Mistwalker (4 page)

“I'm going to go do the dishes,” Darby said, wheeling toward the kitchen.

“I'll help,” Cade added.

“Me too.” Megan's voice overlapped Cade's and he shrugged.

“Then I'll go hide in the bunkhouse. Hope Kit was too busy with Medusa to see that.” He pointed at the television, almost smiling.

Darby stood in the kitchen doorway, about to describe the black-and-white mare to Cade, as he sat on the entrance hall bench to tug on his boots.

“Okay?” Cade said under his breath without looking up.

Darby wasn't sure what Cade meant. Was it okay he'd rescued her? She didn't like being a damsel in distress any more than she liked being the
wahine
cleaning the kitchen, but Cade was standing taller than he had since she'd first met him.

Confronting Manny, and now this…

Still seated, Cade jerked down the cuffs of his jeans and raised his eyes to her. His jaw was set hard. “I know you woulda pulled yourself out.”

Darby noticed Megan walking toward the kitchen, still looking amused.

“Yeah, after I swallowed a couple gallons of salt
water,” Darby said, then added, “Thanks for having my back, Cade, really.”

Cade stood, shrugged, and pulled his hat over his eyes, but not far enough to hide his flush. Then he shouldered past the front door and into the night before Darby had a chance to say anything about the mysterious mare.

“M
y father treats me like a slave!”

The words in Ellen Kealoha's high school diary were written in red ink that bled through the page. After reading that first sentence on the pages that had fallen out of the black leather book, Darby couldn't stop.

“He says I don't understand, but he won't explain!!! When I beg him to, he walks away. Always. He can't think of a good enough argument because
I'm right
when I tell him he's too stingy to hire a ranch hand when he's got a kid he can work half to death!!!

“Too bad if she's a REALLY TALENTED ACTRESS. I wouldn't even care about the work if he'd let me ACT. Mr. Taylor says I'm good and his
new student teacher Mrs. Martindale said so, too.”

Darby looked up from the page for a second. Mrs. Martindale? Could it be the same Mrs. Martindale who was her Creative Writing teacher this year?

“He couldn't come see me in the play because he had to stay home with Mom. Obviously, I get that, but I showed him my
Anne Frank
review and he was proud! He said to go ahead and try out again and he'd come see me. But what's the use of auditioning for a play if he won't let me stay after school for rehearsal? He makes me come
home
right away, every single day!”

Darby thought of Mrs. Martindale again. Even though her Creative Writing teacher had wrongfully accused her of plagiarism, she'd later apologized. But that wasn't what Darby was remembering.

When Mrs. Martindale had suggested Darby be on the staff of the school's literary magazine, Jonah had asked if that met after school.

Mrs. Martindale had said yes, but added that the school was getting a new after-school activity bus for kids from outlying areas—like Darby.

And when Jonah made excuses, Mrs. Martindale had winked at Darby and insisted they'd work something out.

It was strange, Darby thought, that Jonah, who let her go on all kinds of adventures all over the island, had acted like she had to come straight home from school and do chores. Almost like it had been a reflex, left over from her mom's high school days.

Was that possible?

Darby started to turn the page, but it was stuck to the next one. Carefully, she worked her fingertip around the edge. When the pages parted, she found pink flower petals, a scrap of newsprint, and just two sentences written on the page.

“I like being with the horses, I love Prettypaint and Ebony and all of them, but the real me is on that stage. Can't I have both?”

Darby was smiling until she managed to read the small newspaper print on the short article.

“
Alexandra Rojas Kealoha
died at her home on ‘Iolani Ranch following a long illness. Wife of Jonah Kealoha, mother of Ellen Kealoha, daughter of famed soccer player Roberto ‘Boot' Rojas and schoolteacher Ikena Kamakau Rojas, she was born on Moku Lio Hihiu….”

Darby's gaze raced over the words three times before she realized she was reading her grandmother's obituary. Her mom's mother had died while Ellen had been a freshman in high school.

“One year older than me,” Darby whispered into her bedroom's stillness. She closed her eyes against the burn of tears. Though she'd never known her grandmother, Darby couldn't help putting herself in her mom's place.

