Silver Brumby Kingdom
“It is only one of those tales that seemed to be whispered by the trees,” Whiteface answered, “but there may be more truth in the story that one of the silver horses was way down on the Murray alone, seeking a white mare who was once owned by the other one.”
Thowra gave no further thought to Whiteface, and not another thought to the filly, but turned uphill again, towards Storm. He told Storm what he had heard, and then went straight on, headed for Baringa’s Canyon.
Close behind him went the filly.
As soon as Thowra was out of sight of the herd, he began to go very fast. However fast he went, he made no sound, but the filly, having to make a great effort to keep up, made quite a noise, and Thowra heard her.
At first, when he looked back and saw her, he thought he would send her straight back, and then the idea came to him that she could look handsome in Baringa’s herd. . . . Baringa could not possibly be dead, perhaps hurt, somewhere far away, and unable to get home, and what could be a better welcome home than a beautiful filly for his herd? He would take the filly with him, if she could keep up.
He waited till she was close behind him, and after that he kept looking back to see if she followed.
He did not even call in on Son of Storm, and avoided being seen by other horses, keeping off all tracks.
It was night, and very dark, when he reached the ridge above the Canyon. There he went round and round in a few circles, then down over the steepest and most rugged part, making sure the filly was close on his heels, making sure that the route he picked was really frightening so that she would be less likely to try to climb out — just as he, with his circles in the dark, had tried to ensure that she did not know where she was going.
In this pitch darkness they went into Baringa’s Canyon, almost as though they were dropping down, and when they were nearly there, Thowra, who, in spite of his efforts to frighten her, was glad that the filly was following fearlessly, said.
“Either tonight, or soon, if you choose to do so, you may join the herd of the most beautiful stallion in all the mountains.”
“Who, O Thowra, do you mean? To me it is you who are the most beautiful stallion.”
The filly could feel the presence of Thowra in the darkness as she heard his answer.
“Not I, but my grandson, Baringa.”
“Was it not for one named Baringa that the plovers cried?”
This time Thowra’s answer seemed to vibrate in the invisible leaves of the ribbon gums and sallee trees:
“Baringa could not be dead.”
They had not once stopped moving down the precipitous hillside. Now there were cliffs just underneath them, and the filly must have felt that something even steeper was ahead, because she pressed close to Thowra, but she never hesitated as he led down the small footholds and little platforms and cracks on the granite cliff.
They were almost at the bottom when Thowra said:
“If Baringa is not here, he will return, for he has the most beautiful herd in all the mountains, and now I am adding you to it. There is surely nothing that would be more likely to draw him back.”
The filly wondered if he were really feeling less worried, or whether he was only just trying to make himself believe that all was well. Could a herd of lovely mares call a horse back from the dead? What was the faint gleam she could see in his eyes in the darkness?
She followed him closely, wondering also what sort of reception she would get from the mares, who must be somewhere quite close, A current of excitement was racing through her, too. At last she was going to run with the most wonderful horse in all the mountains — perhaps Baringa, perhaps Thowra.
All at once they landed on flat ground. She could feel through the darkness that there were others coming close. Did she imagine it, or were there the light-coloured shapes of two mares?
Thowra whinnied softly, then a gentle paw touched his nose. He dropped his great head to the grey kangaroo’s.
“Benni, Benni,” he said. “What has happened? Where is Baringa? Where is Dawn?”
“Dawn was swept downstream in the flood in the Murray,” Benni answered, “half a moon ago, now. Baringa has gone searching for her and has not returned, though he should have been back . . . unless he could not find her and he has kept on and on searching. . . . She was soon to foal. . . .”
Thowra felt suddenly cold.
“I did not hear about Dawn, but I heard that Baringa was missing,” he said, “and I have brought this filly for him, when he returns. She is a half-sister of yours, Koora. She must be tired and hungry now. Could you lead her to where she may find some sweet grass? She will need a drink too,” his nose touched Koora — the sweet mare who had followed him over the mountains, and would follow him anywhere, to death in fire or flood, if needs be, or to perish in the snow.
