Crow Bait

Five

Crow Bait walked until morning, and would have walked farther if Lancaster had allowed him.

“Where are you getting this from?” Lancaster asked the horse, stroking his neck. “You’re a bag of skin and bones, and yet you keep going.”

Lancaster didn’t dare get down off the horse. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to get back up again. He had drifted off a couple of times during the night, either to sleep or unconsciousness, he wasn’t sure which. But he had awakened in time to keep himself from slipping off Crow Bait’s back.

The sun was coming up, and while there were still a few Joshua trees around, they did not afford much in the way of shade. There was no point in stopping. He and the horse might not have been able to start again.

“I don’t mean to ride you to death, boy,” he said apologetically, “but I don’t have much choice. And you look like you’re pretty near death, anyway.”

But as near death as he might have been, the horse went on.

If Lancaster had been a religious man, he might have thought that this animal was something supernatural sent to him to save him. But he wasn’t religious—not ever, and he didn’t intend to start now.

“But whoever sent you to me,” he said to Crow Bait, “I’d sure like to thank them in person someday. That is, if you and me manage to get out of this alive.”

Lancaster opened his eyes and squinted as the sun burned into them. He’d done it again, fallen asleep or lost consciousness. His mouth was dry, and his skin felt like sand.

He pulled his hat down low on his head to shield his eyes and then tried opening them again. He was still on the horse, and Crow Bait was still walking.

“Headin’ toward water, boy?” he asked. His throat was so dry he didn’t think the words had come out. He’d just heard them in his head.

Only the smell of water could have kept Crow Bait walking the way he was. As long as he didn’t fall off the horse’s back during one of his blackouts, if Crow Bait made it to water, so would he.

He hoped he’d be awake when they got there.