Star Rise Page 6

  “I don’t believe he can understand us,” Corazón murmured.

  “But I think he does, dear,” Angela whispered.

  “Never,” Bobtail snorted.

  Tijo nodded at the chestnut stallion.

  The horses backed away. It was as if a freak had wandered into their midst.

  Yazz took a few slow steps toward Tijo. “Would you care to show these horses how you can ride? Slip onto my back.”

  “Mules are a peculiar lot,” Bobtail muttered.

  “That we are,” Yazz replied cheerfully, and then did something none of them had ever before witnessed. The mule sank onto one knee, lowering herself so the child with the crooked leg could mount her easily.

  Tijo slipped onto the mule’s back as the others watched in stunned silence. The boy did not make the mouth clicks with his tongue as the Ibers often did. His heels did not dig in. His arms hung loose and did not even grasp the mule’s mane. But the mule moved, first in a simple trot, and then slid into a gallop. Something was transpiring between the boy and the mule, for the mule had begun to trace intricate figures, loops and curving shapes. All the while the boy sat in a perfect balance that none of them had ever seen in a rider. They even began to wonder if he was a “rider.” He had in some way simply merged with the mule. Estrella saw all this. She sensed this fusion. The boy and the mule had each become more than the sum of their parts.

  Hold On stood attentive but trembling. His hearing was so sensitive that he could almost see the figures that Tijo and Yazz were making. Could the herd see what he understood about this boy? Could Tijo gain their trust in this moment?

  “He doesn’t even have a rope on his neck,” Grullo said.

  “Of course not,” Hold On replied curtly.

  “But how does he do it?” Corazón jerked her head as if she was recalling the bridle and the bit.

  “It’s a mystery,” Hold On replied. “Like all the best things.” He held his head high and whinnied. “Come back, Tijo. Show them how you can ride an old blind and very foolish stallion.”

  “It’s impossible,” Sky snickered.

  “I don’t know what to make of it.” Grullo shook his head rapidly, as if the answer would somehow fall out of his mane like a burr.

  Yazz trotted over, and in one smooth motion, Tijo slid from the mule’s back onto the stallion’s. Hold On was more than ready to have him ride.

  Off they streaked across the landscape. Together the boy and the horse galloped in ever more complex loops, with Hold On leaping right over stands of scrub. His timing was flawless and yet the horses saw no signals pass between the boy and the stallion. It was simply astonishing.

  Astonishing and disturbing, Estrella thought. The connection between Hold On and Tijo was peculiar and vaguely threatening. There must be some trick. Something she and the rest of the herd could not see. Had the boy enchanted the stallion?

  “Brujo!” she heard Corazón whisper to Angela. Brujo was an Iber word that she did not quite understand. She turned to Corazón.

  “Brujo — what is that?”

  “Witch, devil,” Angela replied, and looked narrowly at the spectacle of the boy and the stallion racing across the sweep of land.

  “Has he cast an enchantment on Hold On?” Estrella asked.

  “It would seem that way,” Corazón said with a shiver in her voice. “Magic. Dark magic.”

  The two words were like an ice sliver in Estrella’s heart.

  The first herd was astonished and nervous. Tijo and Yazz watched as they gathered in a tight huddle, a configuration they often used during winter blizzards when they turned rumps to the onslaught of the storm.

  “They don’t like me, I can tell,” Tijo said.

  “Stay calm. Let them get used to you,” Yazz replied.

  “What makes you think they will give me that much time?” He did not want to say it, but he sensed that herds and clans were probably much alike. They had their rules, their suspicions. Perhaps the whole idea was foolish from the start. How could he possibly find a home among these horses? He could not even find one among humans. Where would he go?

  “It’s not just you, Tijo,” Yazz said. “They’re skittish about me as well.” Yazz could barely hear them, but she knew from the way they were staring that they had shifted their focus to her. She angled her head, stepped a bit closer, and swiveled her extremely large ears, which were twice the length of any horse’s ears.

