CHAPTER NINE

Guilt Trips.

Sylvie felt lost in thought, which was a new feeling for her, she had to admit. Normally, she considered herself to be a person of action, but now action wouldn't help and she couldn't count on anyone else to help think the problem through.

No, that wasn't true, Taryn would help. In fact, she'd been trying to help, but even she seemed to think that the warning was only a bad dream, and it wasn't. If Sylvie doubted anything else, it wasn't that. So what could she do?

Could she go to her parents? They'd called that morning while Sylvie was having her hooves done and talked for a few minutes before they'd had to go to one meeting or another. Both of them had scolded her for letting her cell die, much more than breaking down Taryn's front door. She promised she'd never let it die again, and charged it fully before walking out--she just wasn't into soaps herself. Taryn had tried to come with her, and while she wouldn't have minded, she didn't want to come between her and her mom, and she wanted privacy to think. Taryn looked rebellious but had settled back into her couch to finish while Sylvie left.

After leaving Taryn's house, she started walking, trying to think. Soon the pavement all kind of blurred together in front of her and sounds vanished as she tried to come up with a solution from this mess.

Could she fight off a horde of creatures that looked like nightmare unions of lions and scorpions with a bit of eagle thrown into the mix? She doubted it. No doubt she could do a lot of damage to them--she was Sure-Shot Sylvie! Thought that title had been given to her by the enemy, she accepted it now as a badge of pride. She could hit anything she aimed at! Even those that thought them safe wouldn't be able to face her in battle. But what about the smoke monster? She couldn't hit anything like that with normal ammunition. No, she had to find a way to stop it before it even began.

What if she could make Taryn human again? No centaurs, no mermaids, just normal people? Then the dream couldn't come true because none of the pre-existing conditions were true. Perhaps then the monster wouldn't come out and the town's suffering wouldn't happen. Also, she thought, people will leave us alone, because we aren't interesting. We'd just be normal kids again...well, teens. After all, I was nearly ready to graduate high school and Taryn had taken some college courses because she was bored.

She sighed, wishing she'd had a chance to take part in her prom. Of course, no one else had either, with the Riot and all. The Riot...the normal guilty feeling stole over her but she shrugged it off. She couldn't stop to think about it now, as she had to try and solve the problems in front of her. She'd never faced a more daunting task, however, and briefly she wondered if she'd be able to do it.

#

It took her a few minutes to realize that she'd stopped, a barrier pushing against her stomach. With a curse, she wrenched herself out of her bout of pity and looked around her, trying to get her bearings.

The peaceful, scenic view of the countryside greeted her eyes. In the distance a tall forest shone like fire, the brilliant reds and golds falling in bright rainstorms with every stir of the cold wind. The sky, for once, stood bare of clouds, letting the sun hold dominion. Under the warm rays, wheat flashed golden while in green pastures cattle strode unconcernedly, heads down while they ate comfortably.

The tranquil scene was lost on Sylvie however, as she stared at the huge barn in front of her. Nearby stood a neat, two-story house. A cattle chute led to one side of the barn while two huge doors stood shut on the front, shielding within from her searching gaze, though she already knew intimately what she would find inside.

Why did I come here? The thought flitted around the edge of her consciousness. Her vision shook, and she realized she was trembling.

A little ways away, there stood a gate. She passed through it and went slowly down the trail towards the barn. Stopping at its great doors, she wondered if she would have the strength to go inside.

I...I can't do it. Not yet. She said. She remembered though, looking down the lane she saw the far field where Taryn and her had gone that horrible night.

Drawn by something she couldn't quite explain herself, she hurried down the lane, her hoofbeats drumming in the hard gravel, dust being kicked up behind her.

Turning right at the entrance, she hurried to the center of the field.

Yep, the scarred remains of the hole where the stump had been gaped from the ground. Off to the side, drag marks indicated where it had been moved to the side of the forest. She followed the tracks until she saw the large stump. Her great idea to help had been to pull that stump...to surprise Mr. And Mrs. Gardner with it and prove to everyone, herself included, that she could be a big help still.

Some big help I turned out to be, she thought bitterly. I try to pull a stump and get the Gardner's killed. Why couldn't I have been a lazy bitch and remained in the barn? Then they would still be alive.

Hot tears splashed down her cheeks, hitting the ground without her noticing. Abruptly she cried out and smashed the stump as hard as she could, first with her fists and then her hooves. The wood groaned and the outer bark splintered, but showed no damage.

"Yeah, that's a big help." A wry, male voice came from behind her.

Sylvie jumped in surprise and fought the urge to bolt. Turning instead to see who had spoken, she saw a young man leaning against the fence, looking square at her. He was dressed in baggy jeans with a couple of tears in them, a plaid shirt with long sleeves spattered with mud and saw dust, and a red baseball cap jammed over curly brown hair. He eyed her cautiously as Sylvie studied him.

