Authors: Terri Farley
“S
amantha!” Gram's exasperated tone said this wasn't the first time she'd called up the stairs.
Sam actually had to turn her head to force her eyes away from her mother's words.
“Yes?” Sam couldn't put the pink paper back inside, but she pressed the lid back on the button box and stood up.
“Jen called to say she was leaving her house,” Gram said. “If you're riding to meet her, you'd better hurry.”
“I'm coming,” Sam said. Her hands trembled as she stared at her mom's handwriting.
She shouldn't take the time to read this now. But how could she stop? This list offered her what she
hadn't had in eight years: a few moments with her mother.
Besides, that last line had the ring of a vow.
No harm to the horses
.
Which horses? River Bend's? A band of wild mustangs? What had Mom meant? Had she lived long enough to protect the horses she obviously loved?
Although Sam's eyes lingered on the words, she knew she had to look away. The rest of the list might help her understand what her mother had meant.
She skimmed it once, quickly.
Was it a shopping list? A to-do list?
Sam read it carefully.
Her mother's note was riddled with personal abbreviations. Not all of them made sense to Sam, but there was no mistaking that last one.
The note was too important to rush and too
precious to leave behind.
Carefully, Sam folded it into a neat square, then eased it into the front pocket of her jeans.
She hurried down the stairs, grabbed the brownie Gram offered, then jogged toward the barn.
The saddle horses in the ten-acre corral lifted their heads from grazing to watch her. Buddy, her nearly yearling heifer, ambled up to the fence chewing. Ace, Sam's pretty bay mustang, neighed in three short bursts.
“Coming, Ace,” she told her horse, but she didn't stop to reassure him or to rub Buddy's head. It would be faster to just grab her tack and hurry back.
After weeks of reconstruction following a scary earthquake, the barn still smelled like freshly sawed lumber. Sam grabbed her saddle and bridle from the tack room and hefted them against the front of her, trying to balance and walk fast at the same time.
She'd almost reached the pasture when Jeepers-Creepers trotted across the wooden bridge, with Dad astride.
“You thinkin' about doin' any chores before you go out to play?” Dad called.
With a jean jacket pulled over his shirt and his Christmas-new gray Stetson, Dad looked like every kid's mental picture of a cowboy.
“When I get back,” Sam shouted, as she led Ace from the pasture and began saddling him.
As Dad rode closer and she saw the smile white
against his darkly tanned face, Sam decided Dad wasn't serious about making her work. She released a breath she hadn't known she was holding.
Thinking of the note in her pocket, Sam tried to look at Dad as if she weren't his daughter.
Dad had been a college student when he'd fallen in love with Mom. How had he looked on the day he'd proposed? And on the day Mom had died?
Sam shook her head as if she could dispel the awful image.
One thing was sure: he hadn't been the thin, dusty man he was today. And his heart had belonged to her mother, Louise, not to her
step
mother, Brynna.
Sam tightened her saddle cinch and tucked in the loose end. She slid her hand between the cinch and Ace's warm belly.
Dad drew rein next to her. Warmth radiated from Jeepers, River Bend's only Appaloosa. He stamped and blew through his lips, glad to be home.
She should show Dad the note. He'd decipher her mother's abbreviations, and remember what had motivated Mom to write
No harm to the horses
.
She
would
show him. Absolutely.
But not now.
“Brynna's bringing Penny when she comes home from work. I know you wanted to be here,” Dad said.
Sam glanced up at the faint appeal in Dad's voice, then unhooked her stirrup from her saddle horn and let it flop down.
Dad knew her relationship with Brynna was uneasy: comfortable one day, edgy the next.
Brynna was the director of the Willow Springs Wild Horse Center, where hundreds of mustangs brought in from the range lived until they were adopted.
She cared more for wild horses than anyone else Sam knew. And, maybe because she was younger than Dad, Brynna allowed Sam to do a lot of things Dad questioned.
Sam knew Brynna was probably the best stepmother she could have hoped for, if she'd hoped for one. But she hadn't.
How would Brynna feel about this note?
Sam's stomach gave a nervous lurch. She didn't want to know. She'd guess that in spite of the last line about the horses, Brynna would be hurt. That part about buying ingredients for lasagna, for instance, might make her worry. Brynna wasn't much of a cook.
