Wild Blue - The Story of a Mustang Appaloosa Read online

  Sorry, mister. I just don’t know.

  * * *

  There was, of course, no way for Doe and Blue to know that Ezra Penahwenonmi Ryder was protecting their family’s secret. Or that in order to do so, he’d had to sell their freedom.

  CHAPTER 5

  In the following days, Blue and Doe traveled farther than they’d ever traveled before and saw stranger sights than had ever met their eyes before. Each hour of their journey brought new scents, new fears, new sensations, except for one crushing sameness about even the most unfamiliar experience: Everything was ruled by men.

  They were now merely two fillies among a trailer of captured mustangs, and at first Blue’s spirits rose when she was once more surrounded by her kind. But the other horses were as frightened as she and her sister. Doe clung to her side like a burr, resting her head on Blue’s back as they helped each other keep their balance while the miles ticked by. The landscape underwent subtle changes, the hills softened, the smell of juniper and sage replaced that of honeysuckle. The air grew hotter, but at least in this prison they were watered regularly.

  There seemed to be no use in trying to learn anything from the other horses. They shared the trailer with an older, swaybacked mare, obsessively focused on the sturdy foal who suckled vigorously even when the trailer banged and rattled its loudest. The mare was not from Blue and Doe’s range, and she was the lone captive from her herd. She kept her distance, or as much of it as she could, considering their close quarters. When Doe attempted to give the foal a comforting lick, the mare turned on her, ears flattened with fury. Doe startled back, avoiding a nip, and did not make another offer of friendship. The other horses—a young stallion and two yearlings—were trailered ahead of the sisters, and all Blue could determine was that they, too, were strangers.

  The trailer had stopped several times during the day’s journey, so the mustangs didn’t know when they pulled up to the stark corrals scattered across the flat, sage-scented plain that they had reached their final destination. The sun burned a fiery flare at the tops of the low-rolling hills that framed the horizon. Blue watched the evening light catch the dust that the jostling trailer kicked up as it made its way up the long, rock-strewn drive. This was a drier land than home, but still the sight of space, miles of it, and the smell of more horses livened Blue’s spirits and she blew gently out into the air of early evening.

  With a final metallic squeal and shudder, the trailer came to a halt and backed up to a shadeless corral a little larger than Ezra Ryder’s. This time when the doors banged open, Blue didn’t have to think: She sprang out in one shaky leap, bounding forward toward the empty space, the low-lying sun, the horizon that she had glimpsed from the back of the trailer. A fence stopped her. Blue whirled to the right: another fence. To the left: another fence! The space was just beyond, freedom was just beyond: Why were there now always barriers in her way?

  Hours of exhaustion and frustration and fear boiled inside Blue as she whirled and whirled again, neighing wildly to the hills beyond, rising onto her hind legs to paw at the fence as men shouted and came running. She reared and plunged, reared and plunged, racing along the corral’s border, crashing her hooves on the maddening barrier to freedom. She could think of nothing but flight—not even of Doe, until finally her sister’s frantic neigh penetrated the hot rage that coursed through the mustang’s body and brought her to a standstill. Doe neighed again, the sound filled with worry and lonesomeness. Breathing hard, sweat flecking her sides, Blue halted mid-flight. What, after all, was freedom without Doe?

  * * *

  Days passed slowly in the corral. The fillies, mares, and foals were separated from the stallions, who were penned across the road. There were ten male mustangs, ranging in age, some larger than any horse Blue had seen before and some even smaller and thinner than she was. It was the same with the female herd: There was an amazing variety of size, color, conformation, and temperament. Doe befriended several fillies and mares, including a long-legged, rangy bay who stood a hand taller than the Appaloosas, and a stocky pinto whose brown-and-white coat almost equaled the sisters’ with its eye-catching design.