"Sorry." She muttered, looking down at the mess she'd made. "I hadn't meant...uh...what I wanted to say...uh"

"You hadn't meant to make a mess? Looked to me like you did." The man said. "But I'm thinking that perhaps you needed too. Whatch'a doin here anyway?"

"None of your business." Sylvie snapped before she could stop herself.

"Well, I think it kinda is, as I'm caretaker here an' all for Ben." The man corrected her.

"You...you own this land?" Sylvie asked, confused.

"No. I'm just watchin' it for Ben and takin' care of the animals. Ben ain't ready to give this place up jus' yet. He moved in here two months ago...though you can't tell that from how long he spends in town." The man admitted. "So I'm one of the hands keeping track of it for him...when I'm not helping Ma with her place down the lane. Now, let's get you doctored up since you hurt yourself."

Sylvie frowned, wondering what on earth he was talking about until she looked down. Her fists bled from dozens of wounds and bits of wood debris clung to her legs.

"Mom's going to kill me." She sighed.

The man laughed. "I doubt it, especially if we get you cleaned up. Let's go."

Without waiting to see if she followed, he strode back to the barn. Sylvie followed, a little bemusedly at first, until she got to the barn.

At the doors she froze, her hearts hammering in her chest painfully. Her breathing turned to gasps and an overwhelming urge to get out of there nearly overrode her senses. She wanted to escape, to get as far away from that place as possible, to run, run free and leave her past behind her.

"Miss, are you all right?" the man's voice came to her ears and she struggled to calm herself. She would be fine, it was just a building, just an empty building.

Clinging to that one thought, she forced herself to go inside.

#

Inside she found the barn looked much the same as she'd first seen it. Cows looked up stupidly from their enclosures, mooed at her, and then went back to eating hay and the floor was littered with dung and other wastes. Their rooms had been dismantled and the old building looked a little worse for wear. The cattle catcher had been fixed back into place and stood open and waiting for the next cow to pass through. Of the bath, there wasn't a sign of it anywhere.

"Best wait here a minute." The guy said as he entered the small office space. Sylvie could hear him moving around in there, opening and closing cabinets and the general sound of someone searching for something.

Sylvie found herself wondering about the stranger, who it was that Ben had gotten to help him out with the farm. He was obviously fairly young and strong; his arms and legs had heavy ropes of muscle and he looked lean. Not weightlifter style, but more like someone who'd had to work hard for a living. She found herself wanting to run her fingers through his curls; were they real? Or did he style them? They didn't look styled or anything.

The sound of him coming out of the door shook her from the fantasy. Blushing hard, she tried to come up with something to say.

"Ah...I never caught your name." She shook her head, suddenly irritated. Come on girl, you meet a guy and that's the first thing you can think of?

"Stetson" he said shortly. "Now don't move, I'll bandage these up."

He grasped on of her hands tenderly and began applying some sort of ointment that smelled horrible. She wrinkled her nose but managed not to move. Once the ointment was on her cuts, he swiftly applied bandages until she looked like a fighter or something. Then he put them away and grabbed a brush and began currying the wood from her legs.

"When I said don't move, I didn't mean for you to lose your voice." He said quietly.

Sylvie had been watching his every move, seeing the play of muscles in his arms as he manipulated her fingers and arms. Realizing she'd been caught, she coughed slightly.

"Uh...so, have we had classes together before?"

He arched an eyebrow, his green eyes flashing amusement. "Don't think so, seein' how I've been homeschooled most my life. But really, I don't see what that means to you. I'm interested in knowing what you were doing out in Ben's field."

"I already told you, that's private." She told him furiously.

"It ain't private if it's on someone else's land." He told her urbanely. "But I can tell it's eatin' you. Spill."

She glared at him, trying to burn him with her eyes, but he just stared calmly back at her. Abruptly she realized what she was doing and slumped downward. "Fine" she sighed. "I'll tell you."

Can I do this? She asked herself, suddenly unsure. Stetson said noting, but leaned back expectantly.

"See, sometime back I was a guest here, hiding out, as you might say. One night Taryn and I..."

She told him everything about their adventures, from the time they'd been guests on the farm, to trying to pull out the tree to coming back and seeing the Gardner's dead.

"Well, what makes you think it would have turned out any other way?" Stetson asked. "I knew the Gardner family, ol' Bob was a light sleeper. He would have heard you girls bein' kidnapped and come charging to help. He pro'ly would have had his gun, but against a thug like this John...he would've had to been pretty lucky."

He's right...against Big John, he wouldn't have stood a chance no matter what had happened, but Mrs. Gardner Sylvie thought.

"And as for Martha...soon as she woke up and saw Bob on the move she'd have grabbed her fryin' pan and marched in there with 'im. Weren't anything you could do to stop 'em neither. You'd have been wasting your time is all." Stetson continued. "And makin' em seem like they's lives were dependent on you is pure poppycock. They's lives was over the moment that guy entered the farm. Ain't no way he could make a quiet snatch and grab, no matter what he thought. Not here, in this dirt and setup."

