Moon Filly

by Elyne Mitchell

  The whole valley was even darker.

  He succeeded in keeping out of reach, and with every mo­ment, his head cleared, but the darkness was even more notice­able.

  He saw the iron-grey give a wild look around him... He must have noticed the darkness too... Then, as though he be­lieved that the dark was being caused by the cut Wurring had given him above the eye, the grey stallion came hurtling in to fight with all his strength.

  Wurring was sure that the iron-grey had seen that it was becoming dark, so it was not just he imagining that night was coming in the middle of the day! Surely the scuttling animals had known something. The sun was gone when it should be high in the sky. On a clear day the light of the sun was vanish­ing...

  He jumped out of the iron-grey’s reach, and only got half the blow that was aimed at him, but the bigger stallion was furious.

  Could it be that Wurring was to die as the sun’s light was extinguished?

  Wurring could get away if he turned and galloped, he knew, but the darkness was unnatural and terrifying. He could not gallop into it, but he kept moving up the valley as they fought.

  No sun was there to make his mane foam with light. The day had turned to night almost completely.

  The iron-grey was screaming with rage - and perhaps with terror. Flailing hooves were all around Wurring, but he did not turn and run... not into the dark... and this horse had to be beaten.... Or was he going to be beaten himself?

  Darkness settled down on the mid-day mountains.

  16: A Great Swirling Pool

  After the first warm wind, the first warm rains, Yarran left Ravine. She knew that it would still be impossible to go directly east because there would be deep, packed snow, so she made downwards and to the north, first intending, later, to try to cut across the mountains in an easterly direction.

  She did not wish to stay near the bay stallion of Ravine, now that spring was starting. She had no wish to be one of his herd, and it would be interesting to see what herds, what stal­lions, were lower down the Tumut. Wildfire was burning through her. She longed to gallop over high, open country with some stallion as wonderful as Winganna, if one such existed. Somewhere soon, there would be a wild call ringing out, per­haps ringing over snow, for her. She would answer it, but before this she had to find Wurring and Ilinga. She had to be certain that Wurring survived the immense danger which she knew threatened him.

  She picked her way round steep sidelings above the Tumut River; handsome mare threading through the tall white ribbon-gums and the rough-barked peppermints. Occasionally her hooves brushed through the purple of easy-flowering sarsa­parilla. Sometimes the sarsaparilla crept all over a bush, splash­ing its colour above the rocks.

  Yarran went on steadily, glad that she had managed to leave Ravine without the bay noticing. Lower down there were even bacon-and-egg bushes flowering - golden and velvety brown. The going became easier, and after a while she could see below her the valley opening out, wide and green, and many horses were dotted about.

  She walked down, quietly, and keeping hidden in trees, but she walked with proud bearing, as befitted a mare who was beautiful and who had much wisdom. When she reached the fringe of the trees, she did not go into the clear country, but wandered round the edge of it, looking and listening.

  She looked at all the horses, she listened to their neighs, the sounds of the birds, the rustle of the eucalyptus leaves and the murmur of the old dried grass that had seen last spring and summer, and the winter too, for Yarran knew that there were secrets she might learn.

  Before she had been there long she could tell that the horses were restless as though expecting something, and the sounds in the grass and the leaves told her of something that had to be and would happen soon. Down here, too, low on the Tumut, the old bush legend of the vanishing sun, and of the union of

  sun and moon, was being whispered ceaselessly.

  Then she saw Ilinga’s hoofmark.

  Yarran stopped dead. She had not ever thought that Ilinga had come this way for the winter, but she would know her foster daughter’s track among a million other tracks. It took very little seeking to find a full set of hoofmarks - another and another - and thus learn the way Ilinga had gone.

  Scent still hung. It was not very long since Ilinga had headed upwards for the higher mountains. It was also not very long till Yarran discovered that a stallion had followed Ilinga, and that his tracks were made much more recently.

