It wasn’t that far down. But, give or take the missing tie-downs that made no few of the warped boards rattle and rock—and thunder like hell under wheeled traffic, Guil could well imagine—it forecast nothing good ahead.

The next such bridge they reached was worse—two boards were actually missing in a span above a higher drop. Hope, Guil thought, that the villages had done better with the bridges up near the crest.

Another short span. Burn had to cross over more missing boards, easy stride for a horse—but Burn was, by now, not happy with bridges in general.

Then they caught sight of the big one Aby’s images had foretold they could expect, over a gorge by no means so large as Kroman, but impressive, the longest bridge yet—and as Guil looked up from below, it showed sky through its structure.

Guil gazed up at it in dismay, and Burn outright balked on the gravel road, catching the image from his mind and dizzily lifting and turning his head to have his one-sided horsewise view of it. Burn immediately ducked his head down and laid his ears back, shaking his neck.

Nothing to do but have a look, Guil thought, and nudged Burn with his heels, twice, to get him moving up that steep gravel incline.

The bridge looked no better when they came up on a level with it, a long span over a rift in the mountain flank, a cable and timber structure far more ambitious than any they’d met.

It wasn’t wholly suspension, thank God. The rails as well as the roadbed were missing pieces, and four and five of the crosslaid planks were gone at a stretch. He counted four, five such gaps in the bridge deck, so far as he could see from this side, gaps exposing the underpinnings. The boards had probably, Guil thought, sailed right off in the storms, considering the cold gusts that battered and buffeted them, sweeping unrestricted along the dry, slide-choked gorge on the one side and dizzily out into open sky and the whole of the plains and the distant haze-hidden Sea on the other.

He jammed his hat on tight and slipped the cord under his chin before he walked out on the span to look it over, and the look he got sent his heart plummeting. The gaps were big enough to drop a horse through, and the winds that swept across that span could rock a man on his feet.

Burn didn’t like that idea. <Guil coming back,> Burn urged him anxiously.

Days— daysto go back down and across to the other route. With the weather about to turn. If he went back now he wouldn’t get up to Tarmin Ridge until spring—and that left him sitting in Anveney territory all winter, with nothing done, nothing but using up his supplies, his account—granting money was there, of which he was not entirely certain if he failed Cassivey’s commission now. If the villagers found that shipment up there in the rocks—Cassivey and a lot of Anveney folk weren’t going to be damned happy with him.

He didn’t like losing, or explaining to a shipper why he’d failed; and failing what he’d promised himself and Aby, hell—it wasn’t why he’d come this far already.

He walked back off the bridge. <Sharp rocks,> Burn imaged as he made a risky, wind-battered descent off the roadway, holding on to rocks to take a look underneath at the supports. <Burn standing. Guil standing on road. Guil standing on ground.>

The supports were sound enough, run through with iron rods and huge metal plates bolting the whole together.

He climbed back up to the road and walked out on the bridge as far as the gaps. He stood looking at the far side, then shut his eyes a moment, and made his mind as quiet and confident as he could.

<Burn walking to Guil,> he sent. <Burn standing on bridge with Guil.>

<Burn in meadow. Burn eating green grass.>

<Burn on the bridge. Strong thick boards.>

<Sharp rocks. Holes in bridge.>

“Come on, Burn, dammit. It’s too far to go back.” He looked up at gray-bottomed clouds scudding above the peak. <Snow clouds. Burn. Burn walking. Now.>

<Guil with snow on him.>

“Burn, dammit! Come on!”

<Thicker snow. Guil in snow, standing on bridge.>

“Burn. Get your ass out here. < Now!>”

Burn moved, came step after slow step, the wind whipping his mane upward, trying each plank, imaging as he came: <Cold belly. Tail tucked. Fire and dark. Weathered, split boards.>

“It’s all right, Burn. Come on.”

Burn came up beside him, at the area of missing boards, stopped, and lowered his head to take a long, unhappy, dizzy look down into the depths below.

<Burn standing still.> Guil patted Burn’s shoulder hard, to be sure he felt it, laid his rifle and his gear down on the bridge planks, and with a hand along Burn’s side and rump, walked Burn a little distance out to where a number of planks were loose.

It wasn’t easy to free one. It was a plank sized to support a small truck. It weighed like hell and he could only lever it up from the end, looking out over a sheer drop down the face of the mountain, and the wind blasted his hat off, left it spinning and jerking at his back, held only by the cord. He got the plank up, turned it, dragged it back past Burn and, with slow maneuvering and a final, satisfying thump, installed it in the gap.

Burn leaned forward in curiosity and peered over that edge. Didn’t trust that board. But Burn was amazed, preoccupied with the gap, when Guil walked back by him, hand on Burn’s side.

He worked and worked, freed the next plank, and dragged it along past Burn.

ThenBurn caught on what he was doing, <planks missing behind him.>

Burn backed up in a panicked rush. Guil let the plank fall crashing to the deck and grabbed a double fistful of nighthorse mane to stop him. <Burn backing, putting foot into gaping hole. Burn with cattle tail!>

<Kicking Guil,> Burn sent, <biting.> But Burn didn’t do it.

Burn stood there shivering, with a clear imagination of the bridge unraveling behind him.

“You don’t move!” <Burn standing. Guil fitting plank.> Guil hurried as best he could, picked up the plank and dragged it into place.

He went back and got another one. Burn was still standing, shivering. Burn could cross a single missing board. Guil dragged the third board up to Burn’s position.

But Burn was far from certain that any board he’d just seen moved was going to stay put. Burn grew confused about directions, and started to back up in great haste.

“You fool,” Guil swore, threw himself under Burn’s rump and shoved with all the strength he had. <Gap behind us,> he argued, until Burn bent his neck around and took a confused, misgiving look back.

Burn didn’t trust <migrating holes.> Burn wasn’t going back. Burn wasn’t going forward. No.

There were two of them shaking now. Guil retrieved the plank he’d dropped, a quarter over the edge of the decking where it had bounced. He jammed his hat back on and swore and wrestled it up to the two-plank gap.

He dropped it in. He was exhausted and his headache had come back, but he wouldn’t ask Burn to accept a hand-span gap in the planks that were there—Burn’s estimation of gaps wasn’t so reliable at the moment. He dragged and wrestled with it and got it butted.

Then he got up and stamped loudly over the repaired section, while Burn watched in horror. Stepped across the single missing plank. Did a kickstep across it, back and forth and twice more, like a lunatic.

Then he went back to Burn, and with his hands constantly on Burn’s neck, patted and cajoled and argued, with the wind blasting up out of the gorge at both of them, rocking even Burn on his feet. He imaged <Burn walking on bridge.>

When that didn’t work, he tried <Burn standing on bridge in snow. Snow falling thick.> He was cold. The wind cut like a knife. Burn was cold. <Frozen Burn. Ice crystals on hide. Guil covered in frost. Boards falling, carried away on winter wind. Us standing on the last few lonely boards.>