“We'll need to be extra watchful,” Dad said, snagging Sam's mind back. “Penny bein' blind and all.”
“Yeah,” Sam answered. She'd nearly forgotten Brynna's mustang mare had lost her sight during her failed adoption.
The arrival of a new horse would be exciting, but since the saddle herd didn't always welcome newcomers, they'd put Penny in a pipe corral next to the
ten-acre pasture so the horses could get used to each other.
When Ace had been the low horse in the pasture, he hadn't been so lucky. He'd suffered lots of bites and kicks. The others had only accepted him a few weeks ago. Sam was convinced it was because the little gelding had gained new self-confidence while she was training him for the Superbowl of Horsemanship.
They'd need to watch over the blind mare. Dad was right about that. But first, she had to meet Jen.
“I won't be long,” Sam said as she swung into the saddle.
Dad looked skeptical, but he let her leave.
With Sam in the saddle, Ace tossed his head in a figure-eight movement, eager to be off. A restful winter and the Superbowl of Horsemanship cross-country race two weeks ago had combined to put Ace in high spirits. He'd bolt into a run if she'd let him. Instead, Sam eased him into a jog.
When the gelding arched his neck and obeyed, Sam's mind veered back to the note.
Brynna and Dad had met last summer when Dad had driven Sam up to see Willow Springs for the first time.
Even though Dad was a third-generation cattleman and not a fan of the Bureau of Land Management, a spark had jumped between him and Brynna right away.
Sam had overheard Brynna telling Gram that it had taken one single minute for them to know they were meant for each other, but one hundred days to decide to marry.
After crossing the bridge, Sam reined Ace right. She noticed a fuzz of low grass and weeds spreading out from their usual dirt trail.
Suddenly, a fragment from her mother's note made sense.
Sam tightened her reins. Ace snorted. His gait turned choppy.
“Oh, come on, whoa,” she told him.
Ace halted, but kept tossing his head, letting her know he was aggravated by the stop.
Sam rose in her stirrups, took the note from her pocket, and looked at it again.
3. Antelope season/Crossing/horses???
There were the horses, again, but what did it mean?
Antelope Crossing was a flat plain covered with sagebrush and bunch grass and it wasn't far away. But is that what Mom had meant? Or had she meant Antelope
hunting
season? Maybe Mom had capitalized Crossing accidentally.
Maybe, Sam thought, swallowing hard, she'd only thought of Antelope Crossing because it was where her mother had died.
She sat quietly, holding her reins in her left hand while she turned her horsehair bracelet with her right.
Mom had been killed while driving her VW bus. She'd swerved to miss a herd of antelope. The bus had run off the road and rolled.
She'd been killed instantly.
That's what everyone said.
But Mom's note hinted that something had been going on out there.
Ace tensed beneath her. The little bay mustang had picked up on her anxiety.
“Nothing to worry about,” Sam said, leaning forward to rub his neck. “But it might be worth a look.”
Sam loosened her reins, leaned forward, and sent Ace into a lope. Antelope Crossing was just beyond the aspen grove where they'd been planning to ride anyway.
She stared at the range ahead and saw a rider outlined against a blue sky marked with windblown clouds called mare's tails.
In seconds, she realized it was Jen and Silk Stockings, her high-strung palomino.
Perfect
, Sam thought. Jen had come well past halfway to meet her, so they had more time. If she told Jen about the note, she knew her friend would go with her.
Jen wore a green quilted vest over a yellow ribbed sweater and her white-blond braids were bound with yellow yarn. With the back of her hand, she gave her glasses a push back up her nose.
“What's up?” Jen said. Sam watched in admiration as Jen slowed the palomino to a walk, then stopped her
within two feet of Ace. “You look kind of freaked out.”
“I don't know,” Sam began. “I justâ¦I think⦔
“You must know.” Jen used her usual logic to evaluate Sam's discomfort. “Or you wouldn't be fumbling for words.”
“You're right, but I still don't know what to say. Here.” Sam pulled the note from her pocket and held it out to Jen.
“Is this something bad?” Jen asked before she took it. Sam lifted her shoulders so high, they brushed her hair. “Not exactly.”