  There wasn’t much grass in the corrals and the horses had to get used to feeding on the hay provided in bales each day, along with fresh water. Blue wandered the pen, nibbling at the dusty spears of weeds, pawing at the dirt as if it were snow. So much of the mustangs’ normal life was spent in the constant, comforting forage of food that it took her several days to make peace with the stack of hay that was easy to eat but tasted of the dry wind, not living green. And with each adjustment, Blue knew she became more of a captive.

  By the end of her first week in the corral, she knew when the men would bring food, when the men would bring water, and knew the smell and sound and size of them. She thought that learning these things would help her and Doe. And yet with familiarity came a deadening of her senses—she was eating and drinking what the enemy provided her, and while she could not forget it, she still had to take what they gave her.

  It was a shock when Blue first realized that some of the horses in the corrals allowed the men to touch them.

  Doe’s friend the pinto had picked up a stone in her hoof, wedged against the sensitive frog, and for a day she limped around the corral, trying not to put her full weight on the sore hoof. The next morning, the short, thickset man who always wore a hat, and who usually brought the morning hay, opened the gate to the corral and walked in, approaching the group of horses with a rope in his hand. Blue and Doe and several others spooked, darting to the farthest spot along the fence from the man. But a few mustangs stayed put, including the pinto. To Blue’s astonishment, the man put the rope around the pinto’s neck and led her toward the gate. The pinto followed him calmly! Then the man ran his hand down the pinto’s leg and raised her painful hoof off the ground, cradling it in his hands. Blue couldn’t tell what he was doing to the pinto, but Doe’s friend remained perfectly calm. Doe whinnied to her, and the pinto turned her head and whinnied briefly back. Don’t worry.

  The man put down the pinto’s leg and stroked her neck. He removed the rope and the pinto trotted back to the group of mustangs huddled by the fence. Somehow, she was no longer limping. Doe sniffed at the odor of man on her friend, and jerked her head back, not liking it at all. The pinto seemed not to care: She strolled nonchalantly to the water trough, leaving the bewildered sisters to stare after her. But the new captives were soon to discover that they, too, were going to be handled by the men—whether they liked it or not.

  * * *

  It was a hot, dry afternoon, and Blue was dozing by the fence. She was dreaming of home: of green hillsides, the fresh smell of snowmelt, the sound of the wind through the tamarack. Sometimes the breeze that gentled the heat of the dusty corral carried with it a breath of the home-smell … water and rock, pine and rain. Blue sighed in her sleep. There was a scent the breeze could not carry: her family’s.

  Movement at the fence line stirred Blue awake. Instantly alert, she saw that a part of the fence that she’d thought was solid had been moved aside, creating a mouth that led to a narrow passageway. Blue couldn’t tell where the passage led to, but she saw two men emerging from its entrance, ropes in hand. The men circled the mustangs, walking slowly and purposefully toward the rear of the group. Instinctively, Blue turned to face them, unwilling to have them behind her, where they were harder to see. The rest of the horses moved away from the men, walking the line of the corral.

  One man moved to the right, the rope dragging along the ground from his outstretched hand. His pace was slow and deliberate, yet somehow he effectively blocked the mustangs’ progress along the fence line, and now the pinto, at the head of the group, stopped uncertainly. The second man, stepping around Blue, approached from the rear, flicking his rope in the direction of the pinto’s heels. With a snort of annoyance, the pinto trotted forward, through the mouth of the chute! Now the men moved faster, directing the rest of the horses toward the passage, and the
herd broke apart. Three mares bolted directly after the pinto, the corral’s default lead mare. Doe wheeled in place and cantered back to Blue, pinned at the opposite side of the corral. The old, swaybacked mare and her filly ran in circles away from the men, the mother changing direction several times to keep her body in between her foal and the men’s ropes.

  A sudden vision of Shadow, her brave, frail sister, lying helplessly alone as those first men bore down upon her, filled Blue’s mind, and without thinking, she plunged forward to help the old mare protect her foal.

  Whack! The sharp blow to her shoulder was so unexpected that at first Blue couldn’t imagine where it had come from. But then she saw the rage in the mare’s eyes as, in her panic, she turned on Blue and her sister, darting forward with her lips drawn back against her teeth, wild with the need to protect her foal from all comers.