They fed and drank and, later, all stood close together for company. The little herd was glad of Thowra’s presence. This was the sixth night without Baringa.
Already the weather which had been so fine, was changing, and the same gusty north-west wind that was disturbing Lightning, on the Pilot, moved in the trees above.
As they stood half-sleeping, a sound came — a sound only partly heard, not really breaking the silence of the night. Whatever it was made each animal alert and tensely waiting. Waiting . . . Waiting. . . . Then it came, louder, closer, and this time it was the lonely neigh of a stallion, a stallion whom none of them knew.
The new filly was amazed at the sudden tension in Thowra and the others around her. This place must be far away from any horses because it was obvious that they rarely heard a call, and obvious that this call meant great danger. She had felt the hair of Thowra’s coat rising, as though he were listening with all himself. Then she knew he had moved away — knew that, silent as a fanning breeze, he was going towards that sound.
Thowra had heard that strange call, and all the half-formed rumours which he had heard at Stockwhip Gap, and the story of Baringa’s absence from the Canyon, fitted together, and he knew that it was likely that this was a stallion who had heard Baringa was dead, and had come seeking his mares.
There was no time to lose.
Swiftly — his pounding heart filling his great, silver chest — and without making any sound, Thowra went up the bluff at the head of the Canyon.
Thowra had never been a killer, but something told him that this horse must at least be given such a beating that he would never return . . . and then, if he lived and went limping over the mountains, would every horse know that a silver stallion had risen up out of the Canyon in Dale’s Creek and beaten him? Perhaps this horse should never be left to limp over the mountains . . .
Thowra was nearing the top of the bluff. He heard that neigh ring out again and echo in the Canyon around him. It was not just a cry of loneliness, it was also a call to a beautiful mare — to Dawn perhaps:
“Where are you? Come to me.”
Thowra felt fury rising within him. Baringa, who was light and life, could not be dead, and no stallion should be able to come so close to his mares. He climbed the last few feet of the bluffs, and out over the top.
There, a few feet below him, he could faintly see the lightish coat, the shape of a big horse — a very light chestnut or dun.
Thowra had hurried, but he stilled his laboured breathing, and crept slightly up the ridge and around, so that he would not seem to rise up out of the Canyon. Then he attacked the horse from behind.
The dun swung round too late, his hindfeet slipped on the muddy bank and the two horses slid together into the creek. Water splashed up all round them, silvered by starlight.
Thowra landed on top of the other, kneeling on him. The dun was young and very strong: he was also fighting for his life. He gave a tremendous heave upwards and got to his feet, but Thowra was on a rock, towering above him, was leaping towards him.
The dun sprang away, his feet slithering on the hidden boulders below the deep, swift water. Thowra was after him through the starlit spray ?
?? a horse of sparkling water and starshine, but with the strength of the white blizzard.
The dun hurled himself at Thowra, but his feet slipped into a deeper hole. Thowra saw him try to rear up, saw him get into slightly shallower, but very swift water, and then suddenly one of his legs slipped on the rocks, and the horse fell sideways with a scream of pain.
Thowra stopped in mid-rear, dropped his forefeet on to the submerged rocks again. He saw the dun give a convulsive struggle, saw that one hind leg was wedged in the rocks, saw the strange twist in the animal’s back, saw it collapse.
What Thowra could not see in the dark was the horse’s head sinking under the swift, spring current.
He stood waiting, his wet coat touched by the gusty wind, making him very cold. After a few moments he stepped forward. The dun did not stir. He went closer, Only the water moved the mane.
Thowra gave a snort of fear, that fear which all horses feel at the sight of death, and he backed out of the creek, and turned for the Canyon. This horse would not even go limping over the mountains, and Thowra felt uneasy because ill luck in the swift water, had caused his death. Might ill luck have killed others in this spring’s floods?
