It ended with Spook down again against a snow-covered wall of brush, and him still clinging to Spook’s mane, which he began to understand in his panic was impeding Spook’s try at gaining his feet.
Two riders had come up the road on them, cutting off the downhill direction. He didn’t know them, but <Danny and Cloud> were still behind him, and Spook was <afraid> of Danny, more afraid of <shadow in the trees> and terrified of <rider on the right. Gunfire echoing off mountain, rider sliding—blood on snow—>
He couldn’t get back on. He was scared to let go, scared of losing Spook or leaving Spook a target; meanwhile Spook, stumbling on objects under the snow, kept backing up, hemmed in by snow-covered brush, by <rider behind> and <danger in trees.>
But suddenly he knewthese riders, and knew he’d met them. He tried simultaneously to hang on to Spook’s mane and still put himself between the riders and Spook, <terrified of riders shooting.>
<Water running over stones. Light through leaves.>
It was a rider’s calm-sending. It was an urge to <quiet,> he knew that much, and desperately wanted to believe in it.
“Don’t shoot,” he said, finding his voice. “Don’t shoot. He’s not crazy. I’m not. I didn’t kill anybody!”
“Just calm down.”
It was Guil Stuart and Tara Chang. Tara was the rider Spook was afraid of. And Guil Stuart only slightly less so.
But <still water,> was insistent, washing over his vision, alternate with the white of real snow and those snow-obscured figures that had him pinned against the wall of brush.
“Carlo,” came Danny’s voice from behind him and uphill. “It’s me. Calm down. It’s all right. Quiet him down. Calm the horse down. Nobody’s going to shoot.”
He wanted things quiet. He wanted <Spook standing still,> so he dared let go, because he had Spook’s mane twisted in both his hands and he thought it might be hurting Spook and compounding the problem. “Settle down,” he said, scared to let go as Spook stood shivering. “It’s all right.” <Carlo and Danny> was in his head. He didn’t know whether it was his idea or not. <Horrid black thing in snow> was in his head, too, and he didn’t know how, but he thought it came from Danny, by the direction-sense that quivered along his nerves, like awareness of the faintest breeze.
“Carlo,” Danny said, “I got it, I shot it. —Guil, I—don’t know what the hell it is. Lorrie-lie, maybe.”
“Back there?” Stuart asked, and he and Chang at least made a move or the intent of a move in that direction, which gave Spook a notion of <running,> but Carlo didn’t want that now. He tried to calm Spook down, and fortunately or because the others realized Spook’s inclination, they kept Burn and Flicker in the way on one side and Cloud on the other.
Carlo freed one hand and used it to pat Spook on the shoulder— heart pounding, took the risk of freeing the other, awkwardly patted Spook’s resisting neck and secured of Spook at least a trembling quiet.
Then Spook turned his head, butted it against him, <Blood on snow. Spook and Carlo, Spook and Carlo> was the sending, until, his doing or Spook’s or the others’, he gained awareness of the other riders, other horses, distances, minds, intentions, <strong, not moving, quiet water running over brown stones.>
“I’m here,” Danny said quietly, aloud and in the ambient. “I’m just behind you.”
“I know,” he said. “Danny, I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill anybody!”
“I can hear it. I believe you.” There was a lot of <wanting> and a lot of <anxiousness> and a lot of <Stuart and Chang> in the air, with not quite an easy feeling to it—rather a skittish wariness that calm-sendings didn’t stop.
“Devil meeting you here,” Stuart said. “Did you kill it?”
He was talking to Danny, Carlo thought, and what hit the ambient wasn’t comfortable—it was that <shadow> sending that upset Spook. It was <nest in tree beside the water.> It was <Danny and Cloud in the woods, following his trail, under shadow in the trees.>
“How did youget here?” Danny asked Guil, visualizing <road and ice,> and from Guil and Tara, Carlo guessed, came different images, <cabin in the woods, steep snowy climb through the forest.>
That and something he couldn’t get, but didn’t think he wanted to, either. For a moment there were images pouring every which way, <Evergreen village> and <Brionne in furs,> and <rider-shelter with the local riders,> all, he realized suddenly, provoking memories and images from him, <doctor’s house, Brionne in bed, awake> and <Rick Mackey shouting at him in the street> and <him running, running for the gates> with what he knew now was a desperate <fear of jail> and <fear of the mob> and a sense of <safety in the Wild.>
He tried not to contribute to the confusion. Danny had gotten mad when he’d poured too much in on Cloud, in the days when they’d climbed the mountain. But he didn’t think Danny was angry now. Danny and Cloud became <quiet cloud. Cloud on a sunny day.>
Then Danny left Cloud to come over to him, <wanting him to reach out his hand.> And he did reach. He kept one hand on Spook, and he felt <anxiety> as his gloved fingers met Danny’s.
They stood like that a moment, with <fear> and <wanting> running through them like electricity through a wire. Carlo feltDanny’s awareness and calm good sense go along his nerves. He believedDanny was different from anybody he’d ever met. And if he’d damned himself in the eyes of preachers, if riding a horse would do it when his other faults had missed, he made a conscious choice now to be where he was standing, in rider company, a killer with a horse riders called crazed and a would-be killer itself—but he wanted their company, he wantedtheir acceptance among them.
He didn’t know why Danny radiated <wanting contact> and he didn’t know how to understand the <flight> impulse in Spook until the second Spook tried to break away into the clear in complete panic; but he wouldn’t letSpook run from help, not except <running over him,> and he wouldn’t have it, wouldn’t allow it, had himself in the way and his hands on Spook without even knowing which one of them had moved first. He just stood there <wanting quiet> and holding his whole weight against Spook’s shoulder. <Carlo and Danny> was in the ambient and he had the presence of mind finally to join into it, <Carlo and Danny> as hard as he could think it. <Carlo and Danny and Spook and Cloud> while he pressed with all his strength against Spook’s trembling shoulder.
“Kid’s new?” Stuart’s voice asked.
“Today,” Danny said. “Hours. Just barely hours.”
“Easy,” Chang said, and with every word the ambient grew calmer. “Easy, kid. You’re all right. You’re doing damn fine. He’s just on edge. It’s not your fault. Calm. Calm down.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said. His voice was shaking. “He’s scared of you. Spook’s especially scared of you.”
The ambient sank further toward quiet. Tara Chang was quieting things, he thought, and the world unfolded further—wider and wider so that, with his hands on Spook’s side, he was aware of Guil Stuart’s physical pain, Chang’s grief, Danny’s anxiousness—aware of two horses, Burn and Spook, that had known each other in the past, and that were and weren’t enemies; and two horses, Spook and Flicker, that had encountered each other at a point of death and change, far, far down the mountain.
Aware, then, of the mountain far and wide—and a breathless silence fallen around them.
Danny didn’t know what he would have done without Stuart. He didn’t think he could have quieted Spook orCarlo. Cloud was all right with Spook now that Spook had a rider and there wasn’t a threat to his own. Burn was protective of Flicker, that was clear to him and to Cloud, but that was the way things had been, and Spook, with a junior and uncertain rider, was at the bottom of the status list, Cloud just behind the pair Burn and Flicker made.