little too fast for her tired feet to carry her, yet she said nothing. Instead she thought about the valley, her birthplace, where she had worked so hard to get to that year. It seemed as if humans were always trying to catch up to her. What if they had followed her home? Could it be her fault that the rest of the herd was somewhere in a vast mountain range? It seemed unlikely, but the coinsidence of Speedy and Bear - and Harry- to meet her again was incredible.

Suddenly her hoof slipped on a patch of ice. She managed to stay standing up and continue up the now steepening path, but it was a reminder of how dangerous their journey was. Durango was right; on the way back from the tribe it was just lowlands covered in snow, but up here in the mountains there was nothing.

Jade nearly jumped out of her skin when Durango spoke to her. "The pass starts about here, but it's deep in snow. We'll have to tred carefully while we're in here, but at least it's downhill from now on." She nodded, and followed him into the deep snow.

The herd was doing well considering the difficulties they faced. Meals were few and far between, but Spirit saw to it that everyone got an equal amount. Water wasn't an issue, since ice and snow persisted through all hours of the day. It was difficult to shelter so many horses, so instead they huddled in groups to keep warm and dry. Rain was still upset with Spirit, but she was now talking to him again. It seemed that the conditions put strains on everyone, and at the time when they most needed each other they were falling apart as a herd.

Esperanza led as a sort of matriach, her age providing knowledge and wisdom on how to survive in mountainous regions. Even Spirit looked to her for advice in the tough climate, and she never failed to lead them safely through the range.

In a violent snow storm one afternoon she was searching for a shelter, and got lucky. An overhang of rock pertruded right out over the trail and would easily fit all the mares under it. Spirit hurried everyone under the rocks and only lay down himself once everyone else was in. But his mother looked uneasy.

"What is it?" he asked, sitting up.

"There were horses here not long ago," she said, turning. "Jade and Durango. I'm sure it's them. Their scents are all over the place. I couldn't tell before because of the storm-"

Rain had wandered over to listen to the news, but now she was panicking. "The storm! Spirit, they'll be further up the trail by now, what if there isn't enough shelter?"

He stood up to let her rest her head on him. "They've made it this far alone, I'm sure they've been caught in a blizzard before."

"But at least we know that they're close," Esperanza said.

Days passed as they swam through the deepening snow drifts. The further they went the higher it reached up their sides. Jade had resorted to jumping up every few steps to try and keep as much of her out of the freezing dust. As she pushed through the sheets a pile would accumulate infront of her and prevented her from seeing ahead of herself.

Durango was trudging along when he banged his front legs on something. Rock. He started to clamber upto higher ground and collapsed in a heap. He hated to admit it, but his bad leg was causing him problems and the pain had been terrible while he was pushing his way through the snow. Jade saw him ahead and called for him to help her out a bit, but he just lay there, facing away.

She had had enough of his sulking. She drew up all her strength and bounded through the snow  as fast as she could. Once she got to the platform Durango stood up and said, "You took long enough, we need to go now while we still have daylight."

He turned to dive back in but she stood side-on in his way. "Now you listen here, warhorse," she said sternly, "I am over ten months pregnant, I have been travelling for weeks, my skin is chapped, I am cold and wet, and when we finally find a place to rest you refuse to help me get there, then when I arrive - exhausted - you want to carry on because you've already rested. I'm sorry about the news, but there's no need to take it out on me, especially when I need my mate this much. So grow up!"

She snorted and stood like a boulder in his way. His ears were back and his tail hung low. He looked down. "I'm sorry, Jade," he whispered. "I've lost everyone close to me, but you have your family, you'll always have your family."

She lowered her head to meet his. "Not at the moment. That's why I need you to help me, Durango."

They slept on the raised piece of rock over the night before continuing along the pass. To avoid slowing their pace, Durango searched for shallower paths that Jade could handle. He led the way through the snow, carving out a trail for her to follow. She found the tundra easier to handle now, and as they declined away from the peaks the snow thinned, the nights were warmer and vegetation grew here and there. That had been the main problem; food, and it was only now that they realised that they were starving.

So instead of rushing, they worked together to try and uncover a patch of rough grass from the powder each afternoon and stopped to refill their stomachs. Durango would let her have most of it while he watched for mountain predators. It was while he was doing this that is first occured to him that the vast landscape ahead of them was their new home.

"We'll be living down there for the rest of our lives," he said as they plodded down the gentle slopes through a pine forest. "It's all our foal will know."

"But look at it Durango, the plane's huge! We could have several herds living here!" she replied.

He went quiet for a moment. "That's something that we never thought through," he said, "there could be herds here, with powerful stallions. What if there's too much competition for land? Or mares? There could be batchelor herds our here, full of previous foals from the Cimarron. It would certainly cause trouble for your father."

"He can handle it, and I'm sure you'd do your fair share of defending," she smiled.

He looked over the landscape. "At least this land is higher, which means we'll have a quicker decent."

"Not quick enough, I'm tired," Jade yawned, lying down and falling promptly asleep. There was no time for protest over the shelter or defencive position, so Durango just lay down beside her and went to sleep too.

Durango found himself shivering awake - a strange thing to happen. He stood up and shook the settled snowflakes off his coat and stretched his legs and back. Something was wrong, he knew it. Something hit his mind like he had run into a brick wall.

"Jade!" he cried, his voice echoing out through the frozen trees. His breath was visable in the air and the blankets of snow were begining to harden over with a frosty crust. It was too cold for her to be alone, it was the middle of the night, she could freeze to death. A cougar or mountain lion could be anywhere. He looked at the potholes in the snow leading away from where the mare had been lying and followed them along the ground.

After half an hour the trees dispersed and eventually disappeared, but he kept following the tracks. Every now and then he called her name, hoping for an answer. He tried to canter in the snow, but the depth restricted him to a steady trot. Then ahead of him, in the snow, was Jade. He rushed to her and lay down behind her.

"Are you crazy?" he whispered. "You'll catch your death out here, what do think you're doing?"

"I was trying to get some privacy," she snarled, but leaned against him anyway. She sighed. "It's the foal, Durango."

He froze. "Oh," was all he could say. "Oh."

She winced at the pain. "Leave me alone! Don't you know that this is very undignified for me?"

"Since when have you bothered about your dignity?" he muttered. She snapped at him.

"Go away! Ow!" She started crying. "Look, there's a reason why mares go off on their own to foal, it's because we can't stand others encouraging us! This is all natural, I know what I'm doing, so either shut up or go back to the forest!"

He chose to shut up, and rested his head on her neck. She was tense and clearly in agony, but he couldn't do anything to help her other than keep quiet and trust her. That was what hurt him, not being able to take her pain away. He was tempted to leave her and go back into the trees, but the cold was penetrating him right to the bone, and he knew that neither her or their foal would survive long without extra heat.

She flinched slightly. "Argh! Durango, I'm never letting you near me again! Remember what I am about to say - you did this to me!"

He was shocked. "Me? What did I do? You wanted kids!"

"Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!" she screamed, kicking one of her back legs.

"But-"

"Durango," she warned, glaring at him up her nose. He shut his mouth again quickly.

"This better be worth it," she murmured, laying her head on his legs. "We could have adopted a cute little foal that was abandoned, but no - I decided to do things the hard way." She winced again, and drew her head up. "If those stupid humans had just left us alone then this would have all been a lot easier!"

"Yes dear," he sighed. It was going to be a long night.

Once Spirit realised that it was a