Snowfire

by Terri Farley

  “That, and we had to buy new tack, renovate the pasture, update their shots, and have them shod—you name it!”

  “They’ll earn their keep this summer,” Darby reminded her.

  “Let’s hope so,” Aunty Cathy said. “But things will be great,” she emphasized, “if we can sell a few horses at the rodeo and Jonah can book Kanaka Luna with one or two mares. And it would be nice for you kids to win some prize money, too.”

  Even though the rodeo’s prize money wasn’t much, Darby had already been daydreaming about spending it on something nice for Hoku. She had to remind the mustang that she loved her.

  She’d been thinking about horse shampoo, for a couple of reasons. It would not only smell nice, but every time Hoku caught a whiff of the scent on her mane, she’d remember Darby’s gentle, massaging hands.

  Of course, that assumed Darby’d be able to catch her someday.

  Besides the fact that it would be fun to win, she wanted to prove to Jonah that she understood the realities of ranch life, and that his beloved ‘Iolani Ranch would be safe with her, if he—

  “The rodeo is going to be awesome,” Megan’s voice broke into Darby’s thoughts, and Darby was glad.

  “Too bad Sugarfoot can’t compete,” Ann said.

  “No?” Aunty Cathy asked as she held the round pen gate open for the girls.

  Ann shook her head. “He could use the practice, but he’s too unpredictable.”

  Darby had heard about Sugarfoot chasing a client in a wheelchair and knocking him over. That wasn’t what someone who’d come to the Potters’ ranch for a therapeutic riding session expected, but Ann insisted that Sugarfoot’s behavior was “a colt thing.”

  When Cade rode up on Lady Wong, Darby realized she hadn’t asked him how Honi was doing.

  “Is your mom’s pony happy to be home?” Darby asked.

  “She seems real happy,” he replied. “And so does Mom. Tutu’s keeping her busy learning stuff about herbs and all.”

  Darby nodded, and would have asked more, but Ann was ready to ride.

  “So what are we practicing today?” she asked.

  “Jonah’s registered us for the ranching events, like trailer loading and sorting and doctoring,” Cade said. “But he told me we could do more.”

  “We have to do the Gretna Green!” Megan insisted.

  “What’s the Gretna Green?” Darby asked.

  “The real Gretna Green is a place in Scotland,” Aunty Cathy explained, “a spot that’s famous because young couples can elope and get married there without their parents’ permission.”

  “But wait. How can they have a horse race based on that?” Darby turned to Megan, since she was so eager to compete in the event.

  “In the race, the teams are made up of a girl and a guy, each on separate horses, and they have to hold hands while they race the other couples,” Megan explained.

  Cade shook his head. “They’re just going for time. It’s not a free-for-all start.”

  “Holding hands!” Ann cried. “That still sounds crazy dangerous!”

  “It can be,” Cade put in. “You have to practice, know your horse, your partner, and, uh, what you’re doing.”

  “I think Darby and I should enter the race,” Megan suggested.

  “I thought you said it was a guy-and-a-girl event,” Darby reminded her.

  “So what?” Megan countered. “Baxter and Conch look great together.”

  “But they’re both sort of green,” Darby protested. “I don’t know.”

  “I’ll show you how to do it. You can start on Navigator and I’ll take Biscuit, since they’re both so reliable.”

  “Okay,” Darby agreed warily. She’d first learned to ride on Navigator and knew that, whatever happened, he wouldn’t spook or do anything silly.

  With Cade and Ann sitting on the top fence rail watching, Megan and Darby lined Biscuit and Navigator up side by side.

  “Okay, take my hand and we’ll start by walking,” Megan instructed. She held out her left hand.

  Darby did, but she felt off balance.

  “Am I leaning too far?” she asked.

  “No, but you’re crushing my hand,” Megan told her.

  It was true. She’d been holding so tightly to Megan’s hand, her fingers were already stiff.

  “Sorry,” she apologized with an embarrassed laugh. Then she loosened her hold, but didn’t let go.

  “That’s better,” said Megan. “You don’t have to lean so far over. Our arms can reach.”

  Darby adjusted her seat, and she felt a surge of confidence.

