Chapter 23

Even after the workout last night I still woke with the sun and felt like life really was worth living. Taachachi proved it in minutes by freshening up the fire and putting the coffee pot on. I visited the closest of the new shitters and by the time I made it back near the growing crowd of cooks one of them handed me my first mug full.

Since it would still be a few minutes until food was ready I walked over to tell Mama and the pups good morning. Mama wolf perked up and damned if she didn't wag her tail a swipe or two as I approached. The pups were more enthusiastic. They attacked my booted feet as soon as I was close enough and they were soon growling at them and doing their best to nip them into submission. I even bucked up my nerve to put my hand inside Mama's cage and give her a pat or two on the head. Wonder of wonders, I didn't draw back a nub.

Back at my mealtime rock, I sat down and Keelah had a hipbone plate full for me. She even took my mug back to the coffee pot and filled it again. When I started munching and took a good look at what was on my plate I was surprised to find a couple of fried eggs in the mix. Where in hell had they come from? I didn't have to wait long to find out.

Taachachi came over as I was slurping them up and started bragging on Mita. She was the egg finder and I was proud of her too, but I still wondered where in the hell the chickens had come from. With a few questions I learned that these weren't from chickens. Mita had found a guinea's nest.

Actually, I wasn't sure what the proper name for a guinea's nest was. I didn't know a lot about them, but I did know that sometimes they would lay their eggs in a sort of community hole in the ground, and that was what Mita had found, promptly removing every egg except for three or four. Seems like it was common knowledge if you took all the eggs the guineas would find a new nest, but if you left a few they would use the same one.

That knowledge was new to me. Even though I knew what guineas were and have even seen them before, I didn't know very much about them. Ignorance had seldom stopped me from trying something before though, and I was already wondering if we could catch some and get a hen house, or a guinea house into operation. That was for after we were done with this roundup and training trip though. This morning I was just happy to have the eggs.

After breakfast was gone my first duty was to Buck. When I tracked him down he actually seemed glad to see me. That was a good start anyway and he didn't seem any worse for the wear caused by his first night hobbled. I'm sure he felt better for having the chance to graze. I left him at it and went to find Cowta.

We needed one hell of a lot more hobbles than I had and the only way to get them was to teach someone how to braid some for us. I already knew that they had some type of plaiting they did, because I'd seen a few simple things made that way. I didn't know who did the braiding though and I figured Cowta would.

The answer was what I'd halfway expected. Since his accident Cowta had been in the root hog or die mode mostly. He tried to earn his and his family's keep by taking up any type of handyman work he thought was worth a meal or more.

The first problem we ran into was nothing to braid. Since we had plenty of skins lately I asked Taachachi if she knew any women that knew how to cut thongs from rawhide. She looked at me like I was a dimwitted child.

"Every woman knows how to cut thongs," she said.

"That is great. I need two of the bear skins cut into thongs please. I need them for Cowta to make more hobbles from," I said.

"What are hobbles?"

Instead of trying to explain I rummaged around and found the other pair I had. Of course I had to tell her what they were for after that. She caught on, but she asked how Cowta was going to make hobbles out of rawhide thongs. Five more minutes of a plaiting lesson and Taachachi was satisfied. She did think that this braiding sounded too important to trust to a mere man though and she let me know that she and most of my other mates would be watching closely while I taught Cowta the finer points of the art.

That was fine with me, even though I wasn't sure I could come up with any finer points of braiding. I knew how to braid well enough to make things I just had to have and I was sure that with only a little light on the subject Cowta and the women could surpass my limited instructions. For now, cutting thongs would hold them a day or two. I headed back to the pen.

Another day, another twelve horses to train, kinda. I got them started and then handed them off to Biltee. He worked them a little further along and handed them off to someone else, and so on.

There were only six new candidates left in the pen after I finished with this morning's crowd. Biltee came in with me and it didn't take long to get them tied to the snubbing posts and pawing at the ground around them.

"Will we spread out again and drive more of them into the pen?" Biltee asked.

"No, I think we'll just deal with these tomorrow and then take a day off to catch our breaths. I need to do more riding on Buck and teach him some more things this afternoon. By the day after tomorrow he will be able to help us drive the other horses into the pen. Tonight we will release all the horses that we have been working with. They need to be able to graze," I said.

"Will they be hard to catch again?" he asked.

"Some will and some won't. They can't get out of the front fence though so it won't be so hard to gather them back up. Buck and I will deal with the ones that give too much trouble," I said.

I walked back to the camp and went to see Mama wolf and her pups. She didn't give me a bit of trouble when I walked directly to her cage, stuck my hand in and petted her head. The pups attacked me again of course but my boots were holding up well under the vicious mauling.

Visiting Mama reminded me of something else I needed to make by braiding. Her collar. By now I was sure I could teach her to hang around and act civilized but I would need a good leash and collar to get started.

Lunch was a welcome sight when mine arrived via Meetee. After I'd finished I decided that a nap wouldn't hurt me, so I kicked off my boots and lay down on the furs. It reminded me that we'd been lucky so far and hadn't had even a threat of rain. If a thunderstorm came up fast we'd end up with everything we owned wet. Well, it would just have to dry afterwards.

After my snooze I found Buck again, put the hackamore on him and then saddled him up. We spent half an hour riding around and getting him warmed up and then I rode to the short fence's gate where we went through. As a last precaution I remembered to tell someone what I was up to, so I found Taachachi and let her know I should be back in an hour or two.

"Where are you going on that beast?" she asked.

"I'm going to show him that no matter how hard he runs he can't get me off his back," I said, and then mounted.

I could tell almost to the second when Buck realized that he was free again if he could just shake me, he seemed to get that off his mind though. I helped him out by urging him into a trot and then finally into a gallop. At that pace he couldn't resist his natural inclinations. He let it out and went to his fastest run.

Of course there was some danger involved, since if he stepped in some kind of hole we could both end up dead. It wasn't like this was his first trip over this ground though. He spent his life, up until the last few days, traveling all around this area, and I'm sure he was as aware as me that he shouldn't step into any holes.

He gave me a surprise when we came to the first small stream, since I felt him bunch up his muscles to jump it. I leaned out over his neck to help him with the balance and he cleared it easily. I couldn't let him try that on the next one though because it was too damned wide. Luckily he'd tired a bit before we reached it and when I tightened up on the rein a little he dropped back to a trot and then a walk.

We waded the larger side stream when we came to it and went on out to the river. I turned him toward the camp where we'd had the trouble the other day, but I didn't intend to go that far. Just as I walked him over a small rise I got a big surprise and so did the big man from Weeta and Woota's camp, the one that was Geeko's father.