around me. For the grass to be so high, few horses had grazed it, maybe since early summer. The night breeze blew, the grass whispering. Owls called in the distance. Bats darted overhead. I had left the driveway behind.
I found an open place where a deer herd had slept at some point, the grass pressed down in circular areas as big as their bodies, like dimples of safety. I stepped around and over old horse droppings and fresh deer pellets. I startled a bird off her nest. But nothing unexpected was there. No white-headed person. There were no footprints in the soil, no hairs caught in the grass, no indication that a human had raced through here. Had the white thing I saw been the rump of a white-tailed deer? Feeling foolish, I moved in a semicircle around and back toward my car, a sudden gust at my back.
Just ahead, I spotted a sleeping horse. Not wanting to get trampled, I stamped on the ground. But the horse didn’t leap or climb to its feet. It didn’t move at all. I edged closer, parting the grass, scanning with my flashlight. The beam fell on the horse. It was dead and decomposing. Melting like wax. Its coat looked reddish brown beneath the green froth. I shined my flash all across the horse and settled the beam on its face. Beneath the green goo, the lightning blaze shone white. It was Adrian’s Hell, Stella’s stallion. I whispered an anguished, “Nooo. Oh no.”
My flash fell on its lips and tongue. They were green.
The horse wasn’t female, but it was decomposing like one.
I stood there for too long, uncertain, grieving, before I marked my location and turned away, tracing my way back to the car. I debated calling Occam, who, according to the group text reply, was interrogating riders in the barn with T. Laine. Calling him felt like a girl asking her boyfriend for help. If I wasn’t dating him, I would call my boss, so I sent a group text that I was okay, then called FireWind.
“FireWind. Ingram, is there a problem?” he answered. I realized how softly, how quietly he spoke. Much like Jane Yellowrock spoke. Maybe a Cherokee thing?
“Dead horse near my twenty,” I said, meaning near my current location. “Same symptoms as the humans. And I saw something or someone moving in the grasses, but it’s gone. Who do you want me to notify for a search?” I could almost feel him assessing my request.
“Stay put. I’m on my way.”
FireWind was coming. I remembered the sight of him standing, arms out at his sides, as Adrian’s Hell pranced and danced and challenged. And then slowly accepted the man. His arms around the horse’s neck as they embraced. I needed to tell him first. Not let him recognize the stallion, dead.
Moments later, FireWind appeared at my side and placed his gobag on my car hood. I holstered my weapon and stood in the dark, silent.
“Ingram?”
I cleared my throat quietly. “Something you need to know. This horse is decomposing like the female humans at UTMC and here. But he’s a he. Was a he.”
“I understand,” he said. But he didn’t. Not yet. The vision of FireWind with the horse, his stillness like part of a dance.
“He’s Stella Mae’s stallion.”
It was too dark to see my boss’ face, but his body went preternaturally still. His voice held no emotion when he spoke, but his words were too soft, too crisp. “I see.”
When he said nothing else, I turned into the grass. Together, we walked, our feet and bodies rustling the tall leaves, my flash lighting the way to the dead horse. The animal’s black mane and tail were tangled and damp. His eyes were whited over and weeping the familiar green froth. Again, my heart clenched in despair. I wasn’t sure why a dead animal was such a tragic thing when a dead human should surely have been more important. But I hadn’t responded to the dead people the way I was reacting to Adrian’s Hell, Stella Mae’s beautiful stallion. Not at all. And neither was FireWind.
He said something softly, in that language I didn’t know, the words sounding formal, grief in his tone. In English, he said, “I saw him the first day I arrived here. He was a beautiful animal.”
“Do you . . . do you want me to read Adrian’s Hell like I read the land?”
“Is that what you thought I would want? No. You are not to touch