She turns again to find Rosalía behind her.
“I’ll go,” she says.
Ivy blinks.
“Rose—” Grip’s voice is sharp all at once.
She looks past Ivy to him. “I don’t know what’s going on here, but anyone trying to get provisions into the city—we need them, Grip. You’ve noticed everything’s sky-high this spring.”
“No joke,” Melchior says, still glaring, Sam holding his arm.
“I’d like to help with that,” Rosalía goes on. “And there’s income into the bargain. May I ride with you?”
“Rosalía.” Grip stands.
Ivy glances up and down the bright rebozo and skirt. “You ... might want to change.”
Rosalía grins. “I’ll meet you on the way out of town. Just tell me which direction.”
“North.”
She gives a quick skip out of Grip’s reach as he snatches for her arm, then dashes off around the corner of the stable, out of sight.
Grip rounds on Ivy, jaw and left fist clenched. Ivy is struck by how awfully tall and broad-shouldered the man is. At least six feet, a couple of inches taller than Sam or Melchior.
“What the hell is wrong with you people?” he snarls and turns away, snatching dropped saddlebags. After jabbing the awl in leather, apparently to finish later, he throws the latch and pushes open his horse’s stall door before grabbing his saddle off a tree.
Ivy turns to hurry away with Sam and Melchior, calling back, “I will give you fifty cents apiece for them if you bring extra of those rice cakes.”
Minutes later, they reach the livery stable, Sam and Melchior discussing both what must be done about hiring Melchior a decent horse and how he will ride with his foot immobilized. Ivy’s mind is racing ahead to food and clothes. If Sam will run to Mr. Harris’s general store while they pick up the horse and saddle, then they can stop by the boarding house on the way out for a few more things and to explain matters. She longs to put the teal dress away and not risk it once more on the trail, but perhaps it is just as well that they are all in town clothes. They want to look respectable to the freighters when they reach Raton Pass.
They walk into the stable, past a man harnessing a buggy horse, then stop dead before Elsewhere and Luck’s stalls. Beside Elsewhere, closest to them, a handsome, blue roan stallion is munching his way through a manger of hay.
He turns his black head as they stop, pulling to the end of his rope, regarding them in a bored manner, then going back to his feed.
Sam stares.
“How did he do that?” Ivy asks.
Melchior grins. “Told you he always comes back.”
“Got your outfit in the saddle room beside the others, Mr. L’Heureux,” a voice calls from above.
They look up to the hay loft where Mr. Quiles beams down at them.
“That stallion came wandering in here last evening—saddle and all. Real stiff so I filled his manger and he worked away while I got the tack off.”
“We are most grateful, Mr. Quiles,” Sam says.
“Any sores on him?” Melchior asks. “He was dressed two days and nights.”
“Looks well to me, señor. You check him over and make sure. Give him a couple days if he had a rough time.”
While Melchior examines Chucklehead, Sam hurries off to the general store and Ivy saddles Luck and Elsewhere with the aid of a young stableboy who speaks not a word of English. He smiles and nods to everything Ivy says, which she finds refreshing.
“He’ll ride,” Melchior finally says, leaning back on his crutch as he watches his horse.
“Are you sure? Truly, they all needed a longer break than this, didn’t they?”
“Ideal. But they’ll fare. We’ll pack grain for them and shoot game on the trail for ourselves. Heap of jackalopes up in that high scrub country around the pass.”
Ivy procures the bags of grain from the smiling boy while Melchior saddles Chucklehead. Sam returns with beans, bacon, lard, flour, rice, and other items neither he nor Ivy can look upon with any love.
After arrangements at the boarding house on their way out and final packing and tending to possessions—going or staying—they are on the road, leaving town at a jog.
Luck tosses her head, shies at a darting bird, and bounces Ivy roughly in the saddle. Ivy smiles as they file out, patting the mare’s neck. At least she is not a swaybacked dun. If only Es Feroz were here also, but Ivy has not seen her since the morning before they rode into the fire.