Once the pang of empathy faded, Darby looked at the obituary again. She studied her bloodlines like she would those of a horse. Then she got out her own
diary, copied names, and drew a diagram of her heritage. It didn't go back far, but it was cool that there were Hawaiian names in every generation. Rojas was Hispanic, but from which country? And Carter, her dad's family, what kind of name was that? It would be fun to find out.

All of a sudden Darby sat up straighter. Since her mother had said she had enough money to pay for her own Tahiti-to-Hawaii plane ticket, Darby hadn't used her reward money. Maybe she could buy her dad a ticket to Hawaii!

When Jonah knocked on her bedroom door, Darby jumped and looked around quickly. The hatboxes were under her bed. All she had to do was flop her bedspread over five pages that were the size of her hand. So she did.

“Come in,” she called.

Jonah the horse charmer took one look at her face and said, “What are you up to?”

Darby shrugged her shoulders so high they almost grazed her earlobes.

“Not schoolwork,” he said, but his eyes fixed on her notebooks.

“I'm writing in my diary,” she admitted.

Jonah nodded and his face took on such a faraway expression, Darby expected him to say,
Your mother had a diary
, but he didn't.

“I'm all ready for tomorrow,” Darby said.

“What's to get ready?” Jonah asked.

Darby gestured at the wrinkle-free blouse and new jeans hanging on her closet door.

“My mom always says you can't go wrong with a white blouse and nice jewelry,” Darby said.

“Oh, she does? Which jewelry are you wearing?”

“Okay, so I've only got the white blouse,” Darby said, “but I thought she'd be so glad to see me, she'd let that pass.”

Jonah stared at the window above her bed. When he spoke again, he pretty much confirmed he hadn't been listening to her. “We'll drive over, let people see you get a reward for your work tracking down Stormbird—that's what Babe calls the colt you found, yeah?—and come home.”

“And meet my mom there,” Darby said pointedly.

Ellen's plane from Tahiti had to stop on Oahu before it hopped over to Moku Lio Hihiu, but she should arrive with plenty of time to drive to Aunt Babe's resort.

Jonah knew all that, but he changed the subject, tilting his head in the direction of the living room.

“Pretty exciting stuff on the news, yeah?”

“Pretty exciting,” she echoed.

“That Hoku, she stayed right by you.”

“I know!” Darby didn't mean to wrap her arms around herself in delight. It just happened.

“It's that Quarter Horse blood showin' through,” Jonah teased.

“I'm pretty sure it's mustang loyalty to her herd.
Me,” she told him.

“You get some sleep. Big day tomorrow,” Jonah said.

“Good night,” Darby called as her grandfather closed the door.

She jumped up, brushed her teeth, put on her nightgown, and crawled into bed. But she wasn't done for the night.

She had to read the rest of her mom's diary, because talking to Jonah had made her realize that as Ellen had grown into her teens, the one thing that kept her and Jonah together was horses.

What if I could make that happen again?
Darby asked herself. She thought she could, but first she had to figure out why Jonah had started keeping her mom home to do chores instead of letting her act.

Darby kept reading, and though she didn't find the answer, she discovered what her mom had done about it. To get back at Jonah, Ellen had quit riding.

This is too depressing,
Darby thought. She was about to tuck the pages back in the diary when she saw, “A wild stallion, a flash of silver and black under the candlenut tree, came to visit tonight. He was amazing—a horse made of starlight and black satin.”

Darby repeated the words to herself. They sang through her like a magical spell.

Then she sucked in a breath, got up on her knees, and looked out her bedroom window. She couldn't see much through the glass reflection of her own face,
but there was the candlenut tree, and right there she'd seen the Shining Stallion, which was probably Black Lava, coming to steal mares for his herd.

She shivered. This was her mom's old bedroom. Why hadn't anyone told her?

But that didn't matter half as much as what happened next in the diary.

“He came for Ebony,” Ellen had written in tiny letters. “A wild black-and-white paint stallion.”

It could be a coincidence, but what if it wasn't? What if the mare she'd just seen was descended from this creature of starlight and black satin?

Keep reading.

“…I let down the rails on Ebony's pen. In the morning, I'll run down before anyone else is awake and put them back up. I'm setting my alarm now. I know Ebony won't run away, but if she has a foal by…”

That was the end, the last line on the last page Darby had allowed herself to read. She read it over three times before she looked up in amazement.

