Page 13 of Savage Reins
She looks like hell. Dark circles ring her eyes, and her face has the hollow quality of someone who's forgotten what a full night's sleep feels like. Her clothes hang loose on a frame that's losing weight from stress and overwork. But her hands remain steady on the lead rope, and her voice stays calm as she murmurs encouragement to the mare.
"Is the stone bruise better?" I ask.
"Improved. Still tender, but the swelling's down."
"How much longer before she can handle speed work?"
"Two days if we're lucky. Three if we're smart."
The math is a harsh reminder that I'm pitting my confidence in a woman I know nothing about against my family's enemy and their anger. Twenty-three days remaining, minus three for recovery, leaves us twenty days to prepare a horse for a race that will determine whether the Petrov family lives or dies. The margin for error has shrunk to nothing.
"Show me the equipment," I say.
Mira leads Rusalka toward the tack shed, a small building that leans against the main barn. She ties off the rein on a post and leads me through the narrow door hanging on the upper hinges.
Inside, leather goods hang from hooks and pegs, their surfaces cracked from age and weather. Everything here tells the story of a family that's been making do with less for too long.
I examine the bridle first, checking the stitching and hardware. The leather is supple despite its age, and the bit shows even wear patterns. It's had professional maintenance, even if the equipment itself has seen better decades.
The cinch catches my attention next. The leather strap that secures everything to the horse's body is worn thin in several places, and the metal rings show signs of stress corrosion. This is the kind of equipment failure that gets riders killed.
"This cinch is finished," I tell her.
"It's held up fine for the past two years."
"Two years ago, you weren't asking it to hold during racing speeds. One hard buck or sudden stop, and this thing snaps. Then you're on the ground with a loose horse and no way to control her." After watching that mare buck her off the other day, I'm not keen on watching her use worn-out tack.
Mira's jaw tightens, but she doesn't argue. Instead, she pulls a roll of leather from a dusty shelf and tosses it toward me. The material hits my chest and falls to my feet.
"Fix it yourself if you don't approve," she says.
I stare down at the leather strip, my hands clenching involuntarily. The challenge in her voice triggers something primitive in my chest—anger mixed with something else I don't want to name. In my world, people don't throw things at me and walk away. They apologize and hope I'm feeling merciful.
But Mira has already turned her attention back to the mare, dismissing me as if I'm nothing more than hired help. The casual disregard should infuriate me. Instead, it does something else entirely.
I pick up the leather and examine it. Good quality material, properly treated and flexible. The problem isn't the leather itself—it's my complete ignorance of how to work with it. I've broken men with these hands, crushed windpipes and shattered bones. But intricate leatherwork requires a different kind of skill, one I've never bothered to develop.
I fumble with the threading, trying to loop the new leather through the metal rings in a way that will distribute stress evenly. My fingers, so sure when they're wrapped around a gun or someone's throat, feel clumsy and oversized. The knot I tie looks wrong, feels wrong, and I know it won't hold under pressure.
"You're overthinking it," Mira says from behind me.
I turn to find her watching my attempts with an expression that might be amusement if the circumstances were different. She steps closer, close enough that I can smell the soap she uses and see the fine lines that stress has etched around her eyes.
"May I?" she asks, extending her hand toward the leather.
I hand it over, annoyed at my own incompetence but curious about her approach. Her fingers move deftly, threading the leather through the rings in a pattern that seems obvious once I see it demonstrated.
"The key is even tension," she explains, her voice calm and instructional. "Too tight and the leather will tear under stress. Too loose and the whole assembly shifts during movement."
She works as she speaks, and there's something hypnotic about watching her complete a task I couldn't manage, something that cuts past the defenses I've spent years building around my ego.
"See how the loop creates its own locking mechanism?" she continues, showing me the finished knot. "Pull against it and it tightens. Release pressure and it loosens just enough to prevent binding."
I study the pattern, memorizing the way the leather moves through the hardware. The engineering is elegant in its simplicity—functional beauty born from generations of trial and error.
"Try it," she says, handing me another piece of leather.
This time, my fingers seem to understand the rhythm. The threading comes easier, the loops fall into place naturally, and the finished knot looks almost identical to her example. The small victory shouldn't matter, but something warm spreads through my chest when she nods approval.