Ahead, Grip waits on the road. The yellow cur sits in dust at the buckskin stallion’s feet, scratching vigorously at his ribs. Grip himself is leaned forward in the saddle, his arms crossed on the saddle horn, the right looking thin compared to the powerful left. With the patch over one eye, dark glare in the other, guns at his belt bristling with cartridges, and a cigarette burning between his lips, he does not resemble a figure Ivy ever imagined she would be happy to ride toward. Yet as Luck, Elsewhere, and Chucklehead approach the motionless buckskin, she feels like hugging the rider.
Instead, she says, “Thanks for coming along, Grip.”
He turns his horse away.
She looks back to see Rosalía on seal brown Volar, riding up at a canter. Ivy clicks to Luck, Rosalía slows to a jog as she nears, the dog scrambles up from the ground, and the eleven of them start north, toward Raton Pass.
Twenty-Fifth
Trail Partners
Riding away, Ivy feels a sense of camaraderie and purpose she has not known since she left her own city and friends. Each one of these people has saved her from something. Even if she does prefer the company of some over others, she is grateful for them—grateful just to be alive.
Warm feelings persist all the way to the second morning on the trail. First, it becomes apparent that, besides Volar, who dances along like a cavalry horse in an Independence Day parade, their mounts are too tired for the journey. Chucklehead is sore and more ill-tempered than ever. Elsewhere walks with his head drooping, eyes half-closed. El Cohete goes with his ears back, snapping at any horse to get within ten feet. And Luck ... Luck is just about her normal self, starting and shying, flinching at every tumbleweed, trying to turn from every bird taking flight.
By the second day, Ivy spends a good two miles walking, just to avoid being jarred so badly. Her leg is only sore, already healing, and her arm well again, though she should have had stitches out.
Rather than traveling all day and resting all night, they break into short journeys and breaks. This gives the horses time to forage or doze for intervals through the day while the riders build a fire and eat a hot meal with the sun high, yet it also means riding well into the hours of darkness. Worse than this is getting back up from one’s bedroll while night is still thick.
Ivy’s muscles ache and her mind churns with thoughts of bounties and steamcoaches on the second day, when Rosalía asks Melchior about the chunky gun lying across his saddlebags. Ivy has never seen the fire-shooter used. Now, rather than wasting words, Melchior demonstrates.
The only thing which saves her from injury, possibly a broken neck, is leading Luck at the time. The explosive jet of fire spraying outward from Melchior and Chucklehead sends Luck into a jumping, screaming panic. Volar rears. Elsewhere starts and leaps away. El Cohete, some distance ahead, only alerts and looks around. Chucklehead takes off as if Lucifer himself sprang out of the ground.
A rushing sound rips the air. Reek of sulfur and paraffin fills her nostrils. Ivy gets only a flashing, vague impression of what everyone else is doing and shouting as she clings to her reins, the image of Luck charging off into the mountains or back to Santa Fé filling her with doom.
“Easy, Luck—whoa!”
The chestnut plunges, dragging Ivy with her across the scrubby plateau. Ivy finds two sharp hooves whirling about her ears but leaps back, tripping against her skirts, yanking the horse’s head down. Luck spins, tugging her off her feet, crashing into brush. A vision of herself being dragged miles on her stomach through
these dry mountains brings her to her senses and Ivy releases her reins.
Tears in her eyes, wanting to pound the earth with her fists, pound Melchior’s handsome face into a pulp, pound that stupid mare, Ivy only lies still a moment, fighting to catch her breath.
“Ivy? Are you all right?” Sam’s hands on her shoulder and arm.
She struggles to her feet with his help, panting, trying to knock stickers from her dress, staring at the ground.
“Please do not hold onto a horse like that. It is more dangerous than being thrown.” He sounds alarmed, not chiding, yet she turns away. Why doesn’t he try it on Melchior? “Better to have a runaway horse than your head kicked. Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine.”
“Let her follow behind on the rope. She will settle.”
“Follow ... what?” Ivy looks up from picking at her dress.
Elsewhere stands behind them. A rope runs from his saddle horn to Luck, who has a loop pulled tight around her neck, standing in a balky, tense fashion, back legs tucked under her body, facing Elsewhere.