Ten
Because the sight of death was horrible, and this death filled him with such foreboding, Thowra, when he started for Quambat Flat, before daylight next morning, did not go by way of Dale’s Creek. He climbed Baringa’s cliff on to the High Plateau.
The change in the weather was now more noticeable. Few stars showed, and the wind was gustier, stronger. As the light started, Thowra could see heavy clouds rolling up from the north-west. Being much more attuned to the weather and the country around him than Lightning was, he knew, even in the early morning, that thunder was coming. When Lightning was hurrying down to the head of the Berrima River, barely heeding the weather, Thowra trotted across the High Plateau, his hair alive to the coming storm.
Once he went right to the western edge, where a wedge of rock jutted out, and he could look down on to the Murray River. Even from that distance he could see that the river was still very swollen. He stood there for a long time, deeply anxious, watching the river, gazing at the country on the opposite bank.
In Thowra life itself was so vigorous that it was impossible for him to believe that Baringa and Dawn were dead without the proof of his own eyes seeing the bodies, or at least the proof of searching and searching and being absolutely unable to find them. The river certainly must have been overpoweringly strong when Dawn slipped in: Benni, he knew, was very fearful for Dawn’s life; but Thowra felt that they both must be alive. With this feeling strongly within him, he neighed his challenge to the river and the unknown land on the other side. Then he turned, once more to Quambat Flat.
He hurried down off the High Plateau, hurried up and down the Quambat Ridge, and at last down on to the tree-fringed edge of Quambat Flat.
He could not see Lightning anywhere, and none of his mares were visible either. Thowra skirted round the flat, hidden in the trees, and going towards Cloud, Mist and Cirrus, and when he saw them he felt the pleasure that always warmed him at the sight of the gracious, old stallion, and the joy he felt in the grey mare, Cirrus, whom he had won, years ago, from Steel.
“There is trouble, trouble,” Cloud said in answer to his question. “Lightning has surely gone to try to find Dawn, and sometime, without doubt, the black stallion will come to claim the mares which Lightning stole at the time of the melting of the snow.” As he spoke, the thunder started its faraway rumblings, and seemed to emphasise all he said. Lightning’s mares were all out of sight in the thick bush on the slopes of the Cobras, Cloud told Thowra, and added that he should find Yarolala and ask her about the fight between Baringa and Bolder. He told him, too, that Lightning had headed towards the Pilot: he mentioned that the dun horse had also gone and not returned. Cloud was not serene and happy like he usually was.
Thowra went off to find Lightning’s herd, still keeping himself hidden in the timber, and, as he went, the thunder sounded closer and more ominous.
At the same time as Lightning was crying his loneliness aloud to the empty hills, his sire, the Silver Stallion, walked without sound through the bush towards his herd.
Goonda was the first of the mares whom he saw, and he was amazed at how beautiful she had become. He went a little further, made out Steel’s mares, then the ones that belonged to the black stallion, and finally a chestnut mare who was exactly like his own sire, Yarraman, and remembered seeing her as a two-year-old in Son of Storm’s herd. She must be Yarolala.
He walked up to Goonda, going out into the open from between the red trunks of two candlebarks.
Goonda jumped with surprise, then greeted him affectionately.
“What tidings have you brought?” she asked.
“None. I have come to learn what has befallen Baringa.”
“That you must find out from Yarolala. She saw Baringa die.”
Yarolala had come closer, and Thowra turned to her and asked her the same question. He knew of the horse, Bolder, knew him to be a savage killer, but when she had finished her story he exclaimed:
“They both died!”
“Yes.”
“Then that is the strangest fight of which I have ever heard,” Thowra said, and stood thinking for quite a while before he asked Goonda about Lightning.
By the time Thowra had learnt all he wished to know — and told nothing to anyone, not even Goonda — the thunder was echoing off the Cobras, rolling round the Pilot, and cashing closer, closer.
