As they rode, they listened to the chirp of the birds, the drone of insects. The soft blue mountain ranges rose beyond the grasslands. A hawk glided lazily across the face of the sun. All of them were content to simply ride quietly and observe and listen to the life-rich valley.
Doc finally broke the silence. “The gates of Eden have swung shut again, and the demons have been given the boot.”
“Not funny, Doc,” J.B. said.
“It wasn’t meant to be, John Barrymore,” he replied.
They reached the slope that crept up to the pass, and they urged their ponies forward, reining them to stop on the shelf of rock overlooking the valley. Ryan gazed at the great piles of white clouds, the wind-ruffled grasses, then to the charred, fire-blackened tract.
Krysty touched his arm. Though she was still a little pale, she was strong, alive and healed. “Are you okay, lover?”
“It was peaceful here,” he answered. “Might have been good to stay a while longer.”
“We can come back,” Mildred said. “The promise of returning to Ti-Ra’-Wa is a very strong inducement to staying alive.”
“What’ll we do until then?” J.B. asked.
“What we always do, what we’ve always done, what we do best,” Krysty stated. “Survive.”
J.B. tugged at the brim of his fedora. “In Deathlands I reckon that’s the best we can hope for.”
” ‘It is the Devil, and the uncharitable votes of Hell, that desire our misery in the world to come,’ ” Doc quoted quietly.
“I liked your ‘ride, boldly ride’ stuff better,” Krysty told him, a strained smile crossing her face.
“Me, too,” Mildred added.
Turning his pony’s head toward the crack that separated Ti-Ra’-Wa from Deathlands, Ryan said, “Let’s do that very thing.”
He kept his back turned toward the valley as he led his friends through the pass.