Hungry flames, orange and red, licked over the shack; the weather-beaten boards turned to the black of fire, the white of ash. The flames tasted, licked, crunched, and enveloped the small structure like a snake consuming a mouse, a drug consuming an addict. Izzy had used the tame fires that cooked her meals and warmed her house, but this all-consuming, all-powerful god—this fire—took, and she, a priestess, presided over the funeral pyre of her father; she watched her father's body with his arms folded across his chest, a Viking king, curl before the fierce, heavy heat. They had placed him there.

          This unholy union of government and mining corporation men, these men who had placed her Pa in the flame, had looked for Izzy and the baby. Izzy had kept Sonny close, rocking his whimpers away, praying that they would not hear her or the baby. But they had not found her; they had not found the baby. Then, the evil, the frenzy, the carnage: shot after shot echoed in the air. While the goat bleated and the chickens shrieked, she had curled on the floor of her safe cave praying, holding Sonny close. When they had finished, when the blood had been enough, they left. Izzy slipped out to see, hoping to salvage something. The goat, shot in the head, had bled all over the ground. The chickens—beaks, feathers, and flesh—destroyed with her father's shotgun were scattered around the goat, like a bizarre murder ritual.  She cried. Without chickens, Sonny could survive until their neighbors brought flour or rice, but without the goat, Sonny, who still couldn't eat solid food, who needed milk, would only last three days, maybe four at most.

          Izzy walked up to the rain barrel which stood outside the house where they captured the pure precious drops of rain that sometimes touched the earth, sometimes pelted the land—wild thunderstorms racing across the desert, gullies overflowing with this precious substance.  They had shot the barrel in wild glee—evil, a pure destructive force.  Six perfect circles in the oak barrel leaked water onto the dry land. Izzy knew; she must journey through the desert. We might die. If I do we might die. If I don't we might die. Mother. Father. Together. Life, fierce life—fierce love, life, life, to live. I WANT TO LIVE. She must take the journey. It was the only way.

          The mule. Sonny whimpered. Izzy shifted his weight, holding him on her hip. The mule would solve the problem. Pa always kept him away from the house in a small pasture beside the pump. Much easier to keep the mule watered, he always said.  The mule, an onery animal, didn't like to be saddled, and though she could put the saddle on and ride, she had never done so without Pa's help. Pa. Izzy wiped a tear on from her eye. Pa was a gentle soul. They should not have shot him. But, her Pa had been warned that the corporations looked at the western desert as their private domain. Others had been run off their claims and their land. It was a shame that the people you should be able to trust were more vile, more dangerous than the land. Even the rattlesnakes didn't strike without reason, not like the men who had left them to die. Pa. She could do nothing more for Pa, now she had to help the living. Sonny needed her. They didn't have much time.

          The sun beat down on her head.  Izzy wrapped Sonny into the blanket and tied the baby against her chest like she had seen the Indian women do as they worked, harvesting meat for the winter. Sonny settled his head between her small breasts, then closed his eyes. Her hands were free. Time to check on the mule.  With the mule, Prince, they could reach the Hunt family in two days and maybe ride right through the heat of the day.  As long as she kept herself and Sonny wrapped up, they might not lose too much moisture to the desert.   

          The men may have missed Prince. Walking towards the hidden corral just back of the cabin, she thought of Sonny.  Sonny had been so good, but Sonny began hiccuping and then began to cry, the cry of hunger. She bounced him a little.

          "Hush, hush," Izzy said. His sapphire eyes looked into hers. "Hush, hush. I'll get you something soon."

          Izzy kissed the top of his head. His scent, soft and warm, calmed her. The mule would be there. The men couldn't track: they didn't know the first thing about mules. She would have seen them go to the small corral while she hid in the cave. The mule would be there.  

          Feeding Sonny would be hard. Izzy had heard that some birds would eat their food then burp the chewed, digested food to feed their young. And, she knew how to catch rabbits. Before Ma died, she had snared them, providing the meat that Pa was too busy to hunt. Ma would skin the rabbit, and they would slice the meat into the cast-iron pot that hung over the fire.  The stew was good. Pa would jerk some of the meat for when he worked deep in the mine, tracing the veins, and looking for gold. Maybe, Pa had left a small pack of jerky hidden in a cache for emergencies. He sometimes did . . . My hunting cache he'd say, but he was a miner: too busy grubbing in the dirt. She wondered if he knew the men would come. They had been warned. Some families had just disappeared. She had assumed that these families had not been able to grow food; these families hadn't found their own mine; they couldn't buy food. Many families, their bones bleached, died in the desert, consumed.

         Izzy looked for Prince. He liked to doze near the rocks where the shadows could cool his back at the heat of the day.  If she had a carrot, the mule would come up and nuzzle her hands, trying to find the treat. Izzya knew with her whole heart that her dark brown mule would save them. He must be there. He must.