able to respond to the daïcha’s words in kind. Just that morning, he recalled, before the arrival of the chon, he had managed to make himself understood to the aged firesmith and other two-foots in the square. But as he drew breath now to speak, his injured throat contracted hard. His neck felt wrenched. Half-stifled, he tossed his head, striving for air. A bitter disappointment filled him. The painful swelling would have to subside, he realized, before he could once more hope to replicate the daïcha’s gargled, clicking tongue.

Champing in frustration, he rose. The daïcha withdrew, slipping through the stall’s gate to rejoin her green-garbed assistants who clustered there. Restlessly, Tai-shan circled the little enclosure, his breathing labored. Why? The outraged question burned in him, unaskable. Why had the chon ordered his minions to attack when he, Tai-shan, plainly had offered their leader no harm, only sought to stand between him and the frail old female?

A stirring among the daïcha’s retinue made the dark unicorn turn. A male two-foot approached, bearing a steaming wooden hollow. His falseskin bore a decoration of purple and gold. With a brief bow to the daïcha and her followers, the purple-badged male began emptying the hollow’s contents into the stall’s feeding trough.

Moisture came to Tai-shan’s mouth as the savor of steamed grain, chopped fodder, and dark, sweet canesap reached him. His belly rumbled painfully. It had been nearly a day since he had eaten last. The daïcha stood looking on with a puzzled frown. All at once, her nose wrinkled. Hastily, she caught the forelimb of the purple-badged male. With one forepaw, she brought a dollop of the mash to her lips. Her eyes widened. She spoke sharply to the purple-clad two-foot.

He bowed his head respectfully but stood firm, refusing to be ordered off. Tai-shan heard the word chon pass his lips several times. The dark unicorn eyed the provender in his feeding trough suspiciously. Obviously it came from the two-foot ruler—yet no chon’s minion had ever brought his feed before. Did the chon intend this gift as a peace offering? If so, what could the daïcha’s objection be—that the ruler had not come himself to deliver it?

At last, the lady broke off. Angrily, she wrested the wooden hollow from the male and emptied the remainder of its contents into the trough, then thrust the hollow back into the other’s grasp before striding purposefully off, gesturing her companions to remain behind when they made to follow. Tai-shan heard her utter the word chon herself a number of times before she reached the shelter’s egress—as though she meant to seek him out that very moment.

Gingerly, the dark unicorn sampled the fare before him, grinding the water-swelled grain between his teeth, crushing the tart, chewy berries and crunching the nuts. They had used honey, he decided, as well as cane. The mash was delicious. Eagerly, he bent his head to the trough. Swallowing proved painful still, but he was almost too hungry to care. The barest hint of bitterness undershadowed the sweet.

“My lord Moonbrow!”

The unexpected voice of Ryhenna snapped the dark unicorn’s head around. A green-garbed two-foot proceeded down the aisle between stalls, leading the coppery mare on a tether.

“Ryhenna,” the dark unicorn whistled in surprise, able to manage his own, fluting language well enough, though his throat still felt raw. Never before had he seen her—or any da—within this shelter, though obviously it had housed more than a few before his arrival. “What brings you here?”

The young mare tossed her head, crowding up against the gate of the stall. Before her, the two-foots fell back.

“I and my sisters are to be housed with thee now, by the daïcha’s command,” she told him. Behind her, Tai-shan glimpsed her fellows being led into adjacent stalls. “O my lord,” Ryhenna murmured, eyeing the bruises and abrasions about his neck, “tell me what hath befallen thee. The rumors have been wild! Such rushing about among our keepers this morn—stablehands beaten, stalls searched. When thou camest not among us in the yard at noon, I knew not what to think.”

The dark unicorn shook his head and sighed. He had had no inkling what an uproar his absence from the palace would cause.

“I ventured into the city…,” he began.

“Into the city?” Ryhenna exclaimed. “Alone, before dawn? But the gate is barred, my lord.”

Tai-shan cocked his head. “I went over the wall, of course. How else?”

Was such not the way daya departed the palace grounds when no two-foots were about to unbar the gate? The coppery mare simply stared at him.

“Over the wall?” she whispered. “My lord, thou’rt divine—no mortal da might ever hope to clear a wall so high! And to wander alone through the City of Fire….” Her tone mingled admiration and dismay. “How fearless thou art! What wonders thou must have beheld—”

Frowning, the dark unicorn snorted. “Ryhenna,” he asked her, “have none of the daya here ever ventured forth into the city?”

“Never, lord!” the coppery mare exclaimed. “The city is forbidden to the sacred daya.”

Tai-shan gazed at her in astonishment. Beyond her, more of the mares with whom he sported daily in the yard were being led into stalls. They glanced at him shyly, gladly, but said nothing. The daïcha’s followers, even the one holding Ryhenna’s tether, stood off to one side now, murmuring quietly among themselves and watching him. The dark unicorn shook himself. The firewarmed enclosure felt suddenly very close and still.

“Aye, I saw many wonders in the city,” he told the coppery mare. The tightness in his throat was growing painful once more. “I met a peculiar kind of da, Ryhenna. One that called itself a gelding. It told me two-foots maimed it as a foal. I saw a firescar upon its flank and welts from blows across its back. I saw other daya cursed and beaten, encumbered to heavy loads by webbings of vine.”

The coppery mare nodded, shrugged. “To haul and carry for our keepers—such is the gelded commoners’ lot. Ours is a lighter service: sacred mares for brood and stallions for stud.”

The dark unicorn blinked. “Brood?” he echoed. “Stud?” He had heard the odd words somewhere before.

Ryhenna nickered. “The taking of mates and getting of young,” she laughed, “according to our keepers’ pleasure.”

Tai-shan stared at her, open-mouthed. “Are you saying the two-foots choose your mates for you?”

“Of course,” the coppery mare replied. “Did we choose one another? Nay, for what mare hath wisdom enough to choose her stud, nor any stallion his mares? Our keepers choose.”

“How do they dare?” the dark unicorn burst out hoarsely. “What gives them the right?”

Ryhenna drew back from him, surprised. “They have every right, my lord,” she replied. “Our lives belong to them. The keepers own us, Moonbrow.”

The dark unicorn shook his head, unable to believe his ears. His limbs had begun to feel strangely heavy and numb. An unpleasant warmth stole through him. The cloying taste of sweetmeal clung sticky to his mouth. He shook himself. The coppery mare fidgeted.

“What are you saying?” Tai-shan demanded of her. “Are the daya prisoners here? Do the two-foots hold you against your will?”

“Our will?” Ryhenna exclaimed. “Lord, we have no will. All daya must bow to the will of Dai’chon.”

“What is this…Dai’chon?” the dark unicorn began. He felt flushed suddenly, and very thirsty. The coppery mare seemed not to have heard him. Her voice grew distant.

“Dai’chon directeth us to serve our masters. Thus hath it been for time out of mind. We know no life other than this.”

Tai-shan turned toward the hollow of water that always hung filled and fresh beside the feeding trough in one corner of his stall. The scent of sweetmeal lingered in his nostrils, sickeningly sweet. The water in the hollow looked cool and inviting. Moving toward it, he stumbled. His own clumsiness amazed him.