Ivy stares. Like the Henry rifle, Sam has carried a lariat on his saddle since she has known him. She never imagined him using it. He may have ridden all spring on a cattle drive, yet, somehow, that has always felt more like hearsay than a fact of his history. He must have thrown the loop just as Luck yanked out of Ivy’s hands.
“Oh,” Ivy says after a moment. “Thank you. Yes, she can come behind.”
“I shall walk with you, if you do not object. Elsewhere needs a break.”
Leaving the rope on the saddle horn and leading Elsewhere by a single rein, he offers her his arm. Luck trails uneasily.
Rosalía is still riding Volar in wide circles to get him settled. Grip has gone on as if nothing happened. Melchior is visible in the distance, also having turned Chucklehead into a circle, the stallion balking and bucking every few strides.
Serves him right. Ivy burns with all she wants to say. All the venom she can spit at him over the stupidity of that fire-shooter—which is a tool against risers, not a plaything to show off. A million words. A million epithets unfit for a lady. And what must the others think? Perhaps Sam or Rosalía will have a few choice phrases for him.
As the group knits gradually back together crossing the plateau, Grip rides in the lead with his dog trotting ahead, Melchior after him by some distance, then Rosalía, then Sam and Ivy trailing, leading their horses.
No one says a word.
After half a mile, when too much ground separates them, Sam stops to help Ivy mount. He swings onto Elsewhere and they move at a slow jog to catch up. A strong smell of sulfur clings about Melchior and Chucklehead. Luck will not approach, snorting and tossing her head. Agreeable to Ivy, except Sam goes on to ride beside him. She stays back with Rosalía instead. Ivy trades her a few slices of cooked bacon for a rice cake and scans the horizon for risers, riders, or her fox as they go.
That evening, after a long break for horses and riders, she fancies she does see a darting golden shadow, but they camp among a vibrant mountain forest and she cannot be sure.
On the third day, Ivy’s sense of urgency feels suffocating. What if they miss the freighter and have come so far for nothing? They might catch it up en route, but that will not be the same as meeting the party at the train and arranging protection at a good price.
Grip leads them into a grassy valley, edged on two sides by pines and pale green deciduous trees, and dismounts. Ivy longs to go on past him, push Luck to Raton Pass. Surely they could be there by nightfall, though Rosalía said reaching the pass in three days would be highly optimistic and four would be swift. Either way, Ivy cannot pass Grip to strike out on her own. She does not know the way.
The rest dismount, Ivy glancing to Sam and Melchior, who have been riding together all day, talking about horses and ranch foremen, guns and harmonicas—Sam apparently owned one which was broken on the drive—and a man named Buckleby who used to tell tall tales around the campfire.
Why should she care? They are entitled to enjoy themselves on this trip as much as anyone. She unsaddles Luck, holding the reins while the red animal rolls vigorously across grass, thrashing out all four legs, then struggling to her feet and shaking herself from ears to tail. Ivy rubs her neck and the white blaze running down the pretty face. Luck does not even try to bite her. Ivy smiles.
She hobbles the mare, pulling the bit from her mouth, though leaving the headstall buckled. She feels embarrassed to be the only rider who must leave a halter or bridle on her horse just to catch her, even hobbled, but she is unsure what else to do.
Rosalía clears a fire patch. Melchior says he and Sam will collect firewood so they can have a dandy breakfast, lunch, and supper rolled into one. Ivy tries not to glare after them. Could Sam not have gone alone? Melchior must limp along beside him, holding Sam’s shoulder for support, now rhapsodizing over chuck wagon food.
She unpacks bacon and bread with Grip, who has been almost entirely silent since they left Santa Fé, not even condescending to ask for more details of the mission. Rosalía fills the little pot with rice and water from a water bottle, then takes stock of provisions.
“Do you have anything else canned with you?” she asks Ivy, studying what she has laid out. Unlike riding alone with Grip, Rosalía believes in sharing meals and trying to keep everyone’s diet as varied as possible.
“Two peaches, one tomato.” Ivy glances again in the direction Sam and Melchior disappeared. The woods are right there. All they need to do is gather a few branches. “We have more for the horses than us. Melchior wanted to shoot game on the trail.”
“Not another big mess like that deer. Too bad no one has a shotgun. Have a squirrel fry.... Ever eaten rattlesnake?”
“What?” Ivy looks around from the forest.
“Good eating if you can get past all the bones.”
Ivy remembers the one whose head Melchior shot off. If only she had known.
Grip throws down his bedroll and lies on his back with his hat over his face, against the sun.
“We are not staying that long,” Ivy says, more irritated than ever.
“The horses need as long a graze as we can give them and we haven’t even a fire yet,” Grip says. “How soon were you thinking of starting?”
Ivy stands from her own provision perusal to start west, up the slope to the tree line. “Some people are not valuing our time.”
“Leave it alone,” Grip says behind her.
“It does not take twenty minutes to pick up a few sticks of firewood.” Ivy marches on.
“Don’t.” Voice sharp now.
Ivy looks around. Grip sits up, his hat pushed back to glare at her. When did he become boss? Rosalía looks uncomfortable, yet Ivy feels suspicious that this is directed at her actions, not her brother’s hostile tone.
“We’re on a schedule,” Ivy says stiffly, working not to raise her voice.
“Stay. Here.” He leans back.
Ivy stands a moment. She wants to walk away now just to prove she can. Yet that is somehow not so easy to do in front of Grip. Isn’t hurrying in all their best interests? Why should he care? Yet the fact that he does seem to, and just spoke more words to her than she has heard out of him since they left town, stays her step.
She returns to the empty fire pit, noticing Grip’s head move to watch her despite his lowered hat. It even seems he and Rosalía exchange a glance, though Ivy cannot be sure. Feeling she lives in the middle of a conspiracy, she begins to slice off bacon and spread strips in Rosalía’s little skillet.
It is some time before Melchior and Sam return with the makings of their fire, still just as cheerful and talking. No one says anything about the wait.
Ivy finally leans back, chewing a blade of grass to pretend she has a vegetable, as bacon and rice cook. It seems there are just as many downsides to comrades as benefits.
Grip and Melchior smoke. The four of them check and clean their guns while they wait.
Ivy watches
clouds through her sungoggles. She thinks of watching stars with her father from the harbor, looking eastward to the great, black ocean from the roof of the Guardian’s Hall, Boston’s tallest public building.
“Do you know that one, Ivy?”
“Pegasus.”
“And that one?”
“Orion. You’ve shown me before, Father.”
“Oh, Ivy.” He kissed the top of her head. “One can never have too much stargazing.”
Then Kitty: bursting free from lessons with Kitty on a blazing, muggy summer’s day. Running to the docks to watch old-fashioned sailing ships or a dirigible taking off with clapping families on board. The girls, both only children and both without pets, stroked the many cats that loafed there, always looking to the clouds. Kitty was, in fact, the only person Ivy knew then who was a single child, forming a bond between them ever since their families met.
If only she could write, could see them, could have one more day with her father, her mother, Kitty, even Josiah White.
If a letter could go through, she would write to her father first, she would tell him she was ... alive. Little better could be said. She must at least get a telegram off, whatever the expense.
As for real letters, she could say more to Kitty, somehow. Kitty would understand. She would let her pen run wild, spew all she could never say in person, never express to those out here, never share in any other way—even the vulgar things which should not be said.
Ivy closes her eyes.
Dear Kitty,
How long it has been and how many lifetimes apart we are. Not a day passes that I do not think of you, wish myself back in your always enjoyable, always welcome company.
I should not like to dwell upon the evils of this place we call the West. I would much prefer to hear how things are with you and your family, wishing you all to stay safe. Yet, since I know you should like to know at least a little, I will turn my pen for a moment to these unpleasant matters.
I have been in New Mexico Territory more than a year past. It is scorching by day, freezing by night, so dry that dust swirls most of the year. There is no ocean to watch the ships. No docks where one might find fresh fish or market stalls for fresh produce.
Lightfall Two: Fox, Flight, Fire (Lightfall, Book 2) Page 6
