WHHT Ch 7

Extremely excited but also extremely embarrassed that this fic has ballooned to be over 25k in length and we are... so not done. OH WELL!! The show must go on, right??

Title: Where Hoofbeats and Hearts Thunder - Ch 7
Rating: T
Fandom: Shadow and Bone (TV)
Pairing/Characters: Aleksander/Alina Starkov
Critical Tags: Canon-Divergence, Horses, Gift-giving, Drama
Chapter Summary: Alina leaves Os Alta with some supplies, Zarya, and at least part of a plan.
Aka that fic where Alina spends more than just one afternoon riding pretty horses with pretty General Kirigan /chinhands/
Excerpt:

Zarya was happy to be working; Alina had last ridden her probably a week past. She pushed against the steady trot that Alina was most comfortable with, eager to step a little more quickly. Alina spent a great deal of conscious effort pulling her back. If they exhausted themselves too soon, it would make it difficult to journey back.

When they broke off from the carefully maintained roads, that was when Zarya finally cooperated and stopped pushing. She might not have followed Alina’s logic for choosing the quieter paths that lead into the thickets and brambles of the woods, but the mare definitely knew that these were not the places to run through.

Alina knew these roads, at least in theory. Os Alta and the surrounding regions were a particular favorite for the Head Cartographer to “suggest” for review whenever one of the junior cartographers fell behind on their quality of work. Alina had been forced to learn all of the main routes and elevation changes practically by heart. All of the detail work of the minor paths - the borders of the noble landholdings and so on - that she would need an actual map to recall properly, but she certainly knew the way to get around.

As such, Alina also could figure out which of the lesser traveled routes would lead her parallel to those major roadways. Even better, the chance to stretch her mental muscles was appreciated. She had been disappointed when she had reviewed Kirgan’s map that evening and hadn’t seen some of the details that should have been there. Even on the larger scale of Ravka, the Black General should have a map with last summer’s roadwork laid between Poliznaya and Balakirev.

Her thoughts skittered when they got too close to Kirigan and the Little Palace. Alina focused on the journey instead, even when she and Zarya paused to eat and to wait out another flurry of snow that kicked up and fell in equal suddenness.