He was looking at the ground 30 ft to the east of the well. He'd put a stake the evening before. Small, just a branch. Nothing ceremonial, just a marker. Here he was going to dig it today.
Not because he had to. Not because someone was coming or something required it because there was water there and he needed water and the place he'd been going wasn't getting it done. Sometimes the thing you needed was under your feet the whole time. You just needed someone to press their hand to the earth and say here. He went outside.
The morning air was cool. Not cold, the kind of cool that wouldn't last, but was here right now. He picked up the shovel leaning against the cabin wall, the one he'd sharpened 3 days ago, getting ready for this, and walked 30 ft to the east, stood at the marker, looked down. He thought about Dany. Not the weight of him.
Not the stone and chest version he'd been carrying for 3 years. Just Danny. The way he'd looked standing in the morning light before everything went wrong. Like someone with a lot of time ahead of him. Like someone who didn't know yet that time was the thing you couldn't negotiate with.
He'd been right about one thing. At least he'd known where Jack would go. Jack pressed the shovel into the ground. The first strike, the particular sound of metal into earth, the beginning of something. Above the valley, the sky was brightening.
Pink now rose. The colors that wouldn't last either, but were here right now, here and true. And his. He dug. The work was simple.
Just work. The kind that asked only that you do it and do it properly and not stop until it was done. The kind of work he understood. An hour in, he hit wet. Soil.
He stopped, pressed his hand flat against the dark earth at the bottom of the hole, the way she'd shown him, feeling for the feeling for the temperature, for what was underneath. Cooler. Yes, definitely cooler. Water moving east right where she'd said. He sat back on his heels and looked at his hands.
Dirt dark, both of them, the calluses and the scar and the history of work done. He picked up the shovel and kept going. Two mornings later, Yoska came back alone this time on a gray horse Jack hadn't seen before. He came in the morning before the heat took hold and tied his horse at the corral and walked to where Jack was working the new well casing. He stood and watched for a moment.
Then you found it. She showed me where. Yasa crouched beside the hole. Looked in deep enough. Another few feet and I can case it properly.
The old man nodded. Stood back up, looked at the valley. "She asks me to tell you something," he said. "Jack went still," she says. Yasa paused.
Choosing the translation carefully. "She says the ground here is better than she expected. " When she first came, another pause. She says she understands why someone would ch it. Jack looked at him. She also says.
Yasa continued with something in his voice that was almost but not quite humor. That the roof still looks like it's losing a fight with gravity. Jack looked at the cabin roof it was. He'd been meaning to fix that for 6 months. Tell her, he said.
I'll see to it. Yasa nodded. Started back toward his horse. Yasa, Jack said. The old man turned.
Thank you, Jack said. For what you kept for 3 years. What Danny gave you. The old man was quiet for a moment. He said to give it to the man who would know what to do with it, Yasa said.
I waited 3 years to find that man. A pause. He was right where your brother said he'd be. Jack looked at him. Danny told you, he said slowly.
Dany told you where I'd go. He knew you. Yasa's voice was simple, not dramatic, just true. He said his brother would go somewhere quiet to be guilty in. Somewhere with enough sky to breathe in.
Somewhere he could walk out every morning and look at a horizon and try to figure out what to do next. He paused. He said to look for a man doing that. That man would be Jack Marorrow. Jack said nothing for a moment.
He looked at the sky, the horizon. He wasn't wrong, Jack said finally. No, Yasa mounted up. He wasn't wrong about much. For someone so young, he settled in the saddle.
He would have made a good old man. Jack nodded. "Yes," he said. "He would have. " The old man rode away.
Jack watched him go. Then he picked up the shovel. Not because of guilt, not because there was nothing else to do. Because there was water 30 ft down and a roof that needed fixing, and a cord hanging by the window that caught the morning light, and turned slowly in the breeze, one face, then the other.
Both at once he dug. The sun climbed. The valley held its breath and then released it slowly, the way it did when something that had been waiting was finally done waiting. And the Thunderbird cord by the window caught the morning light and turned and turned and turned.