White Mist Dog: Saga of the Mountain Sage, Book Two by W. Michael Gear

Author:W. Michael Gear [Gear, W. Michael]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9781639771400
Publisher: Wolfpack Publishing
Published: 2023-05-30T00:00:00+00:00

—David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals

“Easy, coon,” Travis whispered as they crept along a brush-choked drainage. Richard paid careful attention to his feet, making sure that each step was placed so as to avoid rustling the green grass. His heart was pounding with excitement. This was the hunt!

The drainage cut like a twisting wound through the flats. Buffaloberry, currants, and spears of cedar lined the slopes, while a trickle of water fed rushes and cattails in the bottom. Sunflowers and daisies sprinkled color through the grass. Overhead, the sun’s white intensity flushed water from every pore in Richard’s body.

“Close,” Willow whispered behind him. “Wind is right Waugh!”

Travis throttled a chuckle.

“Waugh is not proper English,” Richard reminded, but he grinned and winked at her. To his delight, she winked back and gave him a smile that melted his heart.

“Shhh!” Travis raised a finger to his lips. The hunter dropped to his belly and snaked into a dry gulch that branched off from the cut. Richard dropped to follow, the green smell of crushed vegetation filling his nostrils. His blood began to quicken.

Digging in with his elbows, he followed Travis’s moccasined feet. A hole had worn into the grass-polished right heel.

Travis slipped sideways past a patch of grass-bound prickly pear.

In a matter of moments, Richard’s muscles started to protest from the awkward position. This mode of travel was ordained for snakes and salamanders—not human beings. He bit his lip and squirmed along in Travis’s wake, aware of skittering insects, blades of grass, and the sun’s heat boring into his back.

How far were they going? He tried to lift his-head to see, but Willow slapped his foot. When he shot a glance over his shoulder, she shook her head emphatically.

He grumbled under his breath and dragged himself onward.

Travis had wriggled up to a patch of thorn-bristling rosebushes that clung to the side of the now shallow depression. Heedless of the vicious stems, the hunter eased up to the edge of the draw, parting the plants carefully to slide the long Hawken through the leaves.

Richard winced as he scratched himself and eased into place beside the hunter.

“Careful, coon,” Travis whispered.

Richard peered through the screen of small serrated leaves and thorns. Blooms had already opened in puffs of pink that delighted the nose. But where had…? Yes, there!

The shaggy hump of the animal was no more than fifty paces away. Willow appeared as immune to thorns as Travis as she crawled up beside Richard.

The metallic click of the hammer might have sundered the world, but the buffalo remained oblivious. Time passed interminably.

“So, why don’t you shoot?” Richard barely mouthed the words.

“Poor bull,” Travis hissed. “We’ll wait. Fat cow’ll step up in a minute.”

The minute turned into an hour under the relentless sun. The first fly was almost bearable as it buzzed around Richard’s head. The rest who came—no doubt at some inaudible fly call from the first—drove him to distraction. The best he could do was flip his head to discourage the beasts, but all that earned him was a disgusted look from Travis, whom the flies seemed to ignore.

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