  Yarran took a last, long, careful look at the big valley, eyes searching till she was quite certain that Ilinga had not returned to the horses by some other way. Then she set off to follow Ilinga’s track, trotting along whenever the country allowed. The stallion’s tracks showed that he was trotting too. Ilinga had only walked most of the time.

  The day was already getting late. Night would come before she had gone very far, and though she would be able to follow scent, tracking by night would not be easy. Yarran kept going until dark, and then started off as moonlight sent cold fingers of light into the forest.

  She kept thinking that the stallion’s scent was so fresh that she must catch up with him soon, but she caught no sight nor sound of him. When the moon set, she rested again, and went on in the early-morning light.

  From a rise on the ridge which she was travelling, about mid-day, Yarran saw through the trees that there was thick forest ahead, and then a sunlit clearing. It looked warm and bright, but there was no horse in it.

  She trotted quite smartly through the open trees, and then had to slow down where the forest was thicker. She emerged into the clear country, the sunlit glade, and shivered because everything had got darker.

  The tracks led right on. Ilinga’s track showed she had trotted here, where the ground was not steep and rough. The stallion had trotted too. His scent was very fresh. Yarran thought she might catch up with him. It was then that she also realized that she had been noticing for sometime the furtive, scuttling noises in the forest, and that now there were some kangaroos going very fast across the top of the glade.

  Surely it was a little darker. She wondered where the kangaroos had vanished. Queer how there was no bird song, and now she could not hear the scuttling and rustling. She seemed to be alone. Suddenly she noticed how oppressive the day felt. She was getting very hot. She trotted on. ‘Now, now, now, now,’ was in the sound of her hoofbeats, in the beat of her pulse, as the heat and tension of the day mounted.

  There was a band of white snow ahead. She would be able to roll to cool herself. When she reached it, it looked less shining white. She did not stop. Ilinga had crossed it, so had the unknown stallion. The snow was softening fast. The scent hung on the bushes and earth on the other side of it.

  Yarran paused and sniffed. Ilinga’s scent was as fresh as the stallion’s now. Neither of them were very far ahead, and both were hurrying - she had been hurrying herself. Ilinga’s scent was stronger, as though she were becoming afraid.

  Had the day really got darker? Why was it so terribly quiet? Yarran hurried on, growing anxious, getting almost afraid herself.

  The ridge rose up and up, and patches of snow became more frequent. Sometimes Yarran caught sight of much more snow ahead, but it had almost the look it gets as night comes... a quietness... so dark...

  Yarran pushed herself harder. She was beginning to get short of breath. That thick snow was not on the ridge which she was climbing. She realized that she had nearly reached the top of this ridge, and that it then continued on and on, and almost level.

  Here, just on top of the ridge, the creek was below, on her off side. It was a large creek, and she saw that it must head further to the west, where the snow had been much heavier because the stream was very swollen.

  She threaded her way through patches of snow, just as the others ahead had done. Then she saw Ilinga in front, canter­ing, and a brown stallion following her, but they were like shadows, it had become so dark.

  Dark, dark. They were all going into the dark. What had gone wrong wi
th the day? It was surely only mid-day. Silence and oppressive heat - Yarran felt the sweat running off her coat. No other animals were about now. Ilinga was going faster and faster as though terror were after her - or ahead of her - and she was surely seeking Wurring. Dark, dark, was the sun vanishing?

  Yarran stopped and looked up at the sky. All was dark. The lazy clouds were dark too. For one second before her eyes blinked, she saw through the fringe of her eyelashes a great shadow over the sun. She cast a quick look down to the creek, longing for a drink, noticed that logs and flood debris had caught together, damming it into a great, swirling pool in the narrow valley - dark water beneath the dark sky.

  Yarran began to gallop after Ilinga. This must be what had been foretold. The sun would be almost extinguished - and Wurring was also the sun.

  The sun was nearly gone. Yarran was getting closer and closer to the young stallion and he was not far behind Ilinga. The ridge had become narrow, and ahead there was a high, rough cliff. It looked as though it closed the valley. It loomed high in the darkness. Then she could hardly see even the cliff against the sky. Dark, dark, dark...