  “Take it to a jog,” said Megan when she sensed Darby was ready.

  Navigator swung into a jog, and so did Biscuit.

  Both girls were smiling and soon were loping around the corral hand in hand.

  When they came to a halt, Darby realized that her cheeks hurt from smiling so hard. “That was cool,” she said.

  Cade and Ann clapped and cheered from the fence.

  “Way to go!” Ann yelled.

  “Ready to try it on Baxter and Conch?” Megan asked.

  “Why don’t we just stay with Navigator and Biscuit?” Darby suggested.

  “Because they’re not the horses Jonah wants us to ride,” Megan reminded her.

  “And they’re definitely not the horses we want to sell,” Aunty Cathy added.

  “That’s for sure,” Darby said.

  “Baxter and Conch will be perfect for this,” Megan said. “If you look at them, their conformation is a lot alike. They probably have totally matching strides.”

  “Okay,” Darby said. She was a little embarrassed at her hesitation, but as Cade adjusted her stirrups, she found out he harbored some doubts, too.

  “This is just for fun,” he said, looking up at her. “If things feel wrong, let me know.”

  Mounted on Baxter and Conch, Darby and Megan started once more at a walk. Instantly Baxter stepped out, trying to stay ahead of Conch. Darby clung to Megan’s hand, but just barely.

  “Help,” she whimpered, half laughing as she lost contact with Megan.

  Megan urged Conch to keep up, and they tried it again.

  This time Darby made a serious slip to the right as Baxter flattened his ears and Conch widened the space between them.

  Megan did something to scold the horse, and Conch narrowed his distance from the other gelding. That worked until Baxter began forcing his tongue against his bit, trying to break into a run.

  Darby didn’t know how she was supposed to shorten the reins using just her right hand. Finally, she was stretched so far to her left, she had to decide whether to let go or be pulled out of the saddle.

  Darby let go. When Megan circled back, she said, “This stunt’s going to need some work.”

  Darby nodded, but then she said, “Try it with Cade.”

  “Why?” Megan looked suspicious.

  “Because he’s about a zillion times better rider than I am, and if we want to sell these horses, we want someone riding who makes them look good,” Darby insisted.

  She and Megan rode over to where Cade and Ann sat on the fence.

  “Those two are definitely not in sync,” Ann said when they arrived.

  “I’ll say,” Megan agreed, rubbing her arm. “At this rate one of us will wind up with a disconnected shoulder. Or dislocated. However you want to say it, one of us will pull the ball out of the socket joint. I saw it on that kinesiology handout.”

  “Are you totally set on entering this event?” Darby asked.

  “Yeah,” Megan replied. “Sort of. Definitely. Come on; we’ll just have to practice.”

  Darby didn’t want to take the hand Megan offered her, so she asked, “Cade, will you try it? You’re a lot more experienced than I am. Maybe I would do better as part of a four-person team. I could ride Baxter in sorting, doctoring, and trailer loading, the kinds of things I’m a little more experienced at. That’s what Kimo suggested.”

  “But, Darby,” Megan protested.
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  “I’ll just slow you down,” Darby said, then gave Cade a pleading look Megan couldn’t see.

  “What do you think, Cade?” Megan asked.

  “I’ll give it a try,” he agreed.

  Darby realized that a hint of red had risen on Cade’s cheeks, like a sudden sunburn. These cowboys were sure easy to embarrass.

  Chapter Nine

  After an early dinner, Megan helped Ann and Darby wrap half of a fresh batch of malasadas for their camping trip.

  “Jonah loves malasadas,” Aunty Cathy said as she watched them.

  Jonah patted his belly. “I love them too much. But I can’t resist. Besides, I have another reason for wanting to take a batch along tonight.”

  “Another reason besides eating them?” Darby asked.

  “You’ll see,” Jonah said mysteriously as he left the kitchen.

  “Megan, I don’t know why you won’t come with us,” Darby urged. “It will be so much fun.”

  Megan laughed. “Oh, sure, I just love eating Jonah’s poi and jerky for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”

  “Is it really that bad?” Ann worried.

  “Not if you’re a fan of mashed taro root without a drop of salt or sugar.”

