Chapter 83
They left at first light. The settlement was already bustling, and Elias stood at the paddock gate, handing Mason a packet of dried apples.
Mason thanked him and secured the apples in the gelding’s saddlebag for easy access.
They mounted their horses. Charlotte settled into the mare’s saddle, her hands no longer concealing their condition, while Mason climbed onto the gelding.
The fire road ascended the northern slope of the first ridge, winding through oak and maple trees that still bore the green of late summer.
The horses navigated the incline steadily, and Charlotte allowed the mare to set the pace, conserving her strength for what lay ahead.
Mason spoke with enthusiasm, sharing insights about the changing atmosphere in the settlement.
“Mom used to make this thing with apples and cinnamon when we visited. Aunt Claudia has the tree, but Mom brought the recipe from home. They would stand in the kitchen arguing about whether the cinnamon went in before or after the sugar, and Dad would sit at the table pretending to read the newspaper, but really he was waiting for them to finish so he could have some.”
The story came with the specificity of childhood memory, rooted in details Mason had preserved because they contained the world as he had known it.
“Dad said the barn has a loft with old hay that’s perfect for jumping into, but Aunt Claudia says it’s off-limits. The last time someone jumped, they broke their arm, and she had to drive them to the hospital in Franklin, which took forty-five minutes because the roads were bad that winter.”
The stories accumulated. The apple tree by the mailbox produced fruit that was tart but sweet if they waited until October.
The creek had minnows and sometimes crayfish.
The porch faced west, and Aunt Claudia kept a bench there where she sat in the evenings with a cup of tea.
Charlotte absorbed each detail. The farm took shape through Mason’s telling as a place he had been promised he belonged.
Alongside the infection was something quieter.
Her purpose had narrowed to keeping Mason alive and getting him home.
The purpose had required no future planning, and that future was riding beside her on a gelding, describing the place waiting for him.
Beyond that purpose lay geography she hadn’t allowed herself to consider.
The messages in her pouch pointed west, but her infection suggested that long journeys were becoming theoretical rather than planned.
They descended the second ridge along a trail that switch-backed through pine with the scent Mason had named as Christmas.
The horses picked their way down carefully, and Charlotte guided the mare with voice more than rein.
At the base, they stopped at a stream. Charlotte dismounted carefully, and Mason slid from the gelding’s back to stand beside her with the dog pressing against his leg.
“We’re close,” Mason said.
“Very close,” Charlotte said.
He looked at her. The mask was in place, but his eyes above it held the clarity of a child who had been carrying something heavy and was beginning to understand that the weight could be set down. “Thank you,” he said.
The words were small and perfect, but Charlotte just nodded.
They remounted. The trail rejoined the county road as Elias had promised, and the horses found their pace on packed gravel with the relief of animals that preferred footing they understood.
The afternoon faded toward evening. The light turned amber in the open ground and blue in the mountains.
They reached the crest of the third ridge as the sun touched the western horizon.
The road followed the ridgeline briefly before descending toward the valley Elias’s map had marked with three farms, the third belonging to Claudia Green.
Charlotte reined the mare to a stop at the highest point.
Mason’s gelding halted beside her, and the dog emerged from the underbrush and sat at the horse’s feet with its ears forward.
The valley lay below them, broad and green, with the creek visible as a silver thread through the bottomland and the farms arranged along the western road.
Charlotte studied the valley through binoculars.
The first farm showed activity, with figures moving between structures and smoke coming from a chimney. The second was quieter.
The third farm lay farthest west against the tree line.
Charlotte could make out the main house, a barn, several outbuildings, and a fenced pasture in the fading light.
And smoke. Thin, consistent, rising from the farmhouse chimney into the air that had gone still with the approach of evening.
Mason saw it. She watched him go still on the gelding’s back, his small body locking into the posture of a child processing confirmation of something he had carried as faith rather than location.
“That’s it,” he said. “That’s Aunt Claudia’s.”
Charlotte lowered the binoculars. The infection burned.
Her hands shook on the reins. The messages pressed against her chest, and beneath them was the awareness that the purpose she had carried since the shoreline was now visible in smoke rising from a chimney three miles distant, and whatever came after would require a reckoning she had postponed for the entire journey.
“We’ll camp here,” Charlotte said. “At first light, we ride down. You’ll be there by midday.”