  Yarran felt that she was galloping through the night, and some great menace was chasing her. It must have been the darkest moment - sometime back, when she stopped and looked up - because suddenly she knew that a little more light was creeping over the sky.

  Ilinga must know where she was going. She was still moving so fast.

  On and on they went, until they were almost beside that great, rearing cliff, and the two young ones ahead suddenly turned down the almost perpendicular drop into the valley. Yarran followed, and started to slide. She dug in her hooves to

  stop herself.

  As she looked up, the two vanished from her sight, one after the other - and it was getting much lighter, so they had not just gone into darkness.

  Yarran went down carefully till, at her feet, the creek van­ished into a large hole below the cliff. She took a step back­wards in fright, then timidly stepped forward again, two or three steps, her nose timidly outstretched.

  This was where Ilinga and the stallion had gone, for their scent was right to the edge, and so were their hoofmarks, slip­ping and sliding. But there was another scent too. Yarran sniffed eagerly.

  It was quite fresh. Ilinga must have been going too fast, been too desperate to notice it.

  Just on the other side of the creek was a hoofmark.

  17: Sun beneath a Shadow

  While the sun slowly and almost completely vanished beneath a great, round shadow, Wurring and the iron-grey had fought their way up the valley to the mouth of the cavern. There was

  no mistaking the menace of the iron-grey. Both horses were terrified of the unnatural dark, and the older horse’s terror had made him savage, determined to kill. Wurring could feel this, and suddenly knew that, even if the middle of the day had become dark and full of fear, if he were to live he must escape. If he stayed, death would claim him.

  Behind was the tunnel into which Ilinga had disappeared. The tunnel would be dark anyway, whether it was dark or light outside. He would race up it, and away - if he could get away. He started to dance backwards into the cave, always facing the heavy stallion. The iron-grey followed. Maybe he would never get away from him, and the tunnel was so narrow it could give the stronger stallion a big advantage. He must try it - race beyond the boulders. Wurring swung around in the darkness and flicked his heels with great force as a parting kick at his opponent - and felt them strike flesh and bone very hard. There was no time to look back. He fled into the tunnel, and as fast as he could go along its smooth stone floor, deafened by the echoes of his own pounding hooves.

  He remembered the boulders in time, and went slower. As the thundering, echoing noise died down, he realized that no one was following him. Perhaps that iron-grey had had enough of the tunnel, the time he chased Ilinga through it and was lamed. Wurring did not think of how his hooves had hit bone and flesh, but he did think that he must take care not to lame himself among the rocks. Then he felt the first line of boulders in front of him.

  Wurring remembered those rocks. He remembered them as enormous, insurmountable boulders that had stopped him go­ing with Ilinga, and he remembered it all in a queer haze, because he had been in great pain.

  Now he was surprised to find that he could feel his way through them all fairly easily. Four good legs, of course, were better than three. He travelled quite quickly until he came to the very big boulder. Here he spent some time and had to search until he found the footholds around one side, and all that time there was no sound from the iron-grey.

  Wurring got up on to the top of the rock, then he was over it, beyond it, and in the smooth tunnel again, hurrying. He came to the next lot of tumbled boulders and was almost over that before he felt the touch of fresh air on his face. There was no light because the sun had been almost extinguished, but as he reached the opening, there was certainly more light than there had been in the tunnel.

  Wurring stood there, checked by the splashing water. How was he to get out?

  Ilinga must have got out of here, so it must be possible. If only it were not so dark. Wurring was young and strong. He jumped on to the mud bank, which was smaller, now, because the water was continually splashing over it. From there he leapt straight up and out of the hole.

  He stood for a moment, looking at the narrow valley, the great tall trees looming against the dark sky. Like Yarran, he saw through his eyelashes, for one fleeting second, that the sun was under a round cloud. Then he took a deep breath, filling his lungs.

