Elphame's Choice. P.C. Cast

reigns. “Or I shall leave you at the temple next trip.”

      The Goddess didn’t dignify the comment with so much as a snort. Etain ignored the mare who was now ignoring her, and muttered something about grumpy old creatures, but not loud enough for the mare to hear. Then she squinted her eyes and held her hand up to block the setting sun from interfering with her view.

      Her daughter was running with a speed that caused her lower body to blur, so that it appeared that she flew above the brilliant green shoots of new wheat. She ran bent forward slightly at the waist, with a grace that always amazed her mother.

      “She is the prefect blending of centaur and human,” Etain whispered to the mare, who swiveled her ears to catch the words. “Goddess, you are so wise.”

      Elphame had completed the long loop in her imaginary track, and she was beginning to turn toward the grove in which her mother waited. The setting sun framed her running body, catching the girl’s dark auburn hair on fire. It glowed and snapped around her in long, heavy strands.

      “She certainly didn’t get that lovely straight hair from me,” Etain told the mare as she tried to tuck one of her ever-escaping curls behind her ear. The mare cocked an ear back attentively. “The red lights that streak her hair, yes, but the rest of it she can thank her father for.” She could also thank him for the color of those amazingly dark eyes. The shape was hers—large and round, resting above high delicate cheekbones that were also copies of her mother’s, but where Etain’s eyes were mossy green, her daughter’s eyes were the entrancing sable of her centaur father’s. Even if Elphame’s physical form hadn’t been completely unique, her beauty would have been unusual—coupled with a body that only the Goddess could have created, the effect was breathtaking.

      Elphame’s pace began to slow, and she changed direction so that she was heading directly for the stand of trees in which her mother and the mare waited.

      “We should make ourselves known so that she doesn’t think we were lurking around in the shadows watching her.”

      They emerged from the tree line, and Etain saw her daughter’s head snap in their direction in an instinctively defensive gesture, but almost immediately Elphame recognized them and raised her arm to wave hello at the same time the mare trumpeted a shrill greeting.

      “Mama!” Elphame called happily. “Why don’t you two join me for my cooldown?”

      “Of course, my darling,” Etain shouted back. “But slowly, you know the mare is getting old and—”

      Before she could finish the sentence the “old mare” in question sprang forward and caught up with the young woman, where she pranced spryly sideways before easily matching her gentle canter with Elphame’s gait.

      “The two of you will never be old, Mama.” Elphame laughed.

      “She’s just a putting on a show for you,” Etain told her daughter, but she reached down and affectionately ruffled the mare’s silky mane.

      “Oh, Mama, please. She’s putting on a show…” Elphame let the sentence trail suggestively off as she quirked her eyebrow and gave her mother a knowing look that took in her glittering jewelry and the seductive wrap of her buttery leather riding outfit that fitted snuggly over her still shapely body.

      “El, you know wearing jewelry is a spiritual experience for me,” she said in her Beloved of the Goddess voice.

      “I know, Mama.” Elphame grinned.

      The mare’s snort was decidedly sarcastic, and Etain’s laughter mingled with her daughter’s as they continued compatibly around the field.

      “Where did I leave my wrap?” Elphame muttered half to her mother, half to herself as she searched the edge of the tree line. “I thought I put it on this log.”

      Etain watched her daughter scramble over a fallen limb as she searched for the rest of her clothing. She wore only a sleeveless leather top, which was wrapped tightly around her full breasts, and a small strip of linen that hugged her muscular buttocks, and was cut high up on her hips, before it dipped down to a triangle to cover her in the front. Etain had designed it herself.

      The problem was that although the girl’s muscular body was covered with a sleek coat of horsehair from the waist down, and she had hooves instead of feet, except for the extraordinary muscles in her lower body she was otherwise built very much like a human female. So she needed a garment that would allow her the freedom to exercise the inhuman speed with which she had been gifted, as well as keep her decently covered. Etain and her daughter had experimented with many different styles before happening upon one that successfully accomplished both needs.

      The result had worked well, except that it left so much of Elphame’s body visible. It mattered little that the women of Partholon had always been free to proudly display their bodies. Etain regularly bared her breasts during blessing rituals to signify Epona’s love of the female form. When Elphame uncovered her hoofed legs, people stared in outright shock and awe at the sight of the Chosen’s so obviously Goddess-touched body.

      Elphame loathed being the recipient of the stares.

      So it had become habit for Elphame to dress conservatively in public, only shedding her flowing robes when she ran, which was almost always alone and well away from the temple.

      “Oh, I found it!” El cried, and trotted over to a log not far from where they stood.

      She picked up the length of fine linen that had been dyed the color of emeralds and began winding it around her slim waist. Her breathing had already returned to normal; the fine sheen of sweat that had caused the downy hair on her bare arms to glisten had already dried.

      She was in spectacular shape. Her body was sleek, athletic and perfectly honed, but there was nothing harsh or masculine about its casing. Her lovely brown skin looked silky and seductively touchable; it was only after actually touching her that the finely wrapped strength of the muscles beneath the skin could be fully realized.

      But few people dared to touch the young goddess.

      She was tall, towering several inches over her mother’s five-foot-seven-inch frame. During early puberty she had been thin and a little awkward, but soon the curves and fullness of womanhood had replaced that coltishness. Her lower body was a perfect mixture of human and centaur. She had the beauty and allure of a woman, and the strength and grace of a centaur.

      Etain smiled at her daughter. As from the moment of her birth, she had embraced Elphame’s uniqueness with a fierce, protective love. “You don’t have to wear that wrap, El.” She hadn’t realized she had spoken her thought aloud until her daughter looked quickly up at her.

      “I know you do not think I need to.” Her voice, usually so like her mother’s, suddenly hardened with suppressed emotion. “But I have to. It is not the same for me. They do not look upon me as they do you.”

      “Has someone said something to hurt you? Tell me who it is and he will know the wrath of a goddess!” Green fire flashed in Etain’s eyes.

      Elphame’s voice lost all expression as she answered her mother. “They do not need to say anything, Mama.”

      “Precious one—” the anger melted from Etain’s eyes “—you know the people love you.”

      “No, Mama.” She held up her hand to stop her mother from interrupting. “They love you. They idolize and worship me. It is not the same thing.”

      “Of course they worship you, El. You are the eldest daughter of the Beloved of Epona, and you have been blessed by the Goddess in a very special way. They should worship you.”

      The mare moved forward until her muzzle lipped the young woman’s shoulder. Before she answered, El reached around the mare’s head to stroke her gleaming neck.

      She looked up at her mother and said with a conviction that made her sound older than her years, “I am different. And no matter how badly you want to believe that I fit in, it’s just not the same