  The men took advantage of the mustangs’ disarray. As Blue leaped aside to avoid the mare’s charge, the brush of a rope across her pasterns drove her unseeingly forward … forward … straight through the mouth of the passage and into the narrow chute. She could hear her sister snort behind her and knew that she, too, was caught. Only the ferocious old mare and her foal were untouchable, at least that day.

  What in the world was the men’s purpose? Nothing that happened next made sense, and Blue fought: fought because she could not trust, fought because she was afraid. Waving their arms, the men drove her farther into the chute, and a door banged shut behind her, separating her from Doe. Another door swung closed ahead of her, blocking her escape. A rope fell over her head, hands grasped at her mane, her jaw. They did not hurt her, but they were men’s hands, and she could not run. She struggled to break free, to break from their hold and to break from the narrow space that reminded her of the first place she was held captive: the hated trailer.

  They were too strong for her. She had no room to move, no space to rear or to kick. Strong arms cradled her head, her neck. A soft voice, low and cadenced like Ezra Ryder’s, spoke in her ear. Something was forced in her mouth, and the back of her tongue was coated with a pasty substance. Pricks of pain in her neck. Blue stood frozen, each muscle strained with tension. Then another sensation on her neck—ice, blazingly cold, startling in the afternoon heat. And then just as suddenly as it began, it was over: The door before her swung open and Blue bounded free. One of the men patted her quarters as she leaped away, down the chute, into a new paddock where the other mustangs were already chewing hay and swishing flies. It was almost as if nothing had happened.

  But it had. Something had happened inside Blue. She waited anxiously for her sister, neighing toward the fence that separated them. Now Doe’s fine head, with its whorls of strawberry and white and its delicate pink muzzle, was encircled by the men’s arms. Blue could just see the white outline of her sister’s eyes, wide with fear but latched on hers, drawing on Blue’s image for strength. Finally, it was over—the last gate swung open, and Doe ran to Blue and the others, shaken but unharmed. She bore a strange mark on her neck, just below the crest where her red mane hung shaggily down. It was as if her Appaloosa coat had suddenly developed a new pattern. Blue remembered the sensation of ice on her own neck. She sniffed Doe, hating the smell of men on her, but needing the reassurance of closeness. And when she looked down, she was startled to see that the rusty wire that had clung to Doe’s leg for so many days had disappeared.

  As the sisters stood together under the glare of the afternoon sun, Blue thought that she hated nothing more than the smell of men. Men were fences and ropes. Men were the trailer and thirst. She suddenly knew, and knew it as strongly as she knew herself and her instincts, that she could not bear to have them catch her again.

  This is what happened inside her: A rebel was born.

  Before, with each new, bewildering event, she had reacted from fear, from her wild need to flee the unfamiliar and the threatening. But now she had learned things, lessons she could use with her instincts. Blue knew what humans wanted: to trap her and her family. And she knew that she must escape, whatever the cost. They would not touch her again.

  CHAPTER 6

  One particularly dry and sun-soaked morning, a new sort of disturbance broke the monotony of life in the pens. Blue had just finished a long drink of water when she caught the fumy smell of trucks and heard in the distance the rumble of wheels jutting over the rocky drive toward the corrals. The recently captured mustangs—Doe and the old mare and her foal included—startled alert and moved toward the back fence, ears flickering nervously toward the commotion. The pinto and the other veterans cocked an ear and then settled back to swishing flies.

  Soon the drive was a whirl of dust that cloaked a small troop of cars and pickups groaning to a halt under the blazing sun. Doors slammed, and the brown haze filled with the voices of men. Blue raised her muzzle and snorted. Not all of the men sounded the same. These were new voices, surely, and also different kinds: high-pitched tones among the low, and softer voices, too. Doe glanced at her questioningly, and Blue took a cautious step forward, sniffing the dust-choked air, determined to learn—a determination that more and more outpaced her fear.

  This here’s the mares and fillies, and the stallions are penned across the road.

