Leafia’s POV

  It felt good to finally be sitting but as soon as we started moving my light headedness caught back up with me, making the task of staying on the horse harder than it already was going to be. The horse seemed to know that I cked confidence in riding with only my left hand. She was being willful and not listening to commands. The only saving grace was the Mist was even worse off than me. I could not help sighing for relief when we had to stop riding after just a few minutes.

  Much to Emily’s disappointment, Michael had almost no experience riding horses and trying to ride double with Mist did not work out. Mist was over excited by everything she was seeing and would not sit still on the horse. After three times of needing to be righted in barely any more minutes than that, Laurel made Mist switch horses before anyone got hurt. Because of that, Mist was riding double with Gray but even he was having a hard time keeping the horse under the two of them.

  Istan had proposed the idea of riding double with Mist, but after seeing the obvious anticipation on his face Laurel refused to let him ride with Mist. I heard her say something along the lines of “I do not want to be accused of stealing her husband again,” but I did not have the concentration to spare. The horse was taking all my effort.

  With three more people in our company we were short a horse even with Mist riding double and Laurel walking. In the end Istan and Michael took turns walking and riding what had been Istan’s horse. Neither of them were able to keep up with the horses the whole time but the switching helped. It was a little humorous to watch Michael as he started his turn walking. He tried to keep up with Laurel as she casually walked next to the horses. It reminded me of the first day I had met her. Trying to follow a forest spirit through the woods was now on my list of things to avoid if at all possible.

  Laurel had volunteered to walk so that Faun could ride Laurel’s horse by herself. One of the only things that kept me moving this morning as we were tearing down camp is that I was still more helpful than Faun or Mist. Mist couldn’t stand independently for any length of time, still. Faun was restless, but after the exertion of yesterday’s escape, her strength only allowed her brief spurts of wandering around camp before she had to take a break. I had to think she over exerted herself st night with all she did around the camp. I was going to suggest then that someone needed to ride double with Faun. But after being helped up on the horse by Laurel, Faun made a few soft sounds to the animal and it started gliding down the road perfectly while Faun’s hand never touched the leads. I guess riding a horse is easier when you can actually talk to them. I had to think it had something to do with the rider because that horse had never behaved quite so well for Laurel.

  I wish my horse was even a quarter as obedient as Faun’s was being. Any pride I had felt this morning about being useful had vanished as we continued down the road. After a few hours of riding I was at the end of my limit. The horse must have realized that I was feeling weak and would often try to wander into the verge for a snack. I felt light headed to the point that even staying upright in the saddle was hard work. Steering the horse was not even on my mind anymore.

  After coaxing my horse back onto the path for the 100th time, I could feel myself start to lean precariously to the side. I reached out to grab the reins or harness or something. But there was no arm to grab them. Just as I was resigning myself to a painful fall, strong hands caught my side and helped me right myself. I looked over to see Michael standing next to my horse. I muttered a “thank you,” as I felt my face slightly color. Though judging how pale my reflection looked in the water this morning I had to think that there was still no color showing up. Or was it showing up even clearer since I had no color to hide it?

  He just gave me a small nod but continued walking by the side of my horse. After only a minute he took the reins for me and started leading the horse. This freed up my hand to let me hold the pommel. This did help but I was still beyond tired. I had none of the strength that I used to have. I wanted to stop but I was not supposed to be the weak one. I could not even discreetly ask Laurel for a break since she was answering Mists non-stop questions much to the relief of Gray.

  “Can we please stop for a break soon?” I heard Michaels voice call out from just a few feet in front of me. “Istan and I are both getting tired from walking and could use a rest.”

  I looked over to Istan and saw that he was about to refute but there was some unspoken communication between the two before Istan said, “If we don’t take a break soon I think we might colpse.”

  It was obvious to me that Michael was making the party stop for my sake, but why was he covering for me? I did not understand but I was grateful. Laurel quickly agreed with Michael’s suggestion and he led my horse into a grassy field on the side of the road. I barely waited for the horse to come to a stop before I swung my foot over to dismount, but that did not go well. I want to say that Michael helped me off the horse but in all honesty I would have just fallen to the ground if he did not pick me off the horse.

  Someone besides Michael must have seen my struggling and took pity on me, because It was decided that we would take this time to make lunch since it was only an hour before we would have normally stopped for lunch. I wanted to be angry that I was holding everyone else up but I was too tired to use any of my strength on something so pointless as anger. Even if, no especially if it was my fault that we were taking our lunch early, I needed to pull my weight. It was often my job to gather firewood, so that is what I was going to do. But as I started to gather firewood as I had often done, I stumbled and once again failed to catch myself because of the arm that was no longer there.

  I wanted to cry or yell or rage at the world. But my body could not decide what to do so I just id there in the frozen dirt.