Every night, the horses gathered in the wallow to make the weather shelter. It seemed like a special place — a place where winter could not come even though it might be snowing furiously. A place where the wind grew calm and came with a sigh rather than a bluster across the vast plains. A place where the moonlight trickled down through the leafless branches of a tree until one could almost imagine the buds of spring.
One evening, Tijo could not sleep. Estrella was on guard at the edge of the wallow, so he got up and made his way carefully around the large bodies of the horses that surrounded him.
Estrella could tell that something was troubling him. She lowered her head and tousled his hair with her muzzle. “What’s wrong?”
Tijo turned and looked at the filly for a long time before answering. “Have you ever seen something that maybe at first you think is not real but then begin to believe it?”
Estrella felt a tremor pass through her. She nodded but was reluctant to say anything. Not yet at least. It had been so long since she had seen the flickering tiny horse that had guided them so faithfully.
“Tell me, Tijo.” She neighed so softly he could barely hear it. “What is it that you have seen?”
He was silent a long while. “I’ve seen an owl — an omo owl, the people call it. It has a white face and flies very silently through the night. And I think this owl is perhaps the spirit lodge for Haru, the woman who raised me.”
“Spirit lodge?”
“Yes. In the world of our people, some spirits become guardians for those they left behind. They take leave of the spirit camps from time to time to look in on those they have loved. Haru found me when I had been cast out to die because of my lame leg and now she follows me as I live. But lately she has not come so often and I think it is because I have you, the first herd.” He paused. “Now it is your turn to tell me what you have seen.”
Estrella threw her head back as far as she could. “You see the dipping cup stars and how the last one points?”
“Yes. The North Star.”
“It is our guide star.”
“But that star is real. No one would call you foolish for using the North Star as your guide star.”
“I know, but I have another guide in my mind’s eye,” Estrella said.
She told him about the tiny horse she had first spied in the flash of her dam’s eye as she was dying.
“It took me a long time to understand what this horse was, what it meant. I would see it carved in the cliff rocks as if it had been there forever. And then one day I realized it had been there forever. I had thought I was leading the herd toward the sweet grass, but then I realized that this tiny horse was really leading us on a trail older than time, not just to the sweet grass but to … to …”
“To what?”
“To the place where horses began. You see, we are coming home to the place where we started. She is First Horse. The dawn horse.”
Tijo reached up and put his hands on either side of Estrella’s lovely face. He had grown so tall that it was easy for him to touch the star on her forehead, for which she had been named. He began to trace it with his finger.
“Estrella, I saw your tiny horse.”
“What?” She almost staggered with astonishment. Had he looked so deep into her eyes when he stitched his own face that he had seen the constellations that swept the midnight of her mind?
“I saw it with the owl.”
“The one you believe to be the spirit lodge for Haru?” Estrella asked.
Tijo nodded. “It was the oddest thing. That night when I first saw the omo owl, I felt as if my own spirit had slipped from my body, as if I were outside my own skin but looking at myself at the same time. Then the owl spoke.”
“What did it say?”
“It spoke of many things, some I didn’t understand. It spoke of something called ga that would only be known in times to come.”
“Times to come?” Estrella was bewildered.
“And the omo owl told me the same thing you told me. ‘First Horse,’ it said. ‘The dawn horse.’ He is the one who leads the herd.”
“But where is he now? And where is your omo owl?” Estrella asked, her voice tinged with sadness. She looked longingly into Tijo’s eyes as if searching for the dawn horse but seeing only her own reflection.
“I think they are with us, Estrella. You and I might be what omo calls long spirits or weavers of time, but we are both of us threads in the same blanket.” Tijo tipped his head back and looked up at the starry blanket of the night and pulled his own more tightly around his shoulders.
It was a starry night, and El Miedo was riding Pego through a territory thick with the scent of bobcat, yet the stallion did not shy. One of El Miedo’s lieutenants wheeled his own horse about and began beating her savagely on the shoulder because the mare refused to go on.
