Cloud's Rider

When the games wore down and eyes grew heavy they put the Goss boy to bed in Fisher’s room, figuring Dan wouldn’t mind, and of the several rooms, it was clean, dusted, and they’d opened the door vents to let the heat in from the main room.

He put Je

“Is Randy going to stay here?” Je

“Seems likely,” Callie said. “He might. If he’s good and minds what I say.”

“I hope he is,” Je

Ridley pulled the covers up and kissed his daughter good night. He and Callie went to bed, and he and Callie made love for the first time since Fisher had come to the barracks. The ambient was that quiet.

For the first time since Dan Fisher had arrived at their gate there was peace in the camp.

Chapter 21

Cloud twitched and brought his head up, an earthquake at Da

“Too quiet,” Tara remarked to Guil, on whose face the firelight cast a slight light. “Yeah,” Da

And having gotten maybe an hour or so of sleep, and considering they were dealing with a beast that could manipulate latches and camouflage itself in the ambient, Da

“I’ll stay on watch a while,” he said to Tara.

“Trust the horses,” Tara said. “They don’t get surprised. No need to lose sleep.”

“We don’t know this thing.” If he hadn’t been waked on the sudden he wouldn’t have argued with a senior rider, but Tara just frowned and looked off into the dark. Guil had shut his eyes, but he wasn’t asleep: the ambient was too live with his thoughts: <Tara and Da

“Understand,” Tara said. “Sending you on. I’d no idea about the horse. Or anything wrong.”

He couldn’t come back with what he thought was Tara’s real reason, <Guil lying sick>and <Tara wanting Guil.> He tried to keep his thoughts out of the ambient and had no luck at all. “I knew that,” he said. “Figured it out, anyway. I shouldn’t have moved from the shelter. Hell, I should have shoved Carlo there out the door and we’d have been fine.”

“Except what’s moved in on the mountain.”

“Yes, ma’am. That’s for sure.”

Tara gave a short laugh. “I’m no villager.”

“No—” Ma’am was his mother’s ma

“Get some rest. We’ll fix things tomorrow.”

“Right,” he said, having presumed as far as he wanted to on senior riders’ patience, and he leaned back against Cloud’s side.

Tara settled down against Flicker. Carlo was out cold, in the ambient just barely, in that very faint way you could pick up someone sound asleep, at very close range.

Carlo andSpook were out, Da

Fighting a solitary war with whatever-it-was. Keeping it pe

Stubborn horse. Very stubborn, ca

So was the horse he was leaning against, the one keeping him warm in the icy cold air. He pillowed his head against Cloud and, patting a muscled shoulder, received a rumbling contentment-sound in return.

Je

She was in this girl’s house and she told her that. She told her so very firmly, and told her she couldn’t have Rain and she was sorry, but that was the way it was. And the girl was very angry and told her to get out.

So she flew back over the camp wall and told Rain he shouldn’t listen to this girl.

But something listened. Something came close, and it might be a horse. But she didn’t think so. And she flew back to that girl in the doctor’s house and stood in the middle of the room and wanted to warn her this wasn’t a good idea, and she shouldn’t call out beyond the wall like that.

Then something waked her up and she was in her own bed and mama was in the doorway and so was papa.

“Je

“I don’t know,” she said, and papa said, “It’s that damned girl. The horse must be back.”

“Is Dan back?”

“No,” mama said, and sat down on the side of her bed and set a hand on the other side of her. “You stay out of the ambient, Je

“It’s really real?”

“It’s real. You don’t go out there.”

“But she wants Rain!”

“Rain won’t go to her,” papa said. “The ambient’s just really loud tonight. The horses are upset. I’ll go out and calm things down.”

“Probably both of us should,” mama said. And Randy had shown up in her bedroom doorway, dressed, but with his shirt half on. “You stay inside and see Je

“It’s my sister,” Randy said. He sounded scared. “It’s my sister. I know what she sounds like.”

Then the bell was ringing again. Je

“That’s the breakthrough alarm,” papa said, and she remembered papa and mama had always told her if she ever heard all the bells, the gate’s big and little ones and the church tower and the fire bell all at once, then she should lock everything down tight and get the box of shells and set them on the table.

And never, never, never go out to the horses.

But Rainwas out there.

Rain neededher.

“You stay put!” papa said in his harshest tone. “Randy, can you do anything with your sister?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yellowflower,” mama said. And papa:

“Je

“Everybody’s in my room!”

“We’re going over to the village.”

“What about the horses?” She wasn’tleaving Rain. She’d never been so scared in her life.

Then half the bells that had been ringing so frantically stopped— leaving just the church bells and one other.

“Is it done?” she asked.

“No,” papa said. “Get dressed!”

Burn got up all of a sudden—which left his sleeping rider scrambling awake, sore side and all, and reaching after his rifle and struggling, with it for a prop, toward his feet, as the rest of the horses surged to their feet and the ambient that had been very quiet suddenly got louder by reason of one young horse that was overwhelming it with question and fright. There was the sound of bells, was what it sounded like, echoing from somewhere distant. Or maybe it was coming through the ambient, which was <there,> and more lively about them than it had been. <Fear> was contagious.

“Da

And it seemed to him that it came from the direction of Evergreen.

Evergreen—where Brio

Not a good thing. Not at all a good thing.

“That’s Evergreen,” Tara said. “What did the ride take you, Da

“Half a day. Six hours at least. I stopped some.” <Depressions in snow. Carlo falling off. Da