Free Black River by S. M. Hulse Page B

this?”
    â€œIt’s a long way up,” Dennis said, without looking at him. “We’ll ride.”
    â€œYou couldn’t have told me this before?”
    â€œDidn’t see any reason to.” Dennis ran a bristle brush over the black horse’s back and laid his free hand over its withers. “I’ll put you on Rio. He’s a good horse.”
    Wes didn’t say anything. He could ride. Didn’t especially like to, but his father had kept a couple horses, chunky animals with coats that never shed all the way out and hooves that chipped on the rocks in the pasture. He’d used them to pack elk out of the mountains, and for a few seasons Wes went along. Fine. He’d do it Dennis’s way, this once. For Claire.
    He watched Dennis smooth the blanket over Rio’s back and swing the saddle up so it settled easy. His stepson moved with the kind of speed and confidence a person exhibited only when he didn’t have to think about what he was doing. Wes watched his hands. They expertly tightened the cinch and knotted the latigo, moving swiftly over leather and metal and still finding time for a gentle glide over muscle and hair. “Let’s get Mom’s ashes set up here,” he said.
    Dennis’s hands crowded each other when he held the small box. The brown paper wrapping was still on, and it rustled as Dennis gently settled the box into the bottom of a leather bag. He tied it to the skirt of Rio’s saddle so it lay against the horse’s flank and rose and fell slightly with the animal’s breath.
    Dennis turned away from the saddlebag too quickly. “Ready?”
    Wes nodded.
    Rio took the bit readily when Dennis offered it, closing his eyes as Dennis guided the leather straps of the bridle over his ears and fixed the buckles. The reins were split, and without so much as a glance at Wes, Dennis balanced them out in his hands and knotted them together. He started to lead the horse toward a bale of hay near the fence, but Wes stopped him. “I’m good.” He took hold of the saddle horn, set his foot in the near stirrup and hauled himself into the saddle. He could often force his way through a single action—mind over matter lasted that long, at least—but his hand punished him good when he tightened his grip on the horn. A sweet pain on a day like this. Tangible.
    â€œCan you hold those reins all right?”
    â€œThey’re fine.” He cradled the knot in his palm and let the reins drape over his fingers. He wondered if Dennis had thought it out beforehand.
    â€œSit back on your pockets a little more,” Dennis said, then turned away to bridle the red horse.
    They started up through the access lane that ran between Dennis’s land and Farmer’s, Dennis in front. The red horse was a firecracker, but Dennis rode him with a natural calm. His spine was absolutely straight, and Wes suddenly remembered this about him, this perfect posture he’d always had, even as a teenager, when most boys slouched like they’d slipped a few notches back on the evolutionary scale. Rio settled easily into step behind the red horse, his head and neck swaying slightly. Wes drove his heels toward the ground, remembering that single piece of advice from his father, and tried to let his body follow the rhythmic movement of Rio’s. It was a strange sensation, made so by the distance of time, but strange in another way, too, a way that made him recall the hitch he’d seen when he watched the horse in the pasture a few days back. Rio’s hind legs moved stiffly, with an up-and-down jerkiness, like pistons short on grease. “This horse has got arthritis,” Wes said.
    Dennis turned in the saddle, and Serrano started jigging. He watched Rio for a minute, and the muscles at the sides of his mouth tautened. “He’s old,” he said, the words like a sigh.
    â€œThis ride going to be too much for