Daria on the Trail:
The Dragons Spine

DISCLAIMER: I did not create A Song of Ice and Fire. A Song of Ice and Fire and A Game of Thrones was created by George RR Martin. I do not own Daria Morgendorffer: the character belongs to MTV Viacom.

Advisory: A little swearing. If this was a film, there would be a lot more swearing as the drivers urged their oxen into motion.

This story is based on my research on the REAL Oregon Trail, not the computer game of the same name.

This story is written for my own amusement and ego gratification, not for profit. If you'd like to gratify my ego, please write and post a review.

Daria on the Trail*Daria on the Trail*Daria on the Trail

Orrick Trout POV:

I awoke the next morning feeling unsettled. This was the day we'd be crossing Rocky Ridge. I arose, helped Kara fold our bedding and put it in the wagon, then waited while Kara and Daria made breakfast. Kara poured me some tea: drinking it helped me relax and plan ahead. I felt tense and had good reason to be: today was the day when our Company would cross Rocky Ridge, one of the most formidable challenges on this side of the Rocky Mountains. Daria had found out about it weeks ago and it put her on edge. She set about finding out what she could about it, both at Fort Laramie and the Platte River Station. I had done likewise, asking trappers, freighters, soldiers and returning travelers what they knew about Rocky Ridge and what sorts of difficulties we could expect to find there. Their answers were disheartening: I learned that Rocky Ridge was the sort of obstacle that could lame oxen, break wheel rims and dash the hopes of Emigrants seeking to cross the mountains and continue on to the Oregon and California. It could be surmounted, it had been surmounted, but it would have to be treated with caution and respect.

I walked over to Johnson's wagon. We had found that we worked well together: Johnson was a man of caution and good judgment, a man who might have had little more experience than driving a wagon from his farm to market before he started his journey west, but who had the wisdom to watch and learn. I found him drinking coffee that his wife had brewed from a pot. I greeted him, his wife and his children, then we set down to business. "Today we climb that ridge," I said.

"Yeah," said Johnson.

"Do you wish to have your people lead or should I and my people set out first?" I asked.

"You have more experience," he replied. "I'd rather you people do it. You can eat our dust later on. What do you want to do once we get there?"

"I'd like to stop short of the ridge, then you and I and some of the others walk it," I said. "We'll look it over, then see if there are suitable paths for our oxen and wagons. Once we find them, we go back downhill and bring our wagons up one at a time."

"Single teams or double teams?" he asked.

"I don't know," I said. "Double teams if we need them, single teams if we don't. Either we'll need them or we won't. I've not been this way before."

Johnson chuckled. "I haven't either," he said.

"I'll get my teams yoked and then we'll set out," I said.

I went back to our camp site where Kara, Bass, Stauffer, Wilson, and some of the others were waiting.

"We have a plan," I said. "We'll be going to the base of the Ridge, then Captain Johnson and I will scout it out. Once we have determined the safest routes, we will guide each team and wagon up the ridge one at a time."

I then turned to Daria. "Daria, I want you to go walk with Mrs. Mudd. Make sure that she has her wagon loaded and oxen yoked. You will walk with her to the base of the Ridge."

"Surely you don't want me to drive her team up the Ridge," she said, looking alarmed. "I'm not that good."

I chuckled. "No, I just want you to walk with her today. I'll try to get one of the men to drive her team up and over the Ridge, and then either she or you can drive the team to our next camp site." The girl, no, the woman did not look enthusiastic.

"I'll do what I can," she said.

Daria POV:

Oh, boy, I thought after Captain Trout gave me my marching orders. I really didn't know Mrs. Mudd very well. I paused in thought, thinking about what I should grab before I set out. I decided that empty chamber or no empty chamber, I'd do well not to leave my pistol in the wagon: it might go off. I picked it up and took it with me when I walked back to the Mudds' wagon.

Mrs. Mudd was standing by her wagon. She had company: some of the other wives from our wagon train: Mrs. Haley, Mrs. Fraley and Mrs. Wilson.

"Hi," I said. The other women looked at me skeptically. I realized that I hadn't paid that much attention to the Yankee families in our wagon train. I'd spent most of my time either with Kara and the other Trouts or, more recently, with a couple of the Westerosi newcomers who'd joined us back at Fort Laramie. I knew some of the American women's names but not all of them.