  That was the man who had roped the pinto.

  A high-pitched voice: Dad, can we go look at the stallions?

  A very low voice: Sure, but let’s take a look over here first. Your mom was thinking about a filly, and we should take some pictures of this bunch to show her.

  An even higher voice: Look at the baby! There’s a little baby one in there! Can I pet her?

  A softer voice, somehow gentler: No, she’s too scared just now. You have to make friends with them before you can pet them. Remember, these are wild animals, honey.

  I thought they were ponies!

  We-e-ell, they are, but they’re wild ponies. Never been around people before.

  Where have they been, then?

  Free, I expect.

  By this time the dust had settled in the lot, and Blue could see the men approaching the corral. The familiar ones who brought the mustangs food and water came first, followed by several new men and … children. Men had foals. That was the only thing these small, high-pitched creatures could be. They gamboled and skipped much as Fly did, and their voices squeaked like Shadow’s. Blue watched them come, fascinated. Smaller men with softer voices followed: females, Blue realized with a start. Men and females and their young. So much to learn!

  As the crowd gathered along the fence, the grown-ups leaning their elbows atop the gate and the little ones scrambling for footholds on the rails, Blue took another step forward, drinking in the sweetish smell of the children. Their sudden, shrill squawks startled her a bit, but she stood her ground.

  Dad, look at that one! Look at those spots! We gotta take a picture of her for Mom.

  Get a look at her sister, right there behind her. She’s the best horse we got here, if you ask me. Found ’em together up north aways.

  She looks like a show horse! That gorgeous strawberry color!

  Soft sighs of appreciation sounded along the fence line.

  That’s the prettiest horse I’ve ever seen. She’s like a rainbow or somethin’.

  You still want to take a look at those stallions, Tessie?

  Naw. I just want to look at this one.

  The gust of laughter that shook the shoulders of the adults made Blue take a few steps back.

  What do you think of the gray one, Tessie? Think your mom would take to her?

  She isn’t as pretty, but yeah, I like her, too. She’s brave! See how she’s standin’ in front of all the rest, lookin’ at us!

  Yessir, that filly is a spunky one, all right. She’ll need a strong hand and patience.

  Mom’s got those, right, Dad?

  Sure does, Tessie. Well, sir, say we wanted to adopt both those fillies, you got any specials runnin’?

  More laughter and the group at the fence broke apart, some
families walking across the road to the stallions’ pen, some wandering back to the cars. The low-voiced man and the little girl followed Blue’s captors back to the barn. The screen door banged shut behind them, and the dust and the day settled down once more.

  * * *

  Blue’s chance came two days later.

  By now, she and Doe and the other recent captures were totally familiar with the routine of their new life. The men brought fresh water and hay in the morning, just after sunup. The sun’s glare moved predictably across the corral, blazing hot and high at midday, throwing long shadows from the fence line in the evening, when the men brought more water. The mustangs swished flies, stared at the hills beyond. Occasionally one of the men would separate a stallion or a mare from their group and drive them through the chute again for unknown purposes. Sometimes the stallions would call out to the fillies, and Blue remembered the grullo, with his sweeping tail and proud young head. She had almost answered him.

  It was the smell of rain that did it, finally … or perhaps it would have happened anyway. The rain unleashed the unbearable longing that filled Blue’s heart, but it had never been far from the surface. She had waited; she had learned. And two evenings after the visitors came, Blue acted.

  It was one of the rare all-day thundershowers, when the sky over the corrals turned the colors of Blue’s own coat, and the clouds rolled over the far hills much as they had over the mountains of the fillies’ home. Usually the rains here were short and sharp, beginning with a crash of thunder and sprays of distant lightning and ending almost as violently as they began, with a washed and brilliant sky framing the sun that would quickly dry the corrals’ puddles, baking the hard earth red again. But on this afternoon, the rains were more determined, or more leisurely: The air held its moisture, the sky kept giving more, and the dry, dusty land around the mustangs’ prison seemed, for once, almost green.