Free Heris Serrano by Elizabeth Moon

couldn't avoid the topic of horses, at least he could get the conversation away from his aunt. "How many horses does your father have, anyway?"
     
    "To answer your first question, no. There are three hunts out of the main house, where we'll be. Each has its own territory. We'll each be assigned to one of them, depending on riding ability. As for horses . . . many thousands, I suppose, altogether. The main house stables will hold five hundred, though we won't use that many. Hunters, hacks, young horses in training." Ronnie tried to imagine five hundred horses in the same place, and failed. The Academy had had ten, for the training of its young officers, and he had no idea what a "hack" was. He was not about to ask.
     
    "We don't hunt every day," Bubbles put in. "Some people do, but most ride out on alternate days. Particularly in the lower hunts, where they're not as good and get really stiff."
     
    "I'll get really stiff," Raffa and Sarah said together, like a chorus.
     
    "Isn't there anything else but hunting?" Ronnie asked, hoping he didn't sound as desperate as he felt.
     
    "There are other kinds of hunting," Buttons said. "Not all of it's on horseback. You can shoot grouse and pheasant, that sort of thing. It's the wrong season for fishing in the nearby streams. Indoors—well, the things my father assumes were normal indoor sports of the time: billiards, cards, amateur theatricals."
     
    "Oh . . . dear." Worse then he'd imagined. Worse than his mother had imagined, he was sure. Traveling with a wealthy aunt on her private yacht had seemed like a good idea when his mother mentioned it. Perhaps he'd have been better off going to some dull assignment in an out-of-the-way base. At least it wouldn't have had fox hunting, and his work might have kept him busy part of the time.
     
    "There are other places on the planet," Bubbles said. "But we can't possibly get away more than once. We should save that for when you're really desperate. Poor Ronnie."
     
    He wanted to snarl at her. Poor Ronnie, indeed. He needed real sympathy, not the mocking look Bubbles had given him. He needed them to understand that it wasn't his fault—none of it. "I'm not desperate," he said firmly. "For all you know, I may take to hunting as easily as any other sport. I may be leaping over fences and dashing along at a run—"
     
    "Gallop," put in Bubbles.
     
    "Whatever. I mean, I'm naturally athletic, perfectly fit: how hard can it be?" He tried to say it with complete confidence; Bubbles, Buttons, and Raffaele burst into laughter. Raffaele? What did she know about riding? He tried to hide his irritation, and forced himself to laugh with them.
     
    "Better try your aunt's simulator," Buttons said, still chuckling. "You may find a few muscles that aren't quite perfectly fit." Then he sobered. "You should do well, Ronnie, really. You're right: you are a natural athlete; it's quite possible that after a few lessons you'll be up to riding in the field. But it's not like anything else."
     
    Ronnie forced himself to smile, and wondered if he could hide in his stateroom all day and night, watching entertainment cubes, until they got to Buttons's home planet. Probably not. He was going to have to think of something they could do . . . something fun, something to reestablish his leadership of the group. Something mischievous, perhaps. Play a harmless practical joke on the old lady, or the crew.
     
    "You may be right," he said, without meaning it. "I'll see what you look like on the simulator first, and then . . . we'll see."
     
    "We ought to see about some swimming, I think," Raffaele said. "C'mon, girls. Let's go play in the water." Before he quite knew how it happened, the girls had vanished, and his two bosom friends were watching him, bright-eyed.
     
    "Come on," said George. "Tell us more about that opera singer. Is it true they have specially developed muscles?"
     
     
     

Chapter Four
    "I didn't ask you if it was 'going fine,'" Heris