"Captain Trout asked me if I could walk with you up to the start of the climb," I said.

"You're that woman who's traveling with the Trouts, aren't you?" said Mrs. Mudd.

"That's me," I replied. "Daria Morgendorffer, errand girl, translator, and part-time English teacher."

Mrs. Mudd gave me a half-smile. "Susana Mudd," she said.

"I'm sorry I couldn't do more for your husband," I said.

"You tried," she said. "You did more than that doctor."

"Did the Captain ask you to drive the team up the hill?" asked Mrs. Haley.

"No," I said. "I think that he or one of the other fellas is going do that." Good thing, too, I thought.

"I saw you back at the fort with a couple of those children," said Mrs. Trout.

"I admit that I'm teaching the Trout kids English," I said.

"I mean the other ones," said Mrs. Mudd.

I smiled. "I suspect that you mean the Thatches. I'm supposed to teach them English too but I spent a lot of my time chasing Othar."

"That's the boy, isn't it?" said Mrs. Mudd.

"That's the boy," I replied.

"That boy is a terror," she said. "He's bothering Martin."

"Who is Martin?" I asked. "Your son?"

"Yes," she replied.

"I didn't know about what Othar was up to," I said. "We can talk to his mother if you like. I do speak Westerosi."

"I might take you up on that," she said. Her face changed expression. "I've got a question for you," she said. "Why are you carrying that pistol?"

"Because the trail over Rocky Ridge is very rough and I don't want it to go off by accident," I said. "My other two guns are currently unloaded and stowed in the Trouts' other wagon."

"I see," said Mrs. Mudd.

"Did Mr. Mudd have any guns?" I asked.

"Yes," she replied. "They're in the wagon."

"Do you know if they're loaded?" I asked.

Mrs. Mudd didn't answer me.

"You might want to do something about that before we set out this morning," I said.

"Aren't you worried about Indian trouble?" she said.

"Not here," I said. "I don't think we need to worry until we're a lot close to the Snake."

"The Snake?" she said.

"The Snake River," I replied. "We'll run into it about the time we reach Fort Hall and then we'll follow it most of the way to Farewell Bend."

"Does it go all the way to Oregon?" she said.

"Just to the state line," I said. "The guidebooks say we'll have to go overland a ways, then we'll come to the Columbia."

"Oh," she said.

"Also, I don't know what you're going to do, but Captain Trout made everybody in his own wagons get out. They're going to walk uphill, even Minti."

"Who's Minti?" she said.

"Their little girl," I said.

She thought about it.

"He's resting," she said.

"Well, he's got reason to be in shock," I said. "And still we must go on." He needs to get up and out of the wagon. Hint, hint.

Captain Trout and Captain Johnson came by. Captain Trout turned to Mrs. Mudd and said "Is everything all right, Lady Mudd?"

"As well as can be expected," she replied. Her face scrunched up and I heard her mouthing "Lady Mudd?".

He turned to me and asked me what I thought of her wagon and teams.

"They look read to go, boss," I replied in Andal. "I do want her to secure her guns and get her boy out of the wagon."

"Single team or do we double?" I said.

"Single team," he said. He then turned his attention to the grieving widow.

"Lady Mudd," he said. Mrs. Mudd gave me a strange look: I didn't doubt she had questions. "I think you want to get your boy out of the wagon and have him walk uphill."

"All right," she said. She walked to the rear of her wagon and roused a sleepy-looking small boy. I tried to guess his age: four, five? I wasn't sure.

"Time to go," he said. He and Captain Johnson turned away and walked over to the next wagon. They walked down the line together, then they came back with some men from both companies. Being back several wagons from the front of our wagon train I couldn't see what they were doing, but I learned later that our guys and people from the Johnson's company went uphill, picking up and shoving some of the boulders on the path over to one side or the other. I didn't fully appreciate what they did until a bit later when we began our ascent up Rocky Ridge's obstacle-course pathway. When they were done they came back down, each man walking back to his wagon. A short time later, Captain Trout's wagon began its climb up the grade, moving slowly and carefully up the trail, trying to avoid having the oxen's hooves or his wagon's wheels make contact with the boulders and lines of stone embedded deep into the ground underneath the trail.

I knew Captain Trout's methