shook his head, smiling. “You talk like an old book.”
“And you like a loose-leaf with pages missing,” she laughed, pushing him away. They momentarily held each other with their eyes. In the silence that followed, many things were left unsaid. Josh knew he would love her always. As a sister, a confidante; as one who shared his closeness to his other best friend, her husband. Rose, in turn, blessed her fortune, to love and be loved by two such as they. The world seemed a glorious place this day.
“I’d better be going,” said Josh, checking the sun. “Mother gets peevish if I’m gone too long.”
From down the road behind the trees came the sound of hoofbeats. They both heard the gallop at the same time. Rose’s face lit up like summer fire. “That’ll be him coming home now,” she grinned with unconcealed relief, and ran off down the path that led to the main road. Josh, too, smiled happily, for he recognized the familiar pace of his old friend’s approach. They would share a homecoming toast.
Joshua stepped out of the grove, walked along its neat edge to the road, and watched Rose running down to meet her returning love. “Beauty,” she called to him, “Beauty!”
He approached her at a canter, fifty yards away. By the time they reached each other, Rose was panting gaily. Beauty stopped, leaned down, and they embraced passionately for a long few seconds. “Beauty,” she whispered. He brought his mouth down on hers, and they kissed.
“I’ve missed you,” he told her when she finally let go. She put her hand up and stroked his short, golden beard, his smooth throat; brought her fingers gently down the curly yellow hairs of his broad, sun-browned chest. She missed his body next to hers.
“Climb up,” he said. “Josh is standing out there all alone, he looks like a lost puppy.”
She hiked up her dress, jumped up on his back, and he set off for Josh at a gallop. She loved riding him this way, bareback, her arms wrapped around his chest from behind, her knees pressed firmly about his flexing foreshoulders, her heels gripping his flanks, her face buried in his long, golden mane.
Joshua watched the two ride toward him – Rose straddling his good friend’s back – and he raised his hand in greeting, in affection, in admiration: Beauty was, had always been, the most graceful Centaur Joshua knew.
The three reclined on the grass in the smile of the noon sun, sipping apple wine. Rose lay with her head on Beauty’s side; his tail flicked away the occasional fly. They were talking and joking.
“I’ll bet you’ve completely forgotten how to shoot,” scolded Joshua.
Beauty smiled. “I haven’t drawn a bow since I started farming.”
“Give up this farm,” Josh shook his head. “You weren’t meant to be a farmer.”
Rose kicked lazily at Joshua. “You leave my Beauty alone, he’s a good farmer.”
“And a rich one, now,” Beauty laughed. “I sold every seed in Port Fresno.”
“And strong as a Horse,” Rose continued her thought, patting Beauty’s haunch with just the slightest trace of innuendo. Beauty brushed her face with a snap of his tail.
“Stronger by half than the puny animals you call Horses,” he snorted. “It is said that when the noble race of Centauri migrated to this continent from our own, long Before the Ice, the local Centaurs of this land were so shamed by comparison that they all donned dog-masks and were forever after known as Horses.”
Josh and Rose laughed. Beauty’s pride in his ancestry was well known to them – it was said by many that his great-great-great grandmother had been a leader in the heroic trek over the land bridge which had connected the continents Before the Ice. Sometimes pride in his heritage puffed the Centaur up a bit too much, though, and then he became a target for his friends’ gentle jesting.
“The first Centaur. Now you know, I’d always heard,” smirked Joshua, “that Horses were here first, that one day a Horse met a strumpet on the road…”
“Enough,” said Beauty balefully, “I know this joke.”
“And the strumpet said, ‘I’ve a grand treasure between my legs if you’ve the Horse sense to find it.’” Josh continued. Rose’s eyes twinkled.
“Enough, I say,” warned Beauty.
“So up her love-nest the Horse thrusts his head and when he’s up to the neck, what happens but he gets stuck…”
“Enough!” Beauty boiled. Josh and Rose did nothing to hide their glee. Above all, Beauty was a proper gentleman.
“Sometimes,” he continued, greatly put-upon, “you can be the most tasteless boor. I suppose you’re only Human, though, so I must make allowances.”
He couldn’t long stay angry with those he loved, though, soon relenting to their apologies and prods. And so, well into the cradle of the afternoon they sat, warmed by the sun and the company.
The yard was perched on the high slope of a gentle hill, and in the intermediate distance they gazed on the gray Pacific. Far, far away, near the almost invisible horizon, a small, triangular white sail could be seen.
“A boat alone,” said Josh. “Pirate?”
Beauty shook his head. “Too close in for a pirate ship. Probably the Port Fresno mail run.” He finished his wine.
“What’s the word in Port Fresno?” Josh asked. “Anything about the War? Any new Kings or Popes to worry about?” His tone was light, but he saw a shadow cross Beauty’s face.
“Nothing on the War, but there is something.” Beauty paused, gave Rose a sideways glance. “Bands of savages killing and pillaging all up and down the coast.” He paused again. “Vampires have been seen.”
Rose made a disgusted, loathing sound in her throat. Joshua tilted his head. “Hard to believe,” he said. “Never heard of Vampires coming this far north.”
Beauty shrugged. “That was the rumor.”
There was a long moment’s silence. The sun somehow looked lower in the sky now, the sky itself less joyous.
Josh rose. “Well, I’d best be gone, the day’s not waiting.” The thought of Vampires north of the Line was a chilling one; bleak news for the Human race. Was there no end to troubles on this earth? Josh wondered.
Rose stood and kissed him on the cheek. At that Beauty stood, too. “I will go with you,” he said.
“That had better be a joke,” Rose warned.
Beauty raised his hands in apology. “I have to go give Moorelli his seed money. I should have dropped it off on the way in, but I hated the thought of keeping you waiting.”
She looked skeptical.
“It is a two-hour trot,” he protested, “I’ll be back before the day is cool.” And then, as her frown softened to a pout, he continued, “Cool enough to warm you up, woman.” He bent down, kissed her quick, and grabbed a handful of her bottom. He was rarely so demonstrative in public, but then, Joshua was hardly public.
