The pillars of creation

With a wave to the stableman as he held the big door open for them, they rode out into the frigid night. Both horses, apparently pleased at the prospect of activity, despite the hour, stepped briskly along the street. Rusty turned her head back, making sure that Betty, at their left, was keeping up.

It wasn't long before they passed the last building on their way out of town. Thin clouds raced before the rising moon, but left enough light to turn the snow-covered road to a silk ribbon between the thick darkness of the woods along each side.

Betty's rope suddenly jerked tight. Jennsen looked over her shoulder, expecting to see the goat trying to nibble at a young branch. Instead, Betty, her legs stiff, had her hooves dug in, resisting any progress.

"Betty," Jennsen whispered harshly, "come on! What's wrong with you? Come on." The goat's weight was no match for the horse, so she was dragged down the snowy road against her will.

When Sebastian's horse stepped over, jostling Rusty, Jennsen saw the trouble. They were overtaking a man walking down the road. In his dark clothing, they hadn't seen him at the right side, against the dark of the trees. Knowing that horses didn't like surprises, Jennsen patted Rusty's neck to assure her that the man wasn't anything to be frightened of. Betty, though, remained unconvinced, and used all the rope available to swing a wide arc.

Jennsen saw then that it was the big blond man from the inn, the man who had offered to buy them a drink-the man she thought, for some reason, should dwell only in her dream life rather than in her waking life.

Jennsen kept an eye on the man as they passed him. As cold as she was, it felt as if a door opened into the infinitely colder eternal night of the underworld.

Sebastian and the stranger exchanged a brief greeting in passing. Once beyond the man, Betty scampered ahead, pulling at her rope, eager to put distance between her and the man, "Grushdeva du kalt misht.»

Jennsen, her breath caught fast at the end of a gasp, turned to stare wide-eyed at the man walking down the road behind. It sounded like it had been he who'd spoken the words. That was impossible; those were the strange words from inside her head.

Sebastian made no notice of it, so she didn't say anything lest he think her crazy.

With Betty's agreement, Jennsen urged her horse to pick up the pace.

Just before they rounded a bend and were away, Jennsen looked back one last time. In the moonlight she saw the man grinning at her.

CHAPTER 13

Oba was throwing a hay bale down from the loft when he heard his mother's voice.

" Oba! Where are you? Get down here!"

Oba scurried down the ladder. He brushed hay from himself as he straightened before her waiting scowl.

"What is it, Mama?"

"Where's my medicine? And your cure?" Her glare swept across the floor. "I see you still haven't gotten the mess out of the barn. I didn't hear you come home last night. What took you so long? Look at that stanchion rail! Haven't you fixed that, yet? What have you been doing all this time? Do I have to tell you every little thing?"

Oba wasn't sure which question he was supposed to answer first. She always did that to him, confused him before he could answer her. When he faltered, she would then insult and ridicule him. After all he had learned the night before, and all that had happened, he thought that he might feel more confident when he faced his mother.

In the light of day, standing back in the bam, with his mother gathered before him like a thunderhead, he felt much the same as he always did before her storming onslaught, ashamed, small, worthless. He had felt big when he came home. Important. Now he felt as if he were shrinking. Her words shriveled him.

"Well, I was-"

"You was dawdling! That's what you was doing-dawdling! Here I am waiting for my medicine, my knees aching me, and my son Oba the oaf is kicking a rock down the road, forgetting what I sent him for."

"I didn't forget-"

"Then where's my medicine? Where is it?"

"Mama, I didn't get it-"

"I knew it! I knew you was spending the money I gave you. I worked my fingers to the bone at spinning to earn that, and you go wasting it on women! Whoring! That's what you was doing, whoring!"

"No, Mama, I didn't waste it on women."

"Then where's my medicine! Why didn't you get it like I told you to!"

"I couldn't because-"

"You mean you wouldn't, you worthless oaf! You only had to go to Lathea's-"

"Lathea is dead."

There, he'd said it. It was out and in the light of day.

His mother's mouth hung open, but no words rained out. He had never seen her go silent like that before, seen her so shocked that her jaw just hung. He liked it.

Oba fished a coin from his pocket, one he had set aside to return so she wouldn't think he'd spent her money. Amid the drama of such a rare silence, he handed her the coin.

"Dead… Lathea?" She stared at the coin in her palm. "What do you mean, dead? She went ill?"