Hesitantly, Jen took the pink paper and unfolded it. While she read, Silly extended her golden nose to Ace's bay one, then looked around, ears swiveling to take in the faraway rush of the La Charla River.
Sam watched Jen until she looked up, frowning. “It's from my mom,” she said.
“I figured that out,” Jen said with a lopsided smile. “The part about you trying on sunsuits tipped me off.”
Sam nodded. This was what she adored about her best friend. Jen could smile about something sad, and make it seem exactly the right thing to do.
“How does it make you feel?” Jen asked.
“Kind of like I'm excited and scared at the same time.”
“Because she wrote it right before she died,” Jen said. It wasn't a question.
“Why do you say that?” Sam yelped, while Jen nodded in understanding. “What makes you think she wrote it justâ¦before?”
“Logic,” Jen said, handing the note back to Sam. “She mentions a Mother's Day present for your Gram, and the antelope.” Jen lowered her voice to a near whisper. “And she died the Saturday before Mother's Day, trying not to hit those antelope.”
Sam stared at the note.
1. Grace m.d. (cool apron?)
.
Jen was right! “m.d.” meant Mother's Day, and her mom had been thinking about buying Gram an apron. How could she have missed that?
“You're brilliant,” Sam congratulated Jen.
“Not really. You would've figured it out,” Jen assured her.
“So will you ride out to Antelope Crossing with me? Now?”
“Are you joking?” Jen said, “Of course I'll go. It's like she left you a message.”
Sam took a deep breath. She'd hoped for Jen's cooperation, but Jen was even more intrigued than she would have guessed.
“There's nothing mystical about it,” Sam insisted.
“I didn't say there was.” Jen gave a sigh, then tipped her head to one side, peering through her glasses with an owlish expression. “But this note sounds like a warning. Like something bad was going on out there, something putting the horses in danger.”
Chills skittered down Sam's arms and legs.
“I know,” she said, slowly. “And even though it may be too late, it's up to me to discover what it was.”
“W
e'd better get going,” Jen said, glancing toward the sun. Its brightness shone from behind the mountains now, signaling evening was on its way.
Sam swung Ace alongside Silly, and the two horses settled into a side-by-side gallop across the range. Black mane and white, brown legs and golden, showed that the two horses were as different as their riders, but just as well suited to each other.
Without speaking, Sam and Jen agreed to ride past the bridge that led to River Bend Ranch. Even though there was a more direct trail that climbed the ridge overlooking the Forsters' two-story white house, they didn't take it. If they cut through River Bend, Dad or Gram would call them back to shovel
out stalls or something.
Instead, they cut left on a rougher trail that ran along the border between River Bend and the Elys' Three Ponies Ranch.
After navigating the terrain between the two ranches, they crested the ridge, then took the downhill trail to Aspen Creek.
“No sign of Moon,” Sam said, glancing around.
Although the young black stallion had been here in the late fall, the place looked completely different now.
Tender green leaves had replaced the aspen trees' crisp golden ones. The footing was still damp, not with mud as before, but with shallow pools of melted snow. Each pool held green islands that were really beach ballâsized tufts of grass.
The horses slowed as they splashed through the cold water, and Sam finally asked, “How did you know about my mom?”
Jen sighed. “My mom talks about the accident every Mother's Day, and each time we see a herd of pronghorn. She liked your mother a lot. They went riding together, and out to movies.” Jen looked at Sam, probably thinking they did the same things. “She always says your mom's death was senseless.”
“I'd like to talk with your mom, about mine,” Sam said.
“No problem,” Jen said, but her tone was distracted and she frowned at the trees surrounding them.
Sam knew why Jen looked uneasy. The last time they'd been here, cougars had been on the prowl. But they were gone now, and Sam had bigger things to worry over.
“Right after it happened, I couldn't ask my dad to tell me much,” Sam explained.
“Well, you were only five years old.”
“Yeah, but that's not why. Every time I asked, it made him sad. How do you think a little kid feels, making her father cry?”
Jen shook her head, but then her melancholy look dropped away. “I bet he could talk about it now. They say it helps keep a person's memory alive to talk about them.”
“You're probably right,” Sam said.
