SWNOVELS Chapter 15
Storm Whispers
The chorus of voices stopped ringing through my brain the moment I crested the western saddle of Thunder Mountain. Relief and anxiety hit me with a not-so-soft blow.
It really sees me.
I took a swig from my canteen and sucked in a few deep breaths, taking in the sprawling plain and the monster storm obliterating the sky. The energy pulses continued to flicker through the massive cloud bank, but seemed to slowly form a pattern - like casino strobe lights pointing me toward its deceptive main entrance -Where the house always wins, it’s easy to get into - but never easy to leave.
The red rock saddle dropped to the west at a steep but manageable angle, opening up to a rolling plain covered in yucca, sage, juniper and cacti that slowly crept off westward toward another cluster of smaller, dark mountains whose peaks were shrouded in black clouds. The storm lights seemed to point to the base of the distant hills, maybe ten or twelve miles away, the darkened sky making it difficult to really gauge the distance effectively, but the strobing finger of light leaving little doubt as to where I should go.
I began to make my way down the mountainside, the buffeting wind helping keep me upright in the steeper sections, and the first drops of rain began pelting my face as I made my way on to the scrubby plain. I crossed through a section of barbed wire fence when movement from a cluster of juniper and sage to my right made me jump, momentarily losing my balance on uncertain ground that was no longer easy footing, but becoming slick as a wet ice-skating rink.
Àlo, Smokey’s splashed-white, Overo Paint horse emerged from the thicket led by Chase, Smokey’s grandson. Àlo nickered a greeting, as if to say “Where the hell have you been?” Chase handed me the reins with a smile. “GrandPa said why walk when you can ride, Major.” He climbed bare-footed back up the way I’d come and quickly disappeared in the deluge of rain before I could even say thanks. Thank God for little favors.
Àlo seemed to have no trouble negotiating the snot-slicked surface, while I could barely keep my feet beneath me. Hiro shoed all the horses with his liland-forged metal, and apparently it was doing the trick. I wrapped my arms around the big horses neck, grateful for the warm stability. He nuzzled a return greeting then fixed me with a stare that seemed to speak urgency - and I noticed his blue eyes had taken on a familiar, violet hue. “You too, big guy?” I cooed, patting his neck then awkwardly tried to get my slippery boots to find purchase in the stirrups - eventually balancing on one foot and using my scabbard to scrape away enough purple slime to get a decent grip. I heaved up into the saddle, scraped my other boot clean, and Àlo immediately set off for the distant hills at a brisk trot, “Glad you know where we’re going, Hoss - care to clue me in on what we might find where we’re going…” I shouted into the wind, and grinned in spite of my discomfort.
Àlo nickered a “shut up and hang on,” then took off across the desert like his tail was on fire. It had been several years since I rode a horse before the few days in Sedona, but after a few rough and tumble bounces I fell into familiar rhythm with his gait. The rain began to come down in sheets, and I blinked away the downpour - praying with firm conviction that Àlo could see better than I. A bank of liland dust rose a few feet from the ground, kicked up by the deluge. The violet fog seemed to fight vainly against the onslaught, beaten lower and lower to the ground until it disappeared altogether, fading in a watery blur as Àlo and I sped across the desert. My fears seemed to dissipate with the dust, leaning in close to Àlo’s neck, thrill replacing trepidation - but nowhere near anything resembling certainty. For now I’d simply share the stallion’s confidence - it seemed to be the closest thing of substance I could cling to.
The landscape rippled with water and congealing liland - cacti and skeletal juniper trees bending beneath the wind. The lights in the storm continued to point us west, Àlo never wavering from his break-neck pace or course. The sure-footed Paint leapt across small streams that speckled the plain, bits of driftwood and desert detritus swathed in slick liland, seeking paths of least resistance. Fat raindrops pelted my face in an ongoing barrage - a cold reality telling me I definitely was no longer on the shuttle lost in some bizarre dream. Is this really happening? I’m a Marine astronaut - not Don Quixote on some kind of delusional acid trip… why me for crying out loud?
Àlo began slowing the pace as we neared the cluster of limestone hills, leaving the desert and clipping along a stretch of asphalt washed clean in the deluge, the stark black of the road a welcome rarity in the perpetual violet landscape. His hooves rang like crystal tuning forks across the road, a staccato complement to the shrill howl of the wind and soprano dance of the rain. The lights of the storm thrummed over our heads accompanied by a rolling timpani of undulating, gentle thunder. I pulled on the reins - my first effort at attempting to control the driven course of Àlo - and he acquiesced gingerly - seeming to sense the same presence I did, quickly slowing to a ginger trot, slowly dancing in place to cool himself from the spirited flight across the plain.
Àlo’s breath heaved in giant swallows, my knees flexing along with his straining flanks, feeling the strong pulse of his blood flowing in a steady thrum that still bolstered my shaky confidence. The storm continued to rage around us in symphonic cacophony, but a distinct sound like stone against stone - peppered with otherworldly howls that chilled me to the core and caused the sheets of rain to pulse - interrupted the familiar.
D’Leh Bekharboa, Donasha! D’Leh Bekharboa!!
Where the hell was Hiro when I needed him? Another savage peal echoed from a patch of scrub maybe twenty yards distant, and I drew Hiro’s sword, a crystalline ring announcing its presence, and Àlo tensed - a waiting coil ready to spring - and he advanced as the ringing of the sword still sang on the wind, as if in response to an unbidden command.
Àlo shot ahead to where the asphalt ended and leapt gracefully - but totally caught me unawares - and I felt myself rising up and out of the saddle, one hand clutching Hiro’s sword, the other clinging to the reins for dear life. I felt my feet leave the stirrups, no matter how much I willed them to stay - and I knew this was going to be ugly.
Àlo cleared a tall stand of juniper bushes with the grace of a ballerina, while I felt myself unseated and falling off to his right side like a blacked-out drunk off a barstool; the ground swiftly approaching in painful slow motion. I released the reins from my left hand and tucked my right shoulder - this is gonna hurt like a bitch - then quickly slammed into the back of something very unground-like - and massive; the liland blade in my right hand skewering whatever breathing wall I’d just hit straight through the back; the blade wrenched from my grasp as I rolled to the ground in extremely ungraceful fashion. My eyes registered the big chunk of red rock my head was aiming at a millisecond too late - then darkness.