  Ann made a face.

  “Just kidding. Sort of kidding,” Megan said. “And it’s not the only reason I’m not going, anyway,” she replied. “Cade and I need the time to practice, because once you two come back we’ll have to concentrate on the four-person team events.”

  Ann slid Darby a teasing glance, and Darby returned it. They’d already practiced right up until dinner.

  “What?” Megan asked, realizing something was going on.

  “You know what,” Ann teased. “Cade and you just have to work together this weekend.”

  “Yes…we do,” Megan insisted. “Excuse me if I’d rather not break Cade’s arm by yanking him off Baxter. Your nickname is Crusher, not mine.”

  Ann and Megan had once both been on the soccer team at school before Ann had been sidelined by an injury, and they still acted like teammates sometimes.

  “True,” Ann agreed, laughing.

  “Hey,” Megan said, wagging her index finger at the other girls, “you just wait. If Conch doesn’t get sold right out from under me, then you can say this was about Cade.”

  Darby, Ann, and Jonah parked the truck at the drop-off point at the foot of the trails to the Two Sisters volcanoes.

  The drop-off point was sort of a staging area for trips up to the volcanoes. On the edge of the small parking lot there was a water spigot for filling canteens, a bulletin board for messages and announcements, and a sign-in sheet. This land belonged to Jonah and Aunt Babe. It had been given to them by their mother, Tutu, and an invisible border ran between the two volcanoes.

  But Aunt Babe and Jonah agreed on two permanent rules: Everyone who went up toward the Two Sisters had to print their name on the sign-in sheet, and no one was allowed beyond the stone trees, which were two miles from the craters of the volcanoes.

  Dusk hadn’t fallen yet, but a mist in the air blurred the peaks of the twin volcanoes, making them look even more magical.

  Darby rode Navigator at a slow and steady pace up the steep terrain. She had loaded her fanny pack with her flashlight, inhaler, some water, and a granola bar, all of which bumped along behind her as they rode.

  Jonah was ahead of her on Kona, his big gray cow horse, and Ann was behind, rocking in the saddle with Biscuit’s steady gait. They passed ohia trees with blazing red blooms, also called Pele trees after the fiery goddess said to rule the volcanoes.

  The last time they’d been up here, one of the Two Sisters had erupted. Darby tried not to think about it, but the Pele trees reminded her of Tutu’s tale about the white stallion, who was only one of many forms that Pele’s brother Moho could assume.

  He was the god of steam, and another of Pele’s brothers, who sometimes took the form of a black stallion, was the god of thunderclouds.

  Snowfire, god of steam.

  Black Lava, the god of thunderclouds.

  It struck Darby as poetic that these two roamed together, just as they did in the legend.

  “You girls are quiet,” Jonah commented as he ducked to pass under a branch laden with low-hanging lehua blossoms.

  “I guess I’m getting a little tired,” Ann admitted. “That doctoring race—getting on and off of Lady Wong, who must be seventeen hands tall—”

  “Sixteen,” Jonah put in. “And you do a nice job riding her.”

  When Ann sat a little straighter in the saddle, Biscuit picked his feet up and arched his neck. Ann apparently knew how rare Jonah’s outright compliments were, and her pleasure had flowed right down the reins to the buckskin.

  They came to a trail Darby remembered from her trip with Megan and Ann. It still gave her a shiver when she thought of how these trails were formed. They were carved naturally from flowing lava on its way downhill. If one of the volcanoes should erupt while they were on this path, they were in big trouble.

  Volcanic signs were everywhere. There was a kipuka, an island of fertile life surrounded by black lava rock. And this kipuka had a strange fernlike plant she’d never seen before. Huge and curled in on itself, kind of like a fuzzy green cinnamon roll, it reminded Darby of illustrated books she’d read that showed dinosaurs prowling among prehistoric plants.

  Jonah stopped to look at it, too. “That’s moa. The only other place you’ll see that is on a fossil, yeah?” he told them. “Tutu uses it to make a medicinal tea for a condition babies get called thrush.”

  Farther on, Jonah pointed out tall, spindly koa trees. Dark, sickle-shaped pea pods dangled from their highest branches.

