Rider at the Gate

by C. J. Cherryh

  Then he stirred up more biscuits for the morning, put them on to bake over the coals; and after what felt like a second, Burn had to wake him up off the warm stones to get him to take them out. Burn knew when he smelled it.

  He ate one more biscuit then, put the rest by, and in shaky self-indulgence, made hot tea, assured now his teeth wouldn’t crack if he drank it.

  Among his Anveney purchases was a little metal flask of spirits, for steeping medicines, as he intended, not the luxury of drink.

  But the shelter came, courtesy of the maintenance crews, for which he blessed their kindness—equipped with a bottle on the mantel, and he poured about a third spirits into his second cup of tea; sipped it ever so slowly, letting it seep into dry mouth and dry throat and burn all the way down.

  It was the first time he’d looked at the rider board, up above the mantel. His heart nearly stopped.

  Some not-so-bad artist had filled a large area of the board with a horse head, all jagged teeth, staring eyes, wild mane, ears flat to the skull.

  Rogue horse. A warning to anybody who came here.

  And he knew the sketch artist beyond a doubt when he saw, above it, the mark that was Jonas Westman.

  Jonas had been in this place, on his way to Tarmin, Jonas and his partners—sitting here where he sat. They’d laid the fire he’d used.

  Made that ghastly image.

  But that wasn’t the total source of disturbance. He was feeling something—faint, dim sense of presence.

  —Something in the ambient, no image brushing the surface of his thoughts, just a whisper of life outside the shelter that sent his hand reaching for the rifle.

  It had Burn’s attention, too—head up, ears up, nostrils flared, as he stared toward the door.

  was the first thought that came to him.

  But the sending didn’t seem to come from several horses. It wasn’t strong, it wasn’t loud and it shifted and eluded his conception of it, at times completely disappearing.

  Shadow could feel that way—alone.

  But Shadow wouldn’t be alone. And he wasn’t sure what it was. He wasn’t sure it wasn’t some passing cat—but no cat in its right mind would be out in a blizzard.

  And it didn’t travel. It strengthened, there and not-there, consistently strengthened, while he and Burn stayed still.

  Horse. Horse, he was almost certain. Strengthening presence meant it was coming straight toward the shelter.

  Single horse.

  He grabbed up the rifle, cursed himself as he checked its action—long overdue precaution. He’d used the piece for a walking-stick. God knew what he’d done to it the time he’d gone down and bruised his knee. But it worked. He had a bullet ready.

  He waited, conscious of that sketched image staring out across the room over his head. He felt the tension in Burn, felt—now and again—the sense of something reaching out blindly into the dark, feeling about it, looking.

  A lonely something. A desperate someone. Burn didn’t make the young-horse mistake of reaching back. They waited, quiet for a long, long while, anxious—but he began to want the thing, began to think about and and wanted that thing to come in, come to the gun-slit at the front of the cabin; get it over with, get it finished, the first night he was on the ridge.

  He got up from the floor. He stood listening into the ambient, quiet, careful, not wanting Burn to commit too far, too dangerously out into that dark.

  But it knew now that they were there. It skittered across his mind, canny, and scared, and desperate. He wanted to use his ears—hear it coming toward the door—but the wind screamed that single note across the roof, covering all sound else. He could feel it coming closer, and closer, and filling all the ambient, there and not there. He went to the wall, where the gun-port was—hesitated to unlatch it until he was reasonably sure what he was dealing with.

  he felt it. Then:

  Burn made a strange soft sound. entered the ambient.

  Another thump. Hard. Two. Burn immediately grew excited, throwing his head and imaging back as, over the shriek of the wind came an unmistakable nighthorse sound outside the door, a female’s sound. Burn did a little sideways dance as Guil left the wall and grabbed a fistful of mane with his free hand.

  “Burn, dammit, shut up.” He got a breath. God,

  “Let me in!” It was hardly a voice. It was maybe a rag of a human voice past the wail of the wind. The ambient was howling
  Burn jerked the mane out of his hand,

  “Open the door!” the voice outside cried, thin and breaking. “Dammit!”

  A blow thumped against the door. He saw He saw and Most of all he felt

  “There’s a rogue loose!” he yelled back. “How do I know it’s not you?”

  “I’m not, you damn fool! God! Open the door! I left my camp, I smelled the smoke—I’m freezing out here, we’re both freezing. Open the damn door!”

  They didn’t feel insane. Bush wisdom held that sometimes a rogue seemed entirely normal. Then wasn’t.

  Burn was going crazy behind him, on totally different grounds, Burn was

  But that was the mistake every victim made in the Wild. The voice outside, someone in desperate, mind-shaking need—the reason to open the door.

  “God! Let me in! I’m not any damn rogue! Let me in, you damn coward! Open this door!”

  Burn believed it. He began to believe it, telling himself it was still early in the season, there could still be a rider out, and he could find somebody frozen to death on his step.