“Ah! Don Roberto, your mare is stubborn.” El Miedo snickered.
“There’s blood ahead on the trail. It must be bobcat blood; that is the only thing that makes this mare shy.”
“Ride beside me. El Noble is steady.”
“The stallion doesn’t shy?”
“Never!” El Miedo said smugly.
From the corner of his eye, Pego saw the slinking shadow of Coyote. This was his moment. He sensed it. Your night to be named. Your proper name to come from the heavens, the familiar voice whispered in his head.
The mare named Artemisia pranced nervously beside the stallion.
“There’s blood down the trail ahead. Bobcat blood,” she neighed.
“Artemisia, you are named for the hunting goddess. And you let a little blood scare you,” Pego replied.
“A bobcat killed my foal and you expect me not to be frightened?”
He snorted in disdain. “I expect you to do your duty. To serve!”
“And you are not frightened?”
“As my master said — never!”
Pego began to trot forward. His master gave him his head, as the stallion was fearless and seemed to know where he should go. He came to a quick halt near the blood, dropped his muzzle, sniffing the ground. He had picked up another scent. Not quite horse but almost. Was it … horse … horse and perhaps human? The scent of three creatures’ blood threaded in the air. And then El Miedo spied the droppings. He dismounted to examine the droppings and the tracks. Two minutes later, he came racing back to El Noble.
“Horses have come this way!” El Miedo exclaimed. He gave the stallion a pat, then looked at the sky. The winged horse constellation glittered fiercely. “¡Dios mío! The stars shine their light on this horse.”
It was as the dream foretold. The kingdom, the crown, an empire were about to be his. He had found the trail of horses.
“El Noble found the trail,” the lieutenant exclaimed. “We will capture those horses and then we go on and capture the land.”
“El Noble is no longer his name,” El Miedo retorted. “From here on, he shall be called by the name of the heavenly winged horse of the night. We shall call him Pegasus. Summon the priest.”
Pego’s heart thundered in his chest. Vengeance and ascendance. Coyote’s words rang in his head. He turned his head to a slope encrusted with sagebrush and watched the coyote dance off into the night.
The plump padre came riding up from the rear ranks. He dismounted his horse with the help of a groom and hurried up to where El Miedo stood beside his stallion. The two men exchanged words briefly. The padre sent the groom back to fetch his saddlebag. When he returned, the padre took out a vial of holy water and a white cloth that he used to bless the horses on Saint Eligius Day. However, that was a blessing, not a christening. Could a beast be christened? And to christen that animal with the name of a heathen god — Pegasus? He was unsure, though he dared not question El Miedo. But what would His Holiness say? Well, His Holiness was far, far away. The padre nodded at El Miedo, who flicked his whip lightly behind Pego’s knee. Pego lowered his head and bent his knee until it was flat on the ground. His opposite leg
extended in a graceful forward slant. El Miedo nodded once again to the padre, who began to sprinkle holy water on Pego’s head.
“May this horse, O Lord, receive thy blessing and be sound in body and by the grace of Saint Anthony, the patron of all animals, be preserved from evil. I christen you Pegasus in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.”
Pego felt the little droplets of water on his head and shoved his ears forward as the priest’s muttering rolled over him. Was there ever such a horse as I? he thought, and felt a thrill course through his veins.
The weather grew colder, but that only made Tijo work harder and faster to cure the bobcat skin. He washed the bobcat’s hide along with those of the rabbits, too.
“How long will this take?” Bobtail asked. He had never really come around to the idea of remaining at this camp for the winter.
“Well, it takes a few days to really cure a hide properly.”
Estrella caught Bobtail and Arriero exchanging glances. Had Bobtail convinced Arriero as well?
“I never thought I would want hands,” Corazón said. “Look how red that poor boy’s hands are from the freezing water. Can’t you use the water from the warm springs?”
“No. That water is not good for drinking or for washing hides.”
