Unicorn Mountain by Michael Bishop

Author:Michael Bishop
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fantasy
Publisher: ElectricStory.com, Inc.
Published: 2001-09-05T04:00:00+00:00

* * *

Aware of an alien touch, Bo opened his eyes. Sam Coldpony, who had not eaten with Libby and him for several days, stood beside his bed with the tips of three icy fingers on his throat. Still groggy from sleep, Bo feared the Ute was about to murder him. He lay motionless, staring up through the gloom into the implacable eyes of Lib's hired hand and wondering if maybe being slaughtered in bed wouldn't be preferable to dying slowly of AIDS.

"What time is it?" he said.

Sam withdrew his cold fingers. "You too sick to take a little hike with me, Gavin?"

"A hike? Where? What's going on?"

Sam said, "How fast can you get dressed?"

Bo turned his head. His clock radio's digital readout told him that it was 6:12. Libby had probably been up about an hour, but he usually slept at least two hours beyond her. Having Sam Coldpony act as an unexpected human alarm so far ahead of his own schedule was both irritating and spooky.

"Sam, didn't anyone ever tell you it was impolite to answer a question with a question?"

"If you're not too sick to come with me, you need to hurry. I can't promise that it ain't too late already."

A whole day had gone by since Bo's run-in with Libby over her unicorn drawings, and he dimly suspected she had put Sam up to this early-morning harassment to get back at him for accusing her of planting them. Yesterday, she'd gone out of her way to avoid even a single face-to-face meeting.

Bo pushed himself to a sitting position. "Just what the fuck are you talking about, Sam?"

The Ute was wearing blue jeans, an old army-surplus jacket, and a baseball cap. "Get dressed," he said. "I'll wait out here." He retired to the living room, leaving the door partly open.

"Suppose I don't feel like getting dressed?" Bo shouted.

"Then you'll miss something you need to see. Get a move on. I should be helping Miss Libby with the roundup."

Exasperated, Bo got dressed, and a moment later, feeling tight in the gut and lightheaded -- is it the altitude or my attitude? -- he was skipping along behind the rigorously striding Indian, past Miss Lib's barn and up the trail snaking its way toward Naismith's Cabin on the high flank of Ptarmigan Mountain. I suppose I ought to feel honored that Sam wants to show me his place, Bo told himself, but instead he worried that the man planned to bludgeon him with a club and stuff him down an ore shaft in Naismith's Mine.

About fifteen minutes later, this worry was amplified when Sam led him right past the ancient cabin and along the steepening path toward the mine. Bo was already badly winded, and he resented his guide's refusal to stop, rest, and offer him something to eat, for he had not had breakfast yet.

On the other hand, his pride would not let him suggest halting, and when Sam kept trudging doggedly upward, Bo clamped his teeth and just as doggedly followed.

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