  It was a woman, he was sure it was a woman, by the horse and by the pitch in the voice when it cracked—and he’d no wish to deal with female horses or female riders; Burn was going crazy on him, Burn was going to go for the mare if he let them in—

  “Open up!” Another thump of a fist. And he didn’t see what else to do. He set the rifle aside, drew his pistol for closer range—then lifted the latch, gave the door a shove, and put his shoulders against the front wall.

  The door dragged outward with a gloved hand pulling it. Then a horse, as forward as Burn, forced her head in—surged through, a snow-blanketed darkness that met Burn in the middle of the room and dodged him in a perimeter-threatening dance around and around a second time as Burn sniffed after and the mare gave him a surly, warn-off.

  He’d glanced at them like a fool—anxious about the horse. He glanced back a confused eyeblink later face to face with a muffled, snow-mantled and angry rider—as the mare shook herself from head to tail and spattered the whole room with snow and icewater.

  “Who are you?” the rider demanded to know, and slammed the door shut. A gloved hand pulled off the hat and ripped the scarf off a head of dark hair, a pair of dark eyes, a wind-burned and pretty face—which was no comfort to a man hoping he hadn’t just let two killers into the shelter with him and his horse. “What are you doing here?”

  “My name’s Stuart,” he said, and didn’t put away the gun. “Out of Malvey district. Who are you? The proprietor?”

  “Tara Chang. Out of Tarmin village.” Teeth were chattering. Hard. “Malvey’s a far ride. What are you doing up here?”

  “The rogue killed my partner. I’m afraid it’s got your village.”

  A tremor of distress hit the ambient, but not strongly. The situation at Tarmin was no surprise to her.

  But it was about all her constitution seemed able to bear. The bled out and she walked over to the fire—sank down on the hearthstones in a precipita
te collapse of the legs, head down, gloved hands in hair. “Hell,” she said, and the pain in the ambient drew the mare over to nose her rider’s back.

  The gun didn’t seem so reasonable as it had. He wasn’t sure. He kept expecting an explosion, a sudden shift into insanity. But with none in evidence, he put the gun back in holster, carried the rifle back to the far side of the fireplace, the side he determined to sit on—and thought of and

  “Yeah,” she said. Her eyes were pouring tears. She hadn’t gotten her gloves off. God knew about her feet. Or her horse’s.

  he thought.

  She approved of that. She leaned and got the bottle of spirits— uncorked it and took a swallow.

  You weren’t supposed to do that. It was stupid when you were cold, but she didn’t take another. He put on another pan of water to heat, and with a wary glance at the woman sitting on the hearth, eyes shut, cradling the bottle in her lap, decided he’d better fill water buckets again—his and the horses’.

  Which meant the door opening, however briefly, and a cold gale swirling for a moment about the room while he packed one and then the other bucket with snow.

  Burn didn’t care. Burn was nosing about the mare as he came back in, pulled the door shut, and set the buckets on the hearth.

  Interested—God. “Burn, let her alone, you damn fool! She’s damn near frozen!”

  Damn fool, he thought, and poured the woman tea in one of the shelter’s cups. “The water barrel’s frozen solid,” he said. “It’ll warm up by tomorrow, maybe.”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  “I’ll rub your horse down. She’ll be all right. Gloves off. Boots off. There’s aromatic rub and there’s snow for water.”

  “Yeah,” she said, and started pulling gloves off with her teeth. He took the salve, of which he didn’t have but half left, and started in on the mare’s legs, while Burn licked the ice off the mare’s back. The mare nipped Burn. But not hard.

  “God, save it,” he muttered to Burn. “There’s problems. God!”

  Burn sent him and and he got a feeling that he didn’t know words for, but it involved pushing himself on a woman when she hurt. The rider was upset, the mare was upset—

  “Let her the hell alone, Burn, you damn fool, give her a chance to catch her breath.”

  “Flicker,” Chang said from the hearthside. “Name’s Flicker.”

  He caught the image. A lot like Shadow, only light, not dark. She was picking up the other business, too, and while neither of them was acutely embarrassed—she was no junior—he felt himself pushed and set upon by his own horse. In most respects he and Burn were a match. Not in this.

  “Sorry,” he said, and squatted down, arms on knees, as far away from her as he could and still feel the fire. “My horse is a fool. You want to quiet it down?”

  “They’re all right.”

  “Are you? Hands and feet?”

  “All right.” Her feet were bare. She wiggled toes, and meanwhile downed a piece of biscuit—she’d found them; chased it with spirit-laced tea.

  She seemed to be. So he got up and got several of the shelter’s blankets down from the shelf, and he didn’t invite approaches. She and her horse seemed all right, he was entirely sorry he’d given her a hard go-over and kept her out in the cold—but wherever she’d walked from, those feet hadn’t been cold as long as his had, and Tarmin’s troubles weren’t just today’s event. A day ago—at least. She’d been somewhere safer than he had.

  She mumbled, “Two days. I think it’s two days.” She gave a shiver, and poured more of the spirits into the tea. Offered the bottle to him.

  He wanted more awareness than that while he slept, though he was very glad to see she would sleep soundly.