  “I don’t like it,” Bobtail was saying. “I don’t like it one bit. The boy is strange, and the mule? You know what mules are like.” He turned to Corazón.

  “Well, they are certainly not our … our …”

  “Order,” Angela said.

  “They’re crude,” Bobtail said.

  “Yazz is extremely intelligent,” Hold On said.

  “A mule, intelligent?” Arriero said.

  “Yes, Arriero!” Hold On replied sharply, then sighed. To think that he had for so long yearned to be back with the first herd and now nothing was as he had anticipated. He turned to Estrella.

  Estrella could not meet his gaze, and although she knew he could not see her clearly, she was fighting not to lay her ears back in his presence. She did not fear him. She feared these strange creatures who accompanied him.

  “What do you think, Estrella?”

  “I think the boy is strange, and I … I worry that he has … cast a spell on you and the mule, and that is how he can ride you.”

  “What?” Hold On was taken aback, though he knew what Estrella was thinking. On the evening just before the fire broke out in the canyon, a coyote had lured Estrella into the brush toward a clump of a plant — flora loca, it was called. She had become delusional and in her fevered dreams had thought the coyote was her dam, Perlina.

  Estrella began to tremble and scratch the ground nervously with one hoof. She did not like to be reminded of that evening. She had been a fool. Now she did not know how to respond to Hold On. She could not bear the thought of Hold On thinking poorly of her. And if not for this boy, they might never have found Hold On again.

  “Listen to me, all of you,” Grullo said. “We have to remember that the boy has helped Hold On. He has become Hold On’s eyes. Who knows what might have happened if they had not found each other?” He tossed his head with a snort.

  “So before we say no to the boy and no to the mule, we should let them travel with us,” Grullo said. “Give them a chance.”

  “One human can draw more humans,” Bobtail said.

  “We have to try,” Grullo said emphatically.

  They turned their heads to Estrella, waiting to see what she thought. Once again, she found herself in an impossible position. The boy made her uneasy — his smell, his movements — everything recalled the terrible men who’d left her dam to die in the sea. But she couldn’t cast him out without betraying Hold On, the best friend she had in the world. “He can stay with us, for now. Until we decide what’s best.”

  Despite Grullo’s plea, the horses of the first herd did not take readily to the newcomers. Later that afternoon when the sun was still high, the horses settled down for a brief rest under the spreading branches of three cottonwood trees. The manner in which they had arranged themselves seemed purposely to exclude the mule and Tijo.

  “Come on over here, dear,” Angela said to Hold On. “It will be cooler in the shade. These late autumn afternoons can turn hot.”

  “No, thank you,” Hold On said. “I shall stay here.”

  Tijo reached up and stroked his neck. You can go.

  He neighed softly in reply. I prefer your company.

  These four simple little words, I prefer your company, glowed in Tijo’s mind like the brightest constellations in the sky. Tijo had said good-bye once to the person most dear to him — Haru. Saying good-bye to Hold On was unimaginable.

  El Miedo was riding on his fine horse El Noble as he made his way north. It was bobcat territory, and the horses and pack animals were skittish, but not this magnificent sta
llion. Nothing seemed to frighten him. He had also picked up the scent of the bobcat, but bobcats did not frighten him. He had fought them off before with the help of Coyote when he traveled with Azul, the two mares, and the filly Lourdes.

  In fact, the bobcats knew he was working with Coyote. And for all their cunning, and their fleetness and their strength, they feared Coyote.

  Things often worked out for the best, Pego thought as he made his way through this rolling countryside braided by two rivers. It was as if the very landscape acknowledged his and El Miedo’s power, for the thin silvery grass shivered in their wake as they passed through. With El Miedo astride, they led five hundred men, eighty-three carts, twenty-four mules, and nearly six hundred horses. The parts fused into one massive creature that seemed neither man nor beast but some other force of nature, as if a torrential sea were plowing through the landscape.

  Coyote had brought him to El Miedo, and El Miedo had immediately recognized Pego’s quality, his nobility.

