The Dark Horse

The Forbidden Tarot Series

by Patricia Simpson

Medicine Valley, California

Jack Hughes dismounted near the cave, his knees shaking and his ears ringing. He hadn’t eaten for three days, and a wave of lightheadedness swept over him as his boots hit the ground. He blinked away the dizzying blackness inside his head and urged his strawberry roan forward, seeking shelter from the storm that whipped over the hills in a roiling frenzy.

Jack wondered if the Washoe Indian legend was true after all. Was this place cursed? One moment the sky had been blue, and the next it had turned purple with rage, growing darker and more virulent with every step he had taken in the remote valley.

Wind and hail had forced him toward the yawning mouth of the cave to the east, and now huge drops of rain splattered his back. But even at the young age of thirteen, he wasn’t the kind of kid who was easily scared or easily deterred from his path. He would ride out this storm and complete his vision quest, accursed valley or not.

He’d gone three days without food, and had spent every evening of the long ride meditating on his life, determined to find a way to live differently than his folks, especially his father. He wanted none of his father’s greed and anger, and none of his mother’s cowardice and complacency.

He’d heard stories about the Native Americans who had once freely roamed the Sierra Nevada and the Great Basin, how boys his age had fasted and prayed, and sometimes set out into the wilderness in search of a spirit guide. Although no Native American blood ran in Jack’s veins, he had come to this desolate valley with the same goal in mind: to find his spirit guide, to find his path in life.

Jack didn’t know what rituals the Native Americans performed during their quests. But his lack of knowledge didn’t deter him either. He knew his heart was in the right place, and that he was open to all possibilities. If a spirit guide was to come to him, he was certain it would appear in this special place unfrequented by hikers and hunters.

He’d been warned to stay away from Medicine Valley, and told by his grandmother that only powerful shamans dared to venture into the narrow shadowy canyon. But he had come here nevertheless, half of him running from his father, and half drawn by the magical stories he’d heard about the valley. He knew in his heart it was “the place.”

Lightning flashed overhead and a roll of thunder crashed soon after as the storm plowed directly overhead. The echoing boom shook the earth and the surrounding trees and rattled Jack’s eardrums.

Terrified, his horse yanked up his head and gave a shrill whinny, dancing backward.

“Easy, Biscuit,” Jack crooned, gently urging him back down. “Steady now, boy.”

He stroked the side of the horse’s neck and looked over his shoulder into the blackness of the cave. He could see nothing, as his eyes had not yet adjusted to the dark. Rain pelted the dry dirt in the opening where he stood, struggling to calm the horse. The sharp scent of ozone hung in the air, and the hair on his forearms rose, charged with static electricity.

Before either boy or horse came fully to their senses, another flash of lightning rent the sky. Jack looked up just as a blinding light streaked toward the metal rings of Biscuit’s bridle, hit the horse, and in a monstrous glow of blue, traveled down Jack’s arm.

Biscuit reared up, frozen by the bolt of electricity. Jack watched him paw the air as time stood still. Every cell in his body ignited as the glow passed through him. His lightheadedness merged with the searing energy of the lightning, and he felt his body lose all sense of gravity, of form.

He couldn’t move. All he could see now was the floor of Medicine Valley, but only in his mind’s eye. Through the chaparral pounded a herd of wild horses, their manes flying, their tails like flags. Jack had seen the wary herd before, but only from a distance. This time they thundered toward him. Or was he only imagining things? Was that noise he heard coming from the horses or was it the rolling thunder of the storm? Was he dreaming? Had he died from the lightning strike? Where was Biscuit?

Still the horses came, led by a massive black stallion. Jack could see the look in the animal’s eyes, wild with fear and the fury at seeing a man-child invading his territory, could see the bulging muscles bunching at the stallion’s chest as he raised his forelegs, one after the other like powerful pistons, almost to the cave now.

Jack knew he had to get away. The stallion could kill him. One blow from the horse’s huge hoof could knock him unconscious, leaving him to be trampled to death. He tried to move, but his body would not obey him. The awesome beauty of the stallion held him in thrall. He could feel sweat trickling down his back, even though he was aware that his world stood suspended and he shouldn’t have had time to work up a sweat.

And then, in another flash of lightning, the stallion reared up, inches from Jack now, shrieking and screaming, tossing his head, back lit by the storm.

At that moment, Jack would have prayed to a God, had he believed in one. But he just stood there, mute, staring up at the horse, certain it would be the last vision of his life. He had trespassed into sacred territory. He would forfeit his life for the transgression. The old spirits of this place had sent this horse as a messenger of death, to pound the life out of him. Jack knew it as surely as if his sentence had been carved in stone.

He could not break away, could not pull his stare from the blazing eyes of the stallion. He could feel the horse sucking his courage from him, sucking his will, sucking his life away.

The lightning burst again, shimmering over the stallion, streaking through Jack, burning away every human thought, every vision.

His mind went blank, his eyesight went black, and he felt himself falling slowly backward--falling into buzzing, prickling nothingness.

#

The next day, Jack’s grandmother found him lying in the meadow behind the barn, his hair singed, his fingernails black, his clothing missing. Neither of them could explain how Jack had returned to the ranch without his horse in such a short amount of time. All Jack could remember was a vivid dream, of running with the wild herd, of clambering up the rocky trails and galloping across the high meadows, more powerful and fleet than he had ever been in his life.

As his grandmother helped him into the barn, he said nothing of his wondrous dream, and his grandmother said nothing of his strange nakedness. Odd things could happen to a person when they were struck by lightning—making them forget, making them see things they never saw before. Neither Jack nor his grandmother needed more explanation than that.

But once in the barn, as his grandmother fetched him a horse blanket from the tack room, Jack looked down the aisle between the stalls to the patch of blue beyond and thought back to the stallion of Medicine Valley.

Had he met his spirit guide after all? Or had the wild beast’s nature somehow merged with his own during the electrical storm? Was it all just a dream? A vision?

Hungry and spent, Jack sank to a bale of straw and leaned against the wide planks of the stall behind him. He had been transformed forever by Medicine Valley. He knew it. But he wasn’t sure just how.

#

Two days later, Biscuit limped back to the ranch, dragging his tattered reins. His red-brown coat had turned completely white.