  She gave him a narrow look, thinking, Or that was the uncharitable way his mind interpreted it.

  “No,” he said, taking offense. But her thoughts were skittering about so fast he couldn’t catch them, a lot about people he didn’t know, a lot about a camp he thought must be Tarmin, about a jail and an alarm in the night.

  Not comfortable thoughts to sleep with. There was when they got loose, and but he didn’t think—he didn’t think it was an unnatural anger, or an unnatural pain. It just resonated too well with his own, that left him touchy and on the edge.

  She took a precautionary look toward the door, then wrapped her two blankets around herself, with a persistent thought about a man—a rider—

 
 

  He understood that, God, he wished he could put a damper on that feeling, smooth it down, ease the pain, distance the memories. It was her lost partners she’d looked to find when she’d smelled the smoke and come battering at the door.

  <“Who are you?”> with so much anger—

 

  Then it went away. Guil got a breath. The horses did, snappish and dangerous in a closed space.

  While Tara Chang sat in her blankets, rested her head on her jacketed arm and stared bleakly into the fire.

  Guil sat there a moment—asking himself what he’d let in and what was over there with Burn.

  Grief, he decided. A day old, no more. A loss that racketed off his own, and left him raw-nerved. He probably made it worse for her—couldn’t help but make it worse for her.

  he sent, kept it up until the horses had calmed down, until he saw the woman sigh and settle, and felt the ambient quiet enough to dare let go and try to relax.

  The mattresses on the bunks might have warmed if he’d dragged them over and left them an hour or so at the fireside; but right now he was exhausted and the hearthstones were warmer. He took his own couple of blankets, laid his pistol down, wrapped in them and lay down in the fire-warmth, head on his much-abused hat and scarf, that he stuffed under him from where he’d dropped them.

  He was still cold—as if ice had gotten clear into the core of him, and another wave of it was coming out to chill his skin. He lay there by another heavy-coated, living body, as cold as she was, with no erotic notions whatsoever and wondering if he dared shut his eyes.

  But in a few moments of quiet, Burn and the mare were back to their quiet muttering of grunts and sniffing and sneezing—

  The mare was tired, snappish, and out of sorts. Burn, going too far, nearly got something important nipped. He heard the row. More, he felt it, and twitched into a spasm of cold chill, knees drawn up, and wishing intensely that Burn would quiet the hell down.

  The woman in front of him was a solid sleeping lump now. Two drinks, as tired as she looked to be, and probably the roof could fall on her unnoticed.

  Probably it was safe to shut his eyes and get some sleep. He didn’t have any reason to doubt her. Burn didn’t doubt the mare, and kept at his courtship, somewhat more gingerly—which didn’t make Burn’s rider more comfortable. Guil turned over, arranged his arm over the gun and belt beside him.

  In very remote case, he was sure. But he didn’t believe in deliberate chances.

  Meanwhile the horses were bickering, Burn was exhausted, sore, and impatient, having made the one perilous try at a chilled, sore-footed, sore-backed mare, and settled to a sullen male posturing— imaging until Burn’s male rider was

  Burn wouldn’t. The mare was on her feet. Burn was Burn wasn’t going to lie down in the presence of any If Burn deigned

  “God.” Guil took
several deep breaths, and imaged, loud and mad. Which was fit to wake his own bedmate. So he sent,

  The mare settled down fairly abruptly, imaging—he was sure it was the mare—

  Burn postured, Burn circled twice, lifted and flagged his tail, preened a foreleg, finally—

  Guil sent furiously.

  Burn preened the other foreleg, and gracefully, gracefully, settled to a noble resting posture—not damned comfortable, but, hell, Guil agreed, asking himself if he’d ever in his human life possibly been such an ass.

 
 

  He grew warm, finally. He shut his eyes, drifted toward sleep, listening to another shifting-about with the horses. Horses didn’t mind resting their legs, but give it about an hour and a healthy horse would be up to sleep a while standing; and down again, when he tired of that—they weren’t quiet sleeping partners, unless the night was very cold indeed.

  Which it wasn’t, with the fire going.

  And now—

  Now Burn wanted

  God.

  But Burn had to. It wasn’t Burn’s fault. Sex failed and the other urge of nature took over. You couldn’t ask Burn to wait. You could want to shoot him—but, hell, you woke up, took your gun to guard the door, you got up—

  He let Burn out. He stood there against the wall, freezing in the brief blast of cold air, testing whether human beings could nap standing up—he could manage it.

  But now that Burn was outside, the mare wanted

  Fine. He couldn’t keep his eyes open. He opened the door and Burn wanted in where it was warm. Immediately. Burn came in, radiating cold, covered with snow. Shook himself.

  Guil shut his eyes, folded his arms tightly to keep himself from folding over in the middle, braced his heels, and waited for the mare. While the wind shrieked over the loose shingle.

  In not so long the mare wanted back in and he wearily opened the door, accepted another horse shaking herself and spattering snow about, as he shut the door and double-checked the latch, arguing with himself that the mare was perfectly sane, that possibly now that the horses were settled, he might settle.