“It’s only going to get colder,” Bobtail said. “The sooner we get to the sweet grass, the better it will be for all of us.”
“Not all of us.” Estrella whinnied and looked toward Bella.
“You can leave me,” Bella said. “I am getting a bit better each day now. I’ll catch up if you go on.”
“No, Bella,” Estrella said firmly.
“But if she says she’ll catch up …” Bobtail snorted.
“None of us is going to catch up with anything before those mountains, and the one place you do not want to be when winter strikes is in the mountains,” Hold On said. He paused and looked toward Estrella, then flicked his ears.
Estrella knew she must be firm about this. “The sweet grass is not before the mountains. It’s on the other side. That much I can tell you. Even if Bella were not with us, it is too big a risk to travel now.” She paused, then added, “But you are free to go if that is truly what you want to do.”
The words hung in the air like suspended ice crystals. There was a long silence. Angela now stepped toward Tijo and gave his red hands a warming lick with her tongue.
“I wish we could help, dear.” She chuckled. “Silly me, if only we did have hands like Corazón said.” The tension suddenly broke.
“You can help,” Tijo said as a thought struck him. He had gathered only enough alder limbs to build a stretching frame for the bobcat’s skin but not for the rabbits’. “I’ve seen you pick up branches and chew the bark right off a tree. I need branches like those over there in the pile. Can you get me some and strip them for me?”
Grullo walked over to the pile and examined the neatly stacked slender limbs that Tijo had stripped of their bark.
“We can do this,” he said. “Just have to get a good grip with your cheek teeth and bite. A single snap, I think, and the branch will break.”
The horses were excited, and it didn’t take long before the pile of alder branches had doubled. Tijo had more than enough for his stretching racks. The horses stood back and watched him intently as he bound together the racks with the gut of the bobcat, which he had saved, and set them firmly in the ground. There was hardly a part of the animals that he did not use. The intestines he had removed, cleaned, dried, then cut into thin strips. The tendons he had carefully separated from the muscles. Before he put the skin on the stretcher, he had taken his curved stone hand blade, which looked as if it had been made to fit his palm, and began scraping away the flesh and fat. Then, to the horses’ shock, he cracked open the skull of the bobcat, scooped out the brains, and began to spread them on the scraped skins, adding creek water as he mashed the mixture into the skin.
“Why are you doing that?” Sky asked, lowering his head very close to the skin.
“It makes the hide very soft, soft to sleep under. Soft to wear.”
“When do you put it on the stretcher?” Estrella asked.
“Not until tomorrow.”
The horses stuck out their necks and shoved their ears forward.
“Huh?” Grullo snorted.
Tijo suddenly realized he had spoken in the language of his people, something he hadn’t done since he had started traveling with the herd. He was not sure what language he used to communicate with the horses, as it was not exactly spoken, and yet they heard each other, could listen and understand one another.
“What did you just say?” Estrella asked.
“I am sorry. I slipped back into the old tongue, the tongue of my people. Haru always told me to do this when we worked on skins. She said let the brains sleep with the skin, let the skin sleep with the brains, and soft dreams shall be your blessing.”
The skins were finished just in time for the first blizzard. Tijo sat with the bobcat fur draped over his shoulders. He wore a rabbit hood on his head that he had just stitched up, and was now completing a muffler from the other rabbit skin.
“You look like an animal!” Sky exclaimed.
“A funny sort of creature,” Verdad said. “Part cat, part rabbit.”
“I feel warm. I don’t care what I look like,” he said, glancing up at his friends. “But I have one more skin I want to get. A big buck.”
“Buck?” Estrella asked.
“A deer, you know. A buck or a doe,” Tijo replied. “A doe would be nice.”
Hold On stepped forward. “Why? Why would you need a deer?” His voice trembled. The other horses had fallen silent. “Their fur is not thick.”
