"Come on," Ty said, increasing the pressure on the lead rope until he could pull no harder. "If you think that little bit of a path looks rough now, wait until it's raining fit to put out the fires of hell. When that happens we want to be long gone from here."
Lucifer's ears went back as he set himself more firmly, pulling hard against the pressure on the hackamore.
"Your daddy must have been Satan's own black mule," Ty said, but his tone was still mild and reassuring. "Come on, son. You heard the lady. The first part is the hardest. After that it's as easy as licking honey off a spoon."
Lucifer's ears flattened against his head.
Ty had several choices. He could keep pulling and hope the stallion would give up. He could keep pulling and have Janna make a loud noise, stampeding the stallion over the rim-and right onto Ty. Or he could lure the stallion onto the trail using the oldest bait of all.
"Janna, do you think that cat-footed mare of yours will go down this trail?"
"I don't know. It's worth a try."
"Easy, son," Ty said as he went up to Lucifer and put pressure on the horse's black nose to make him back up. "If you don't want to be first you'll just have to get out of the way and let your lady show you how easy it is."
Lucifer willingly backed away from the trail. Wind gusted suddenly, bringing with it a foretaste of the chilly storm. The stallion pricked his ears and snorted, feeling an instinctive urge to seek shelter.
Ty wrapped the lead rope and secured it around Lucifer's neck, freeing his own hands and at the same time making sure that the stallion didn't get all tangled up in loose rope. When Ty was finished he led the stallion aside, making room for Janna and Zebra to approach the rough path. When Zebra was pointed in the right direction-straight down-Janna smacked the mare on her warm haunch.
"Down you go," she said hopefully.
Zebra turned and looked at Janna.
"Shoo, girl! Go on, get on down that trail. Get!"
The mustang shook her head as though ridding herself of persistent flies. Deliberately she backed away from the trail.
"Dammit," Ty said. "Maybe if we-Janna, don't!"
It was too late. Janna had already darted around in front of Zebra and started down the trail herself. She picked her way down the first steep pitch, found a relatively secure place to stand and turned to call to Zebra.
"No," Ty said urgently. "Don't take the trail in front of Zebra. If she slips she'll roll right on over you and leave you flatter than a shadow!"
"I'll stay out of her way," Janna said, but her voice was tight. She knew even better than Ty the danger of being on the downhill side of a horse on a precipitous slope. "Come on, girl. Point those black hooves in this direction. Come to me, Zebra. Come on."
As always, Janna's coaxing murmur and her outstretched hands intrigued the mare. She edged as far forward as she could without committing herself to the trail. Neck outstretched, nostrils flaring, ears pricked forward, Zebra leaned toward Janna. Her hooves, however, remained firmly planted.
Without hesitation, Janna retreated farther down the trail. When she reached another relatively level patch of ground, she was fifty feet away. She put her hands to her mouth and a hawk's wild cry floated up. Zebra nickered nervously and shifted her feet. The hawk cry came again, reminding the mare of all the times she had answered the call and found Janna waiting with her backpack full of treats.
One of the mare's black hooves lifted, then set down barely a few inches away. Another hoof lifted. Another few inches gained. Ears pricked, skin flinching nervously, Zebra literally inched her way down the trail. Janna melted away in front of the mustang, calling softly, praising Zebra with every breath.
As Ty watched, his body ran with sweat. A single hesitation, a loose stone, any miscalculation on the mare's part and Janna quickly would be engulfed in a flailing, lethal windmill of horse and human flesh. There was no place for her to leap aside, no place to hide. If Zebra fell, Janna would be killed.
Unknowingly Ty prayed in low tones, never lifting his glance from Zebra's mincing progress, feeling as though his soul were being drawn on a rack.
If you get out of this alive, Janna, Ty vowed silently, I'll make sure you stay out of danger if I have to tie you up and stuff you in my backpack and never let you out.
Lucifer whickered nervously, calling to Zebra. The mare ignored him, intent on the trail and on the girl who kept retreating down the dangerously steep slope. The stallion's next call was louder and more urgent but it had no more effect than the first. He whinnied imperiously. Zebra's ears swiveled and her tail swished. She lifted her head to look, began slipping and sat down on her haunches. For the space of several breaths the mare simply remained motionless, then she slowly gathered herself and resumed her inching progress down the trail.
The stallion's barrel swelled as he took in air for another whinny.
"Shut up, son," Ty said.
Long, powerful fingers closed gently and completely over the stallion's nostrils, making it impossible for the horse to whinny. Lucifer threw up his head but Ty hung on, talking calmly the whole time.
"Yelling at her won't do any good right now," Ty assured the stallion. "That little mare no more listens to you than Janna listens to me. Later I'll be glad to let you give your woman a royal chewing out-and I plan to do the same to mine-but first let's get them to a safe place."
The firm hands and reassuring voice held Lucifer quiet, though his half-flattened ears told anyone who cared to look that the stallion wasn't very happy about the situation.
Ty didn't notice. The farther the mare got down the trail, the more impossible it seemed that a horse had descended it at all. But Zebra had. The evidence was everywhere, in clumps of dirt gouged out by hooves and in hoofprints elongated by skids. Beneath his breath Ty counted out the steps remaining on the last steep pitch before the trail leveled out to the point where Zebra didn't have to go down half-sitting and braced on her stiffened forelegs.
"Seven, six, fi-"
Zebra skidded the last fifteen feet and then stood quietly, absorbing Janna's praise. Ty let out a long breath as he released his grip on Lucifer's muzzle.
"All right, son. It's our turn. And this time I'm not taking no for an answer."
Chapter Thirty
Lucifer went to the edge of the plateau, whinnied loudly and was answered by Zebra. He whinnied again. Zebra looked up the steep path but didn't move one step in the stallion's direction.
"She's not about to scramble up to you," Ty said calmly. He stood to the side of Lucifer's head and pulled steadily forward on the hackamore. "If you want her, you're going to have to do it the hard way."
The stallion stood at the trailhead, laid back his ears… and began climbing down.
Janna found it more unnerving to watch Ty descend alongside the stallion's big hooves than it had been for her to climb down the plateau's face in front of Zebra. The first quarter mile was especially dangerous, for there really wasn't enough room for Ty to stand alongside the horse on the path without being under Lucifer's feet half the time.
Let go, Ty. Let Lucifer do it alone, Janna urged silently. He won't back out now. He can't. The only thing he can do is keep coming down and he knows it.
Snorting, mincing, sliding, sweating, the muscles in his injured leg trembling at the strain, the stallion negotiated the first quarter mile with surprising speed. More than once it was Ty's timely jerk on the hackamore that saved Lucifer from a fall by levering his head up, which helped the horse to regain control when his feet started sliding. Under normal conditions the mustang's own agility would have been sufficient to get him down the trail, but his injury made the difficult footing all but impossible had it not been for Ty's help.