Even if Lightning had gone to the Pilot to begin with, he might easily finish by going to Dale’s Creek. Before starting his search for Baringa, dead or alive, Thowra knew he must make sure that Lightning did not find the Canyon. He went back round the flat, working his way round towards the Pilot Gap from where he could drop into Dale’s Creek.
Goonda watched him until he vanished, and when she looked round, Yarolala had gone too.
Thowra took great care, as he dropped down into Dale’s Creek. He must be sure, if he found Lightning, not to let him think that he knew where Baringa’s mares were hidden. It would be best to let Lighting see that he came from Quambat — always supposing that Lightning did go to Dales Creek.
The afternoon was closing in, heavy clouds making it very dark, and the thunder echoed off the rocks on the High Plateau. Thowra walked carefully down the valley, keeping hidden in the trees. Just before darkness came, he went through a patch of teatree on to the track. There he saw two sets of hoof marks — one, very fresh, was Lightning’s.
Thowra began to go as fast as he could without giving himself away. Then came that tremendous crack of thunder and the lightning that lit the whole sky. Thowra found himself sweating with anxiety. What should he do if Lightning found his way to Baringa’s Canyon?
Again and again the valley was filled with the silver-blue light of the electric storm, and thunder filled the air so that even Thowra could not hear the pounding sound of hooves.
Lighting burst out of the darkness as the valley was lit up again.
Thowra sprang from the trees and stood in his way, himself afire with the silver-blue light.
Lightning pulled up to a sliding stop, almost crashing into the glittering horse who had sired him. He was sweating with
fear.
“Lightning, Lightning, of what are you afraid — not the storm, for you were born during just such a storm as this?”
“No, not the storm. The storm lit up a body. . . .”
“Lit up what body?”
“The body of a dead horse. A dead horse who was alive only three days ago, and he went seeking Dawn, as I was seeking Dawn. Baringa, too, is dead.”
“Goonda told me to come this way to find you. She thought you might come down into this valley from the Pilot. We will go to Quambat together.”
“Let us hurry away,” said Lightning. “This is a valley of death.”
“I know it is a valley of death,” Thowra answered
, “but we will not gallop, lest the whole world knows we are here. Follow me.”
Lightning followed as best he could, but making much more noise than Thowra did. Thowra made no comment because he knew there were no other horses about. By the way Lightning kept on his heels or alongside, he guessed that the fear of death — and whatever had killed that horse — would keep Lightning away from Dale’s Creek for quite a time.
Thowra needed time. He needed time to go and find Baringa and Dawn.
Just as they were reaching Quambat Flat, Thowra said:
“If you go wandering away from your own mares, like this, you will lose them all. The black stallion must come soon, for his own mares, and Goonda has become so lovely.
At that moment the storm lit up the whole of the flat. It seemed completely empty of horses.
Thowra, of course, knew the mares were all there, but he let Lightning get anxious. The more anxious begot about them, the less likely he was to leave them again.
By the time he saw his herd, Lightning had become so worried that he rushed up to them, filled with relief and excitement, and for a few minutes, did not realise that Yarolala had gone. By the time his excitement had burnt itself out a little, and the fear he had left had partly come back, Thowra had gone too.
The night was so dark, except when the storm lit it up, that there was no hope of seeing where Thowra had gone.
Lightning felt most uneasy.
Soon the rain began to beat on the wind, rain that would wash out all tracks. Lightning stood beside Goonda, feeling her warmth go through him, shoulder and flank.
Thowra went deeply into the bush so that even the vivid light of the storm would not easily show him up, and he headed for the junction of the Limestone with the river. Then he intended to go up the Limestone to try to find the place where Yarolala said Baringa and Bolder had fought — and died.
By the time he reached the junction of the two streams, the rain was pouring down, obliterating all tracks. There in the bush, he waited till most of the night had gone because, for this search, he needed daylight. As soon as daybreak came, he started off.