Dreamsnake

At sunrise, what? She had been in a hurry for so many days, rushing against sickness or death or the implacable sands, that she had to stop and make herself realize that she had no reason for hurrying any more, no overwhelming need to get from here to anywhere else, nor to sleep a few hours and rise yawning at sunrise or sunset. Her home awaited her, and she was not at all sure it would still be her home once she reached it. She had nothing to take back but failure and bad news and one violent-tempered sand viper that might or might not be useful. She untied the serpent case and laid it gently on the ground.

When the horses were rubbed down, Melissa knelt by the packs and started getting out food and the paraffin stove. This was the first time since they started out that they had made a proper camp. Snake sat on her heels by her daughter to help with dinner.

“I’ll do it,” Melissa said. “Why don't you rest?”

“That doesn’t seem quite fair,” Snake said.

“I don’t mind.”

“That isn’t the point.”

“I like to do things for you,” Melissa said.

Snake put her hands on Melissa’s shoulders, not forcing or even urging her to turn. “I know you do. But I like to do things for you, too.”

Melissa’s fingers fumbled with buckles and straps. “That isn’t right,” she said finally. “You’re a healer, and I—I work in a stable. It’s right for me to do things for you.”

“Where does it say that a healer has more rights than someone who used to work in a stable? You’re my daughter, and we’re a partnership.”

Melissa flung herself around and hugged Snake tightly, hiding her face against her shirt. Snake embraced her and held her, rocking back and forth on the hard ground, comforting Melissa as if she were the much younger child she had never had the chance to be.

After a few minutes Melissa’s arms loosened and she pulled back, self-contained again, glancing away in embarrassment.

“I don’t like not doing anything.”

“When did you ever have the chance to try?”

Melissa shrugged.

“We can take turns,” Snake said, “or split the chores every day. Which would you rather do?”

Melissa met her gaze with a quick, relieved smile. “Split the chores every day.” She glanced around as if seeing the camp for the first time. “Maybe there’s dead wood farther on,” she said. “And we need some water.” She reached for the woodstrap and the waterskin.

Snake took the waterskin from her. “I’ll meet you back here in a few minutes. If you don’t find anything don’t spend a lot of time looking. Whatever falls during the winter probably gets used up by the first traveler every spring. If there is a first traveler every spring.” The place not only looked as though no one had been here for many years, it had an undefinable aura of abandonment.

The spring flowed swiftly past the camp and there was no sign now of mud where Swift and Squirrel had drunk, but Snake walked a short distance upstream anyway. Near the source of the spring she put the waterskin down and climbed to the top of a tremendous boulder that provided a view of most of the surrounding area. No one else was in sight, no horses, no camps, no smoke. Snake was finally almost willing to let herself believe the crazy was gone, or never really there at all, a coincidence of her meeting one real crazy and a misguided and incompetent thief. Even if they were the same person, she had seen no sign of him since the street fight. That was not as long ago as it seemed, but perhaps it was long enough.

Snake climbed back down to the spring and held the waterskin just beneath the silvery surface. Water gurgled and bubbled into the opening and slipped over her hands and through her fingers, cold and quick. Water was a different being in the mountains. The leather bag bulged up full. Snake looped a couple of half hitches around its neck and slung the strap over her shoulder.

Melissa had not yet returned to camp. Snake puttered around for a few minutes, getting together a meal of dried provisions that looked the same even after they had been soaked. They tasted the same, too, but they were a little bit easier to eat. She unrolled the blankets. She opened the serpent case but Mist remained inside. The cobra often stayed in her dark compartment after a long trip, and grew bad-tempered if disturbed. Snake felt uneasy with Melissa out of sight. She could not dispel her discomfort by reminding herself that Melissa was tough and independent. Instead of opening Sand’s compartment so the rattler could come out, or even checking on the sand viper, a task she did not much enjoy, she refastened the case and stood up to call her daughter. Suddenly Swift and Squirrel shied violently, snorting in fear, Melissa cried “Snake! Look out!” in a voice of warning and terror, and rocks and dirt clattered down the side of the hill.

Snake ran toward the sound of scuffling, the knife on her belt half-drawn. She rounded a boulder and slid to a stop.