Never, not in a million years, would she have guessed her mother could be such a bad kid.
Could Mom's trick have created the mystery mare that I saw today?

Darby bounced on her bed in frustration. She wanted to read more, but a deal was a deal, even if it was with your conscience.

She turned off her bedside lamp before slipping out of bed and reaching underneath for the hatbox.
She lifted the lid—careful not to feel around for the diary's smooth cover, since that would be too tempting—and dropped the pages in.

Moonlight streamed through Darby's window. She still wasn't sleepy, so she retrieved a book. They'd read a short story by Madeleine L'Engle in their literature textbook, and she'd liked it so much, she'd gone to the school library and checked out a novel by the writer.

Curling on her side, Darby read.

She was smiling as the book dropped from her hands, and the link she'd found to her mother, through her diary, comforted her. Her mom was coming. Tomorrow.

Probably today, but she didn't open her eyes to check the clock, and as Darby drifted to sleep, images of the black leather diary reshaped themselves into an aristocratic mare named Ebony, then shrank to a dancing foal, daughter of a black-and-silver stallion.

 

It was four o'clock in the morning when Kimo's truck rattled into the ranch yard. Then Darby heard Hoku's neigh. She knew that sound by heart.

“What's wrong?” Darby slid off her bed and hit the floor, but she was up, walking and talking before her eyes opened.

She managed to open her bedroom door, but collided with Jonah in the dark hallway.

Her grandfather turned her around by her shoulders.

“Go back to bed,” he told her. Chuckling, he walked behind her, steering her toward her warm blankets. “A few steers'll be keepin' an appointment at Hapuna harbor. The guys plan to get an early start before the roads are clogged with people coming to see you get your big money.”

Darby heard a clang. Jonah must have bumped into the clothes hanger on her closet door holding her white blouse. She hoped it didn't fall and get wrinkled, but she concentrated on finding that comfy spot on her pillow. Still, he'd said something about steers and money, and Hoku had called out a question, hadn't she?

“Huh?” Darby asked. “
What's
happening?”

“Kimo and Kit want to get back in time to come for Babe's media luau….”

Darby's eyes opened for a second. She was pretty sure that wouldn't make sense, even if she was wide awake.

“And me, I'm up figurin' how I can make enough from each shipment of cattle to pay Kimo and Kit half of what they're worth….”

She understood that, but she didn't want to think about it. Not now.

 

Megan bounced on Darby's bed three hours later. “I can't believe the phone didn't wake you up. It's rung like a million times!”

“I was up late,” Darby explained. She pulled herself to
a sitting position and rubbed her cheek, pretty sure she'd used the hardback book for a pillow. “The phone?”

“I think everyone we know from school's called to make sure our award ceremony is at eleven.”

“Really? Like who?” Darby asked through a yawn.

“Like everyone. Ann's called twice, a bunch of people from the soccer team and the swim team, and most of the neighbors.”

“Okay,” Darby said, but then her heart did a double jump. Her mom could already be at the airport in Tahiti.

“Want to know what I think?” Megan asked.

“Sure.”

“Half of them want to be our friends because we're about to be rich, and the other half want a look at your mom, the celebrity.”

“Have you already been for a run?” Darby asked, noticing that Megan wore sweats and carried a water bottle.

Megan usually stayed in bed until her mother shook her awake for school.

“I couldn't sleep,” Megan said. She prowled the perimeter of Darby's room, but she didn't touch anything.

And that, Darby thought, was one of the traits that made Megan such a good friend. She might be nosy, but she wasn't pushy about it.

Darby stood up, took a deep breath, leaned over,
and touched her toes, then flipped her long black hair back like a mane.

“Better,” she said. “I'm awake.”

“Is this what you're wearing?” Megan stood in front of the white shirt and new jeans. “Where did you get this cool necklace?”

“Yeah, it's what I'm wearing,” Darby said hesitantly. “But what necklace?” She didn't take a step closer. “The last time you talked to me about a necklace it was haunted or cursed or something.”

“Stop it,” Megan said, and though she was turned away and Darby couldn't see her face, she could hear the smile in her voice.

With delicate moves, Megan lifted a fine chain from the hanger and dangled it.

A winged gold heart the size of Darby's little fingernail swung back and forth before her eyes.