As the earth beneath the horses' hooves grew dry, they rode more quickly. It was warmer, now that they were out of the shaded Aspen Creek Canyon.
“Snake Head Peak,” Jen said, pointing to a rock formation jutting from the nearby hills.
“Creepy name,” Sam said. The gray granite ahead wore a spiky halo of sun. “Does anyone live over there?”
“Yeah, a guy who's sort of a hermit.”
Sam cleared her throat. “Look how nice Mrs. Allen turned out to be,” she said. “And I thought she was a hermit.”
“Yeah,” Jen said. She didn't sound convinced.
The first thing Sam noticed as they came to the
edge of a wide plain was the shadow. Snake Head Peak cast a column of darkness over the sagebrush and bunch grass-covered flat.
Sam had just decided they were on a wild goose chase when something moved. Suddenly, she wasn't looking at a monochrome landscape.
A herd of grazing mustangs and pronghorn covered the flat.
Ace and Silly snorted and danced, but the wild animals had long since picked up the scent of the intruders.
Antelope and wild horses
.
Sam's hand fell from the reins, about to touch her mother's note. Ace was too spooked already to risk rustling paper where he couldn't see it. Besides, she didn't need to look. She knew what the note said. Her pulse pounded and her eyes swept the plain, looking for danger.
The brown and white antelope had black horns that seemed perfectly aligned with their dark eyes. They were small, maybe three feet tall, and they'd frozen statue still among the horses.
There
. As two blood bay mares showed themselves amid the mustang herd, Sam's heart bounded up with joy. Those two ran with the Phantom's band. She couldn't see him, but the great silver stallion had to be nearby.
Ace bolted forward, reminding Sam that this had once been his herd. She tightened her reins and Ace
stopped, but his tail moved in a resentful swish.
Some silent signal flashed among the pronghorn. Like multicolored popcorn, they bounded, not up, but in long leaps, from a dozen spots within the herd of mustangs.
Sam couldn't catch enough breath to speak to Jen.
The pronghorn were coming this way. Slender and graceful as deer, they turned so she could see the cinnamon swatches on their backs. Their cheeks and chests were milky white.
Once separated from the mustang herd, they joined together.
For safety
, Sam thought. Their leaps were amazingly broad and they'd moved so close that Sam could see some had faces marked with black bands.
Then they turned.
Like a flock of birds, they moved as one until she could only see their white rumps fleeing across the range, away from the horses.
“I can't believe⦔ Sam began.
She was thinking of Mom and the notes she'd left behind. Something about the antelope and mustangs had worried her mother, but Sam only saw their beauty.
A flash of silver caught Sam's attention. Ace bunched beneath her and then she heard a stallion's scream.
The Phantom rushed through his mares, scattering them as he galloped.
Sam had seen this charge before. She searched for an intruding stallion.
“There,” Jen said, pointing.
Sam saw the clump of sagebrush, but no horse.
“What are youâ?”
The flicker of brightness, at ground level, could have been a match, or light bouncing off a mirror, but then a crack of lightning rolled through the desert air.
“Run!” Jen shouted. She clapped her heels to Silly's sides and leaned low as the mare surged from a nervous walk into a full gallop. Jen's white-blond braids mixed with the palomino's flaxen mane.
Sam didn't follow, though her chaotic thoughts finally focused. That crack had been a rifle shot. There was no way she'd leave the Phantom here alone, to face a gunman.
But a man with a rifle wasn't a mustang's natural enemy. The Phantom shouldn't charge; he should run.
The rest of his herd fled as a big honey-brown mare led them after the antelope. Far out on the plain, they were nothing more than bouncing dots, but the horses followed.
The Phantom rushed away from his family, toward the sound.
Muscular and gleaming, he flowed like liquid silver around sagebrush and rocks. His flint-hard hooves made every step count. He was homing in on the enemy.
Once, the Phantom had been tame. He might have been tolerant of men, if they hadn't penned him, strangled him with ropes, pursued and nearly poisoned him.
Captivity had taught him not to fear men.
Freedom had taught him to hate them.
Should she go after him? Sam tried to think. She might keep the horse from being shot, but if a stray bullet struck her, she'd be no good to him.