"Big John would have found a way." Sylvie shivered. "He's supposed to be ex-special forces or something. Not someone who would be foiled by a little thing like dirt."

Stetson shrugged. "Didn't matter how good he was. This gravel would sound against any tire that came in, and there ain't a way to fix that, no matter how special ya are."

"I guess." Sylvie said, feeling overwhelmed. Could it be true? She desperately wanted to believe that it was, but in her heart she knew it couldn't be. It just couldn't be. How could she explain that to him though? Even Ben had told her much the same thing.

"Look, that ain't the only thing that's buggin' yah, though it seems like you aught to visit a shrink. What else is eatin' ya?" he asked again. By this time they'd moved to the great doors and were watching the sun settle in the sky. He'd gotten her a glass and a drink before grabbing an old wooden chair and sitting down with a root beer in hand.

She looked askance at him. "What are you, Sigmund Freud?" she asked sarcastically.

"Don't know." He shrugged easily. "Never met him."

She stared at him, wondering if he was putting her on. When she decided he was being serious she sighed. "All right, mister snoopy, let me tell you about this vision I've been getting."

Stetson leaned back in his chair, his eyes hooded and thoughtful when she'd finished. For a long while he didn't speak, but stared out over the sunset. Sylvie caught herself watching the play of light on his strong jaw, the red on his cheeks as he looked away from her.

"Well," he said at last. "That is something. Never had a vision myself, but I won't doubt your word on this." He looked at her fully now. "So, what are you going to do about it?" he asked.

"Me?" Sylvie asked in surprise. "What do you mean?"

"This vision came to you, obviously to warn you. What are you going to do about it?" Stetson asked her.

"What about you? What would you do about it?" Sylvie challenged.

"Decide."

"On what?"

"On what I'm going to fight for." He said easily. "Bad things comin'? That happens every day. If it ain't hail beating your crops flat, it's coyotes or wolves killin' livestock or men killin' men for what they's got. Ain't nothing you can do to end it, but you have to decide what you've got worth fightin' for. Me? I've got my land, I've got my ma and brothers and sisters to care for. They's worth fightin for, down to my life if necessary. This town? These people? They're my friends too, and I'd fight alongside 'em for who they are and what they're owed. After that? (he shrugged) I don't need to know anything but that."

He looked out again at the russet landscape. "What is worth fightin' for, Sylvie? For you, I mean. And how far are you willin' to go to do it?"

Sylvie opened her mouth, but closed it again. She didn't quite know what to say. What was worth fighting for was easy; her family, her best friends, the town...she'd fight for them. But how far could she go? Would she be able to lay down her life and whatever else it meant to protect them, to fight for them? How far did she push responsibility? Sylvie didn't think she was a coward, but she couldn't be absolutely sure.

She realized she had started biting her lip and forced herself to stop.

Stetson got up, draining his bottle. "Well, I've got to get the last of the chores done before goin' home. You've got your thinkin' to do now. I assume you know the way home, right?"

"Yeah." Sylvie nodded. "I do."

"Well, take this flashlight. It's Ben's, so you can give it back to him when you see him." Stetson handed her a big heavy flashlight he pulled from the building.

With that, he put away the chair and walked out of the barn, leaving her alone with her thoughts. The cattle lowed and here and there a chicken cackled at some dainty it had discovered. In the distance a horse neighed and an owl hooted. The sun finished sinking and the stars came out, shining cold and clear in the dark sky.

All the while Sylvie stayed right there in the darkening barn, thinking furiously, weighing her courage and fear and trying to see how far she'd be willing to go to protect and help her family and friends.

"Let it go! Let it go!" a voice unexpectedly sang.

Sylvie grabbed her cellphone from her shirt pocket automatically and answered the call. "Hi mom." She said.

"Sylvie! Where are you! Are you all right!" Her mom asked worriedly.

"I'm...fine, I think." Sylvie said quietly. "Now, thanks to Ben's handyman. I'm out at the Gardner farm, mom."

"The Gardner farm! What are you doing out there?" Her mom sounded surprised.

"Thinking. Didn't realize where I'd walked until I got here."

"Well, just hang on, Dad's going to get the truck and trailer and drive out there."

"Actually mom, I can walk home I think.  I mean, I walked out here." She laughed.

"Dear, it's getting dark! You aren't walking home alone!"

"All right, so why don't you meet me out here? We can walk home together. Dad can follow us in the car, and you don't have to go borrowing anything." Sylvie suggested.

There was silence for a while. "I guess...that...could work." Her mom said slowly, "Although I haven't ridden before."

"I think you'll like it mom." Sylvie said with a smile. "It'll give us a chance to catch up."