Again, Janna watched the process with a combination of anxiety and admiration. Most of the men she had known would have snubbed Lucifer's nose to a post, twisted his ear in one hand and then climbed aboard in a rush. Once the rider was in the saddle, the horse would have been released and spurs would have begun raking tender hide. The bucking that would have followed was inevitable. So was the fact that some horses broken that way weren't trustworthy. They tended to wait until the rider was relaxed and then unload him with a few wicked twists of their body.
Yet Ty had to be able to trust Lucifer with his life, and he had promised Janna to treat the stallion as gently as possible and still get the job done.
Breath came in sharply and then stuck in Janna's throat while she watched Ty shift his weight until his boots no longer touched the ground. Lucifer moved nervously, turned around in a circle rapidly severjal times, then accepted the fact that Ty's soothing voice was coming from a new direction. After a few minutes the stallion began grazing rather irritably, ignoring the fact that Ty was draped belly down over his back.
By the time two more hours passed, Ty had gotten Lucifer to the point of not flinching or even particularly noticing when Ty's weight shifted from the ground to the horse's back. Janna had seen Ty creep into position, moving so slowly that every muscle stood out as he balanced against gravity and the mustang's wary, mincing steps. When Ty finally eased from his stomach to a rider's normal seat, Janna wanted to shout a cheer. All that kept her quiet was an even bigger desire not to spook the mustang.
For the stallion's part, Lucifer simply twitched his ears and kept grazing when Ty sat upright. The horse's whole stance proclaimed that the bizarre actions of his human companion no longer disturbed him.
Elation spread through Ty when he felt the calm strength of the stallion beneath him. More than ever, Ty was certain that Lucifer had been gently bred, raised by humans, and then had escaped from his owners to run free before any brand of ownership had been put on his shiny black hide.
"You're a beauty," Ty murmured, praising the stallion with voice and hands. "Does part of you know that you were born and bred to be a man's friend?"
Lucifer lipped grass casually, stopping every few minutes to sniff the wind. Ty made no attempt to guide the stallion with the hackamore. He simply sat and let the mustang graze in a normal manner. When Lucifer moved in the course of grazing, he walked a bit awkwardly at first, unaccustomed to the weight settled just behind his withers. But by the time the sun was tracing the last part of its downward arc in the west, Lucifer was moving with his former confidence, adjusting automatically to the presence of a rider. Occasionally he would turn and sniff Ty's boot as though to say, "What, are you still here? Well, never mind. You're not in the way."
Ty's answer was always the same, praise and a hand stroking sleek muscles. When Lucifer responded to a firm, steady pull on the hackamore by turning in that direction, the praise and the pats were redoubled. When the pulls were accompanied by gentle nudges with Ty's heels, Lucifer learned to move forward. When the pressure on the hackamore was a steady pull backward, the stallion learned to stop.
"That's it for now, son," Ty said, sliding carefully from Lucifer's back. "You get the rest of the day off."
The stallion snorted and sidestepped at the release of the pressure from his back, but that was all. When Ty raised his hands and tied the hackamore lead rope securely around the black neck, Lucifer didn't even flinch.
"You're a shining wonder," Ty murmured.
Lucifer promptly put his head against Ty's chest and rubbed hard, trying to dislodge the hackamore. Laughing softly, Ty began soothing away the itches that came from wearing leather against hot, sweaty hide.
"Sorry, son. I'm going to leave all this gear in place. It won't hurt you and it will save me a hell of a lot of trouble come tomorrow, when the lessons resume. But right now you've earned a good graze and I've earned some time in the Tub. Get along, son. Go over and berate Zebra about the crazy Jiumans she sicced on you."
A few minutes later Janna looked up from sorting herbs and saw that Lucifer was riderless. For a moment her heart turned over in fear. Then she realized that Ty had probably dismounted of his own accord, giving both himself and Lucifer a rest. Janna turned back to her herbs, testing the leaves' dryness. Fragrances both pungent and mild rose from the rustling herbs as she set some aside to be taken from the valley and designated others to be made into tinctures or lotions or balms. She knew that she wouldn't have time to properly prepare more tfyan a fraction of the herbs and seeds she had collected, but tthat didn't stop her. Working with them gave her hands something to do besides remember how it had felt to touch Ty and her mind something to do besides think about leaving the valley behind… and then leaving Ty behind, as well.
Stop thinking about it, Janna told herself urgently. And don't think about Mad Jack probably being sick or Cascabel probably waiting to kill me. Don't think about anything but these herbs. I can't affect Mad Jack or ty or that cruel renegade. I can make lotions, though. I can make a batch of stomach medicine and leave it behind. I can do the same with the other medicines. I can do anything I want while I'm still here.
Except seduce Ty.
Herbs and seeds tangled and fell to the ground as Janna's hands jerked at the thought of seducing Ty. She bit back unhappy words and picked up the mess. The second time she thought of making love with Ty the same thing happened. Her fingers were just too shaky to deal with anything as finicky as preparing medicines.
"Well, I can at least get some of that sulfur water from the high spring," she muttered to herself. "Surely that shouldn't be too difficult for my clumsy hands."
Janna grabbed a small metal pot and set off toward the Tub. In the past weeks the trail had become rather well beaten. Both she and Ty loved to float in the warm water and watch the clouds change shape overhead. They did their floating alone, but the thought of what had happened the one time she and Ty had been together in the Tub nearly made Janna drop the small pot. She would have given a great deal to be allowed again to touch Ty so tenderly, so intimately, so wildly. Just once more.
Just once before they left the valley and never saw each other again.
When Janna entered the narrowest part of the valley, the hot springs' steamy silence brought an onslaught of memories. The lush profusion of soft-leaved plants, the sparkling condensation of water on black rock, the vague sulfur odor underlying that of earth and sun and greenery, everything combined in her mind to create a dizzying mixture of memory and desire.
And then she saw Ty rise out of the nearest pool and stand naked on the sandy shore. Silver streamers of mist lifted from his hot skin, moving as he moved, their fragile grace in sharp contrast to the bunch and ripple of his powerful muscles. Unable to move, Janna simply stared at Ty, transfixed by the pagan beauty of the man, memorizing every pattern of water curling down through the dark hair of his chest and torso and thighs.
Janna didn't have to look at Ty's face to know that he had seen her. The visible evidence of his maleness stirred into life, growing rapidly, insistently, rising from its dark nest of hair as inevitably as Ty had risen from the steaming pool.
The pot Janna carried made a sharp sound as she dropped it onto a rock. She didn't even hear the noise. She had attention for nothing but the man who stood naked before her. Without knowing it she began walking to him.