By the time the sun had faded to a friendlier strength, they’d rounded up the last of the stragglers and pestered them into moving from a paddock of short dead grass to one with slightly longer dead grass. In Harry’s opinion, they didn’t seem very grateful.
Lucas begged to be allowed to get down and stretch his legs and walk Chez back to the stockyards. Instead of explaining to him that the hills were a lot steeper than they felt on horseback, Annie agreed instantly, and then she took off at a steady canter. It seemed she wanted to talk to Harry alone, so he nudged his tired horse into a reluctant trot to follow her. He glanced behind to see Lucas slide from the saddle to land on shaky legs, while Chez took a couple of sideways protest steps at being left behind his herd-mates. Lucas scra
