When the first riders came over the hills, their horses were, predictably, tired — not quite stumbling with exhaustion, but not far from it. The mouse-horses were not going to put up with that sort of abuse on the return leg, and all the speed that the riders had gotten on the outward leg would be lost as their mounts took their time getting back.
And now came the part that Rosa had been looking forward to. She had not really laughed much since her mother died. She and her mother had shared so many things, and laughter was high on the list of the things she missed. And — all right, she knew she was going to be laughing at those hapless Princes, and that was not kind — she needed laughter desperately.
As she had known it would be, as the trial unfolded before them, it was not just funny, it was hilarious. Three of the first men to arrive had brought shepherds with them, the lightest of the lot, two girls and a boy and their relatively small dogs. The shepherds jumped off the rumps of the horses without being told; the little dogs looked eager to get to work. The shepherds at the big sheepfold released about two dozen sheep, which looked bewildered at suddenly finding themselves without the fence around them; the dogs went to work, each of them cutting out three sheep and driving them expertly toward the little pens, while the Princes went straight for the eggs.
But although they had thought through the sheep problem, they had not thought about the eggs, nor the difficulty of handling them in heavy metal gauntlets. Very shortly all three of them were cursing and covered in bits of shell and spattered egg. Their return trip was going to be quite...fragrant...as the raw eggs aged ungracefully in the heat.
Rosa only hoped they weren't getting egg inside the armor. That would be rather nasty. Meanwhile more riders were appearing with every moment, and more sheep being released, and the ensuing chaos as riders left their horses at a run, only to be confronted with a sea of swirling sheep, was hilarious. It was a giant white wooly whirlpool, in which every sheep had only one urge — not to get away from the flank of its neighbor.
Some just stood and stared. One very large man had evidently decided that the only way to deal with the problem was to tackle it as he would another unarmed warrior. Which was to say, he was tackling the poor sheep.
Or to be more precise, he was trying to. Sheep, it appeared, were able to evade tackles fairly well, and he ended up facedown on the turf time and time again as the flock swirled away from him. When he finally did manage to seize one, he caught it firmly around the middle and hauled it up off the ground — except that the poor thing was upside down, bleating pathetically while he tried to ignore the fact that he had a smelly sheep's rump right in his face. Doggedly, he hauled the bleating, struggling, unhappy animal to the pen, dumped it in and went after another.
Another fellow had the idea that he was going to toss a loop of rope over each sheep's head and lead it to the pen one at a time. This was, in theory, a good idea. The problem was the sheep were not cooperating. He'd get the rope almost over the beast's head, and it would toss it off again. He kept trying to get closer and closer to it, talking coaxingly, but what he was cooing to them were the vilest, funniest epithets Rosa had ever heard. Evidently the sheep's father, mother and grandparents for the last hundred years had gotten up to some interesting assignations if you believed the incredible words emerging from this man's mouth....It was a wonder this beast still looked like a sheep.
"You really shouldn't be listening to that," Lily murmured, her eyes sparkling with suppressed laughter.
Other men were just attempting what the big man was doing, and the herd swirled faster, in further confusion, sheep leaping over each other in alarm as armored men lunged at them. Finally some of the men realized that once the designated three sheep had been herded up for those who had the foresight to hire shepherds, those shepherds no longer had a job to do. In other words, there were an increasing number of shepherds standing around laughing at them.
But shepherds standing around were shepherds who could be hired now. At least the sheep got a chance to settle down, as the princes converged on the shepherds and began desperate bargains with them, the bids rising higher and higher as each one tried to gethis sheep to be the next in line.
Then more riders arrived. One, an extremely handsome fellow — Prince Desmond, Rosa thought — clearly had some magical charm to help him; he simply walked up to three sheep and touched them, and they followed him as if they were lambs and he was their mother. She narrowed her eyes and concentrated, and sure enough, she saw a sort of green-brown glowing tether reaching from their foreheads to his hand. Magic. Another had a different sort of charm; he flung some sort of dust at them, and wherever the dust fell, a sheep fell asleep. This wasn't magic, per se...it must have been some sort of herb. He put halters on three and led them to their pen; the stuff didn't last long, since the rest of the sheep woke up pretty quickly once he was working on the eggs.
Oh yes, the eggs. Some of the men had clearly thought the egg problem through and had brought various things to pick up and move the eggs with.
Others...had not. And they waited like hungry ducks, watching the wiser fellows, ready to beg the use of their tools when they were done.
Rosa made a note of who took pity on his fellows and gave them the tools, and who did not. "I'd like to add a point for whoever shares his egg-things," she said quietly to Lily, who nodded. "Not penalize for not sharing, but reward for generosity."
"That's a good idea," the Godmother replied, and designated a Brownie to keep track of just that. Prince Desmond, interestingly enough, had neither tools, nor trouble. Rosa wondered if he had another magic spell to keep the eggs from breaking. If so, it was so minor she couldn't see it from this distance. Well, that was not against the rules, and it was a good idea...though it also made it impossible to say whether he would have shared or not.
Then up rode Siegfried and Leopold, who dismounted and took down those bundles of greenery from behind their saddles, and immediately it became clear what the bushes on the backs of their horses were. Fodder.
"Interesting," Lily said quietly. "I would have expected them to try hay, which sheep will only eat in the winter. But those are bean plants, which sheep love."
"Do you suppose that Siegfried went and listened to sheep to find out what they like?" Rosa wondered aloud.
"I would not be in the least surprised." Lily leaned forward and watched them keenly. Leopold and Siegfried, instead of going to the milling, frightened flock, went to the sheepfold and asked for six sheep that were not in a panic to be released. And as the gate was opened, they stood side by side and thrust the bundles of fodder in the sheep's surprised faces. Then, still side by side, they backed away. The sheep were hungry, the men were not acting like predators and the bean blossoms must have smelled delicious. They managed to lead all six sheep, step by careful step, across the space between the sheepfolds and into the pens. While not as fast as the shepherds and their dogs, it was efficient, and clever.
Then they went and dealt with their eggs, just as efficiently, using a spoon and some sort of scoop. When they were done, they generously gave the tools over to two of the other Princes without even being asked.
"Very kind," Lily murmured.
Then just as calmly as they had arrived, the two men got on their horses and galloped off. A slow gallop, meant to eat distance without tiring the horse. Rosa felt like applauding.
But the distraction of new riders turning up and trying even more ploys on the hapless sheep was too much, and she turned her attention back to the trial. Several of the men finally decided to be herd dogs themselves, banding together to chivvy all their sheep at the pens at once. Which was fine, and a good idea, but the pens weren't made for more than three sheep each, and the wooly idiots all tried to crowd into one, met the fence, panicked and began leaping over each other's backs to get out again.