  Pego only wished those pathetic horses of the first herd could see him. They had rejected him as their leader to follow the young filly Estrella. She knew nothing and yet they believed in her. Her bloodline, he could tell, was not nearly as ancient nor as pure and unsullied as his own. Her mother had been a silvery gray, and like so many pale horses, she was suspected of having what some called the Old Eye or the Eye of Time. All rubbish, of course. But they believed it.

  All the horses who had ever turned from him should see him at this moment — leading more than six hundred horses, five hundred men, and fourscore wagons. He was El Noble, the horse with the greatest conquistador who ever rode now on his back, amid the jangle of the steel sword of Toledo and the creak of the wagons. They were a force that would dominate this new world.

  Of course, the chances of the first herd’s surviving the fire in the canyon were remote. Yet it would’ve almost been worth having them alive to see him now. That filly Estrella was too proud. El Miedo would have left her back in bloody ribbons, as he had the mule Jenny’s. And though Bobtail was said to have been a favorite of the Seeker, he was no match for Pego. He would have been given, perhaps, to a second lieutenant.

  Pego sensed that greater rewards were to come his way. El Miedo had been granted a governorship. The Seeker had not. This meant that this new world was theirs! They had found much silver already, but what they needed now to build his palace were slaves, and El Miedo had plans for that. He had sent out scouts. There were two Chitzen villages on the move, and he knew El Miedo planned to capture them when the time was right. But they also needed more horses. A dozen or more had escaped along with ten mules on the night when Yazz had kicked out the rotten rails of the corral.

  Last night Coyote had come again. He slipped into the encampment and found Pego near the watering trough, the special one reserved for El Miedo’s favorites. There were no others of those favorites nearby.

  “Greetings,” Pego neighed.

  “You seem well settled,” Coyote answered, and looked about casually. “This herd has dwindled. Not quite six hundred now. You are not tempted to flee as the others did the night the mule kicked down the rails of the corral?”

  “No. Why should I go? I lead the greatest force in the New World. My master loves me.”

  “Clever,” Coyote replied. “He loves you because you are like him — One to Be Feared.”

  Pego’s withers bristled with excitement. This reaction was not lost on Coyote. “The time has come,” Coyote said.

  “The time for what?”

  “The time for vengeance and … and” — Coyote’s voice had dropped to a hoarse whisper — “ascendance.” Coyote fancied himself a bit of a poet and often fell into rhyme. “Vengeance and ascendance,” he repeated, and looked up where, if storm clouds had not roiled the sky, the star horse would be galloping through the darkness. “You are a god, are you not?” Pego felt a deep thrill and could not restrain himself from a slight nod. “Now is the time. Your time.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Oh, my. For a god, you have short ears sometimes. Can you not hear me? Your enemies live.”

  “Estrella, first herd. They survived?” Pego laid flat his ears and peeled back his lips as if searching for the filly’s scent.

  “Yes.” There was a tone of exasperation in Coyote’s reply. “Through no fault of mine. There is some solace, however. The old stallion Hold On is blind.” He paused and then added in a voice dripping with sarcasm, “Shall we mourn his loss? Cry bitter tears? Oh, I forgot — horses are incapable of crying.” There was a reek of nastiness that came off Coyote that would have alarmed any normal animal, but Pego was not one of those.

  “Really! But what of Estrella?”

  “Not a mark on her.” Coyote paused. “But don’t despair. Is it not clear to you? Your master, El Miedo, needs horses desperately since the mule escaped and what, fifteen, twenty horses fled? Just think of how he will love you if we lead them to the first herd. And you … you, my friend, will ascend. You shall become lord of the largest herd on the continent. El Miedo will have the priest bless you. He calls you El Noble now. But I promise you, when he realizes what you have done, he will — with of course a bit of help from me — look toward the heavens and see who you really are. And he shall call you Pegasus!”

