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CHAPTER 33
“We’re never going to make it upthat,” Shannon muttered to herself.
They had spent the first part of the morning on foot, carefully leading the horses up the rubble-filled slopes that formed the lower part of the mountain. It had been slow going, the horses moving with their heads down as they carefully picked their way among the rocks. Now the rubble had come to an end, and they were facing a much steeper wall of sandstone, which had cracked in such a way as to form a narrow, upwards sloping path just barely wide enough for the horses to go up single file. Just looking at that path made Shannon’s guts crawl.
“I don’t think we have a choice,” Tanner said behind her.
Shannon realized her muttered words must have been louder than she’d realized. She turned and looked at the alpha cowboy, who was pointing out across the basin they’d spent the past day crossing. Her eyes followed the line of his finger, and when she finally saw what he was pointing at, her heart clenched.
A large group of riders were making their way toward the foot of the mountain, raising big clouds of dun colored dust in their wake.
“Maybe it’s the centaurs,” Shannon said.
“No. See how spread out they are? Centaurs would never run in such a sloppy formation. That’s Flarity and his men. I’m sure of it. Logan, can you count them?”
“Eighteen horses,” the long-haired alpha said, “but a few of them look to be missing riders. Hey Rufus, you said there was two dozen of them before, right?”
Rufus had shifted into the wolf for the day’s journey. He gave an affirmative woof and nodded his head.
Logan grunted. “I guess they met up with our friends from yesterday. I was hoping the centaurs would have thinned their numbers more than that. Still, fifteen or sixteen men will be easier to deal with than two dozen.”
Shannon had hoped they wouldn’t have to deal with them at all.
She hadn’t thought Flarity would make his move so soon. Perhaps it made sense, considering how close they now were to the location of the firestone, but there was no way Flarity could have known that… was there?
Oh well, there was still a chance they could get out of this without a conflict. Based on her father’s map, there were two paths leading to the place where the firestone was supposed to be. Originally, Shannon had planned to take the easier of the two paths. However, after Rufus had informed her that Flarity was following them, she had decided on a different strategy. They would take the hard way up, which would allow them to make their escape down the easier and quicker path.
Now, looking at the narrow ridge of crooked stone that lay before them, she was starting to regret that decision.
“Do you think they still have the alpha with them?” she asked.
“Reckon so,” Tanner answered.
“Then he’ll be able to follow our scent.” Shannon sighed. “We’ve no choice, then. We have to keep going.”
Since they were no longer riding, they’d replaced the horses’ bridles and reins with simple halters and ropes that made it easier to lead the animals up the treacherous incline. Rufus went first, followed by Logan and his paint horse, then Shannon and Stormy. Tanner brought up the rear, leading his golden palomino and singing softly.
“Last night as I lay on the prairie, I gazed at the stars in the sky. I wondered if ever a cowboy would land in that sweet by and by…”
Shannon didn’t particularly care to think about the sweet by and by at a moment like this, when she had nothing but a narrow strip of sandstone to keep her from tumbling to the boulders below. But the sound of Tanner’s voice seemed to calm the nervous horses, and right now that was the most important thing.
The only other sound was the clatter of horseshoes as they struck the hard stone, and the occasional snort of apprehension from the animals.
Even though she knew she shouldn’t, Shannon hazarded a quick glance downward. She could see that Flarity’s riders had already reached the little cottonwood grove where she and the alphas had spent the previous night.
Damn. They were already much closer than she’d expected them to be. She wanted to speed up the painfully slow pace of her ascent, but she knew that to do so would be much too risky. She snapped her eyes back to the trail and kept walking with Stormy’s lead rope clutched tightly in her hand. Behind her, Tanner continued his song.
“The trail that leads down to perdition is narrow and dim so they say, and the road that leads up to God’s Kingdom, is staked out and blazed all the way…”
Shannon heard a scrape of iron against sandstone, and her heart suddenly froze.
She knew what that sound meant.
Stormy had slipped.
Even before Shannon had a chance to turn around and look, she could feel the lead rope going taut in her hands. There was a loud clack as the mare got her wayward hoof back onto the flat part of the trail, but in the process she’d gotten herself off balance, and now her heavy body was listing out toward the void.
Stormy whinnied, her black eyes wild with fear. Shannon could only watch in horror as her beloved horse started to go over the edge.