“Their skins.” He plucked at his trousers. “For clothes. Haru made these for me and now, look, I have nearly outgrown them. And their antlers. I can make knives from them, and then of course eat their meat.”
There was an almost deathly silence. Tijo could feel the horses withdrawing from him, sliding away as they stood there perfectly still. “What’s wrong? I don’t understand.”
Estrella had retreated to some unknowable place. She stared at him blankly but in her mind’s eye she saw bones, the bones of a young fawn. She saw the marks of the big mountain lions’ claws on its ribs as they had torn the fawn apart to get at its heart, and then she saw the fawn’s skull and the scratches of a coyote’s teeth that had picked the skull clean after the cats had had their fill of the meat.
Estrella stepped forward. “Tijo, we know you need meat, but you cannot eat the deer — not the buck, nor the doe, nor a fawn.”
The single word fawn made the horses lay their ears flat.
Tijo was shocked. They had never shown such a fearful response to him. But he made no mistake — it was him they feared. The thought that he had somehow frightened these lovely creatures sickened him. “What have I done?”
“Nothing yet,” Angela said. “But you cannot kill a deer.” She took a deep breath. “You see, deer, like ourselves, are grazers. It would be like killing our own. We are too close to deer.”
Estrella came closer to him. Very close. She was almost whispering, for what she said seemed to be only for Tijo. The others sensed this and backed a bit away.
“Remember, Tijo, what you told me, that we are long spirits, time weavers, and how our spirits stretch into the deep past? You said we we are all …”
“All threads in the same blanket.”
“Yes, threads in the same blanket. The deer are part of this blanket. They look different from us, the way the tiny horse looks different. But once, there were not so many differences and we were alike — one herd.”
“One herd,” Tijo repeated. Then he stood up. He looked at the horses and began to speak. He hoped his words would not fall into the gulf now between them. “I am sorry. I have given offense. Hold On spoke of the things you had to forget. I, too, must forget many things. I shall forget hunting deer. I shall forget the d
eer dances my people did in the autumn. I shall make my trousers from the skins of other animals. I shall never eat the meat of a deer or use its antlers to make a knife or tools. But what I shall not forget is your history, your time on this earth from the very beginnings. For I now understand that you are coming home and I … I am just a newcomer to this land where you started.”
As he spoke, Tijo felt the gulf between them contract. He saw a new brightness in their eyes that minutes before had turned dull and empty and stared out at him as if from skulls. Their ears relaxed and began to turn this way and that to catch the often soundless words in the mysterious language that he and the horses shared.
God has blessed this expedition, El Miedo thought. Since Pego had found the horses’ trail, the winds had blown the scent toward them. Horses were the key to the empire he dreamed of relentlessly. At first he had been nervous when the dream creature in the form of Coyote had visited. He thought he was the devil! But now he knew that the perro zorro was a blessing, like the stallion. “Twiced blessed I am,” El Miedo said to himself.
Once he had these new horses, he would carry out the strategy he had been devising for months. He planned to swing west and south so he could meet up with the Seeker, then vanquish him and his puny following. The Seeker had only a fraction of the horses that El Miedo commanded, and a straggly herd of men, the dregs of the Iber fighting forces. Half of them were actually farm laborers or louts he had picked up from bars in the small northern villages of the Old Land. They were not disciplined. They did not know horses, not the way he did. El Miedo had his spies. They reported back to him. Once he got these horses, he was confident he could make short work of the man called the Seeker and make the New World his own. The wind blew harder. The acrid scent of the horses’ sweat filled his nostrils. And with this wind, thought El Miedo, I am thrice blessed. Yes, even the wind is on my side. God is on my side and the wind as well!
Had the wind been in the opposite direction, the herd might have caught their scent. El Miedo had left behind the carts, the mules, and had set out on the trail with his best men on their best horses. It was the elite legion. La Legión de su Majestad la Reina, the Legion of Her Majesty the Queen. It was near sunset on the second day when a sudden cloud of dust rose up from the horizon. Horses!