  Coyote did not mention the boy Tijo or that it was his own vengeance as much as Pego’s that drove him. He did not say that he had been cheated of his due by Haru. That she had swiped that infant from his jaws when he had come out from his lair, hearing the boy infant’s mewlings. But Coyote sought more than vengeance. He wanted power. He knew his world was changing with the arrival of these new animals called horses, with these men astride them from a distant land.

  Then Coyote danced off into the night that swirled with rain and fog.

  I am coyote,

  I am coyote,

  First Angry they call me.

  I am the dream maker

  and the dream taker.

  You might blink

  But never think

  While I work my magic

  To craft the tragic,

  If not for me,

  There would be no you.

  I know your secrets,

  I have no regrets,

  I prey on dreams

  That through you stream,

  Leaving bodies

  For carrion eaters.

  I am the dream feeder,

  I am coyote.

  It was one thing being left out of a patch of shade in the hottest hours of the day. But there were now no “hottest hours.” The midday sun had grown weak. There was a bite in the air. Winter in the old country was harsh even when they were brought into the stables of the Iber and were given grain every day. But the winters were much harsher here in this new world. The horses had endured one winter already in their first year. They needed one another in order to survive.

  Hold On, Yazz, and Tijo had been traveling with the herd for several days now. The day before, they had stopped and gathered around a small watering hole. Arriero had twisted his head around to glance at Tijo briefly and then begun drinking. The message was clear. Find your own watering hole. Tijo turned away. Estrella had watched Tijo limp slowly downstream. I don’t know, she thought, about witches and water. But I do know about loneliness.

  The one time Tijo never felt alone was when he was riding Hold On or Yazz. It was, of course, the source of the herd’s suspicions, yet they could not tear their eyes away.

  “How does he command you?” Sky asked when Hold On and the boy returned with some of the plants they needed for salves.

  “Tijo does not command,” Hold On replied.

  “I cannot believe it,” Estrella said.

  “You don’t believe what you cannot see, eh?” Hold On said in a low, insistent voice. He had never addressed her in quite this manner. She cringed. “Watch this, Estrella.”

  Hold On and Tijo set off again. A thrill pulsed through Tijo. Now was the time to show this he
rd what they could really do. They think you give me the commands! Hold On flexed the muscles in his shoulders and shifted the cadence of his steps ever so slightly as Tijo adjusted his weight. They were approaching a narrow brook that was rushing with water. The herd watched tensely.

  “You see Hold On hears the water,” Yazz said.

  “But how does he know how wide the creek is? There is a big rock in the middle!” Estrella gasped.

  Yazz said nothing. Let them worry.

  “What is the boy doing?” Estrella was alarmed, for now Tijo was standing up on Hold On’s back. They had never seen anything like it. Hold On arched his long neck. His shoulders began to lift as he gathered all his strength. His forelegs curled tighter and the back ones flexed. Suddenly, he was airborne, as if all the stallion’s energy had been uncoiled. The whole time, the boy’s feet never left Hold On’s back. They were both flying. None of the horses had ever seen such a leap. Not even the older ones like Grullo and Bobtail and Arriero, who were veterans of many battles.

  The horses regarded the boy with a wonder untainted by suspicion. He was a different kind of human from any they had ever known. Hold On was not actually being ridden by Tijo, nor was the boy being carried, exactly, across the landscape by Hold On. They had fused into one entirely new creature. It was impossible to tell where horse left off and boy began. It was not witchcraft, but it was miraculous.

  Yet despite their amazement, they were still apprehensive around Tijo. Was he human? Or part horse? Uncertainty, ambiguity confounded the herd, leaving Tijo to wonder if he was destined to be omo forever.

  The scent of the bobcat was growing stronger. Tijo had begun to fashion blade points for his arrows and spear. He needed meat, but could these blades serve the horses, who only grazed on grasses?

  It was chilly and Tijo shivered alone. Hold On and Yazz had gone in search of water, and the other horses were standing in pairs for warmth. Tijo yawned. Despite the cold, his eyelids were growing heavy. The air shuddered with the hoot of an owl.