Beyond the fire, the wasteland was still, as if the wind and even the stones had frozen in the night to listen, and then she heard it again, a faint chink, like a footfall in pebbles. Someone or something was out there, watching her.Gaia turned the knife in her palm, resettling her grip, and peered toward where the far edge of the firelight touched the boulders and the gnarled, wind-stunted trees of the gulch. Without dropping her gaze, she felt by hand that the baby was secure in the sling across her chest, her warm, light weight hardly more than a loaf of bread’s. She’d left the baby bottle on a ledge of rock, out by the fire, and she hoped whoever was watching her wouldn’t take that bottle, whatever else they might do.The chinking noise came again, drawing her gaze to the far side of the fire. Then a head, an enormous, animal head, big as a cow’s but long of face, appeared at the edge of the firelight, looking directly at her. A horse? she thought, astounded to see an animal she’d believed was extinct.