  The sun was almost extinguished, but he felt life and ex­citement surging through him. He turned his head towards Ravine and Numeramang, towards home, and he hoped, to­wards Ilinga, and he climbed, slithering and sliding, up the steep side of the valley.

  He went fast because he had no wish to be caught again by the iron-grey, and the world was becoming slightly lighter. After a while he heard a sound far below him, and, thinking it was the iron-grey, he hurried even more. He must get up and out of this deep-cleft valley, out and away.

  The light grew stronger. Once more daylight was coming back to the world as though there had been an unnatural and short night to break the rhythm of life. Wurring noticed that there were many more of the lazy clouds. It was very hot, too. The dripping sweat was not only caused by his speed and the fear he had felt.

  He reached the top and could see great ridges and moun­tains of snow ahead. Then they were hidden under black cloud. Perhaps it had been raining up there for some time. Presently he felt the first huge spots falling on himself.

  His way lay a little south of west, but that would lead him into the deepest snow, so he headed rather north of west, try­ing to get round most of the snow.

  Sunlight fell between dense black clouds and illuminated the young horse with blazing light. Wurring reared up in the brightness. He felt wildly alive - and at last he was free and seeking Ilinga. Then it started to rain again.

  Wurring kept on, trotting, cantering, picking his way be­tween the heat-rotted fields of snow that were now visibly washing away. Even as he watched, rivulets formed every­where and went tearing downwards.

  The ground was slippery, was boggy, was very heavy going, but Wurring wanted to get as far away from that iron-grey as he could. At least this beating rain would wash away his tracks.

  Rain on the back, rain in the eyes, water running down his shoulders - Wurring trotted on. Sometime, he knew, he would come to deep snow which might stop him.

  The clouds lifted again, and he saw the mountains ahead. Maybe he would have to go even more northerly to find a way through - and now evening, real evening, was coming. There was no sound nor sign of anyone following. When night came he would be able to rest.

  Sunlight: fell obliquely, gliding banks of snow, shining on pools of water. Wurring’s mane and tail were nearly dry. He shook himself so that the hairs separated, and suddenly he was sunlight, fire, life. Once he saw his shadow beh
ind him on a field of snow, far bigger than life size.

  The loneliness of the evening gripped him. Soon there would be no golden light, no glittering beams from between black clouds. A wild duck went winging across the snow, and there was the eerie cry of a plover from a bare swamp. The birds were as lonely as he, but they had started to move and call again, after that mid-day darkness. Lonely, lonely was the threnody of the plover, lonely the wild duck flying, neck out­stretched.

  Wurring was one horse alone, but he sought Ilinga, the filly who had come to Numeramang, that night of the full moon. It was not loneliness that she and her mother had brought with them - though death must be lonely - it was beauty and a strange dream of the future. A moonlight mare ... Ilinga had a luminous quality in her coat - neither she nor her dam had had moonlight through their hair.

  Wurring was tiring, and his head was in a cloud of old stories of the sun and the moon. The sun had vanished that day, of this he was certain. The brolgas had cried to the moon of great danger, and he had had danger enough. Now it was time to find Ilinga. Another wild duck flew high along a pale, blue-green rift in the sky.

  Night was coming. Wurring began to look for some place that would be sheltered from the wind that was now turning cold.

  There were rocks and some trees, some rather poor grass which he could nibble. He would camp there for the night. As he stopped moving, he thought he heard a distant neigh ... a voice he knew? He did not like to answer because of the iron- grey, and the neigh - if it was one - did not sound again.

  Wurring was very tired. He grazed for a while 0n the un­appetizing old grass, constantly looking up and all around. Then he backed himself against a tree in a cleft between rocks. He would sleep on his feet there, where no one could come at him from behind - but he did not sleep. He was tense, waiting for whatever the future held for him, the future that had been promised when that mare walked on to the Numeramang flat with the filly foal at foot, promised in that vibration which went through him as he touched the foal.