Cloud's Rider

Cloud on the other hand was faring much better. Cloud sank down after that treatment, <cold nighthorse belly on cold nighthorse legs,> seeking warmth on the evergreen boughs that were the flooring. Cloud was feeling much better and very glad to have blankets thrown over him, then. Da

Then from somewhere out of the dark came the girl-kid lugging a bucket too heavy for her—a heavy bucket that steamed and smelled, such as his and Cloud’s altitude-ravaged sense of smell could detect, of warm mash. Cloud gave a snort, interested, as the other horses were interested, having had one supper—but, being horses, always willing to eat. Ridley took the bucket and poured a taste into the common trough before he brought the rest to Cloud, who hadn’t gotten up. Ridley set the bucket in front of him.

Cloud sucked up a mouthful of warm mash, and on the strength of that, found it worthwhile to get to his feet and go head-down in the bucket—maybe not to eat much: Cloud wasn’t a fool, among a ca

That meant that Cloud’s rider could go to the warm barracks and the fireside, and Da

Da

“Where did you come from?” the little girl wanted to know, looking back as she walked ahead of them in their little sphere of light; but Ridley said sternly, as he shone the light down the passage: “Get on to the barracks, Je

Man. Man, the senior rider said. People down in Shamesey certainly hadn’t called him that. He’d been struggling all during the trip for Dan instead of Da

And a village rider saw him as a man, an equal, worth respect just for living to get up this mountain.

That was worth the hike up here.

Je

“Rain isn’t your horse,” Ridley said. “You wait for Shimmer’s foal, miss. —Get to the barracks and open that door before I tan your backside for good and all.”

Young Je

Couldn’t feel his feet. Couldn’t see up from down in the shadows. He was passing out of Cloud’s range and his sense of orientation was going.

He put out a hand along the wooden wall, seeking balance, thinking, I’m going to fall—about the time they overtook Je

Warm air met them. He dumped his handful of bloody snow and walked in blind, with Ridley behind him, caught a lungful of the heat inside, and felt himself going as his knees had just turned to jelly.

Strong arms caught him around the ribs and helped him toward the fire and the light. Carlo and Randy were sitting on the floor against the wall.

Brio

Ridley let him down. He sat against the fireside stones, that being all that was going to hold him up. He had just enough strength to take off his hat and scarf, and a moment later to struggle out of his coat and a couple of sweaters before he smothered. He told himself he wasn’t going to pass out. Wasn’t going to make a spectacle.

Ridley came and checked his hands in the bright lamplight.

“Not as bad as could be,” Ridley pronounced his fingers. “A little burn. But not real bad.” Then Ridley unlaced his boots for him and carefully pulled them off. He wasn’t sure he really wanted to know; but they were his feet, he’d no choice, and it wasn’t would-happen, it was already had-happened, whatever the verdict was going to be as the socks came off, one layer after another.

“Mmn,” Ridley said. “Going to lose a little skin. —Feel that?”

“Yeah.” It felt as if Ridley drew blood. Then Ridley stripped the other foot. He felt those toes, too. It hurt so much tears began ru

“Wasn’t sure for a long time that you were human,” the woman said, squatting down near him. “Lot of spookiness out there tonight. Lot of spookiness the last week or so. You know anything about it?”

“Yeah.” His gut knotted up. He started thinking frantically what he could say. “But get these kids to the village first.”

“You go,” Ridley said (he thought) to Callie, and a second later said, “Je

The woman for her part wasn’t enthusiastic about leaving Ridley alone, Da

They’d gotten her here.

And hadn’t they done something good in that? Even heroic?

Even if he had been stupid and missed not just one shelter but both of them in the storm?

And as for himself, at the definite end of his stupid years, his do-anything, dare-anything childhood, and grown older and wiser all in one disastrous climb—he fingered his nose and his ears, wondering if they were frostbitten and whether he’d be scarred for life from this adventure, or whether he could just swear to God he’d learned and didn’t need to do anything this stupid again.

The woman put on a coat and prepared to leave as Ridley pressed a warm teacup into his hands, wrapped in a cloth. That was, the pain in his hands told him, a very, very good idea.

Meanwhile the little girl—Je

“Cloud,” he said, grateful for such simple, answerable questions. “My name’s Dan Fisher. I’m from Shamesey.”

“From Shamesey!”

He was aware her father was listening. And her mother. His voice was down to a hoarse thread. “Yeah.”

“What brought you to the mountain?” Ridley asked, with clear suspicion, and the woman hesitated in leaving.

“Friend of mine needed help.”

Ridley went to the cabinet and took out a bottle. It was spirits. Ridley came and poured a generous dollop into Da

“And what brought you all the way up here?” Ridley asked, and Carlo blurted out,

“Because there’s nothing left down there. Tarmin’s gone.”

You didn’t need the horses to feel the shock in their minds: fear, disbelief, that Tarmin, the biggest village on the mountain, their main depot for shipments going or coming… didn’t exist anymore.

“Tarmin isgone,” Da