  “Take a good look,” Jonah said, pointing. “And not just because darkness is coming. Those koas grow only in Hawaii. We’ve always used them for war canoes and surfboards, but now the wood is used for high-priced furniture.”

  “And that’s bad?” Darby asked.

  “Only if you think native Hawaiians should be able to afford it.”

  When they’d ridden past the koa trees for about a mile, Jonah stopped and dismounted.

  His gray waited, ground-tied, as Jonah unfolded his pocketknife and cut some branches from a tree with bright green leaves.

  “What’s that?” Darby asked as Navigator halted next to Kona.

  “Papala,” he answered as he cut.

  “For Tutu?” she asked.

  “No, for us.”

  Even in the fading light, she saw her grandfather’s smile. She hoped he could see well enough to enjoy this trip. She hoped they’d take it a dozen times more.

  “They have such pretty little pink flowers,” Ann noticed.

  Sticking the branches in his pack and climbing back on Kona, he started them moving along the trail once more. “The flowers are pretty,” he agreed. “That reminds me of a story about another flower: the koali morning glories.”

  “Are morning glories those blue flowers that grow on vines?” Darby asked.

  “Yeah, but these are the wild kind,” he clarified. “The flower opens blue in the morning and turns pink later in the day.”

  “Cool,” Ann murmured.

  “The Old Ones used the vines as ropes. When I was a kid, I had a swing made from it,” he told them. “There’s a legend, though, that the vine was inhabited by little worms that the Creator blessed with thought, then turned into people.”

  “Tyson must have been one of those people,” Ann joked. “It’s easy to believe he started life as a worm.”

  “Yeah, but there’s that part about being blessed with thought,” Darby answered, and Ann laughed.

  Chapter Ten

  The sounds around the riders died out, until only one stubborn bird cried, “e-e-vee,” as it trailed them for another mile.

  Jonah stopped, peered around the clearing, and suggested that they take advantage of the last of the light to make camp.

  Darby was glad she’d learned to do this before. Her fi
ngers were as swift and sure as Ann’s as they helped set up the horses’ high line, tying each end of a long rope to nearby ohia trees as though they planned to hang out their laundry with clothespins.

  Jonah set up his tent and the two-person tent Darby and Ann would share, while the girls watered and hand-grazed the horses.

  “We got the best of the deal,” Darby said as they watched Jonah fit poles together and pound stakes into the forest floor.

  “Thank you,” Ann called to Jonah.

  He just waved and said, “Be careful. Make sure those horses are spaced apart. And don’t give ’em enough slack to get a leg over the rope, or then you’ll see a real rodeo.”

  “Speaking of that, I haven’t seen any wild-horse tracks, have you?” Darby asked.

  “It’s too dark to tell,” Ann replied.

  “And our horses aren’t restless,” Darby said, watching the tied horses.

  So Black Lava and his band weren’t hiding from Snowfire on Two Sisters. They must have gone all the way back up to Sky Mountain.

  After dark, Jonah and Ann helped Jonah build a fire with the wood they’d collected earlier.

  All three of them stared into the crackling flames. Their color shifted from gold to orange to scarlet, reminding Darby of her filly’s coat.

  “The fire feels good,” Ann said. “I didn’t think I’d be cold.”

  “We’ve ridden up a couple thousand feet,” Jonah said. “There’s a reason the snow doesn’t melt on Sky Mountain. Now you two aren’t complaining about the extra blankets I made you pack, yeah?”

  Jonah squatted by the fire, stripping one of the papala branches he’d cut on the trail with his knife. “It’s the altitude that makes it cold, but we’re prepared for it.”

  Darby unwrapped the malasadas they’d brought for dessert. The fire and dancing shadows made the pastries even more of a treat. Ann passed one to Jonah and he took it, but then he did something strange.

  Instead of gobbling it down like the girls were about to do, Jonah wiped the malasada’s greasy surface on the sharp end he’d carved from a papala branch.

  Darby scooted closer to the fire, wondering what her grandfather was up to. She caught her breath in surprise as he lightly tossed one stick up into the air, just above the fire. It whooshed up into the air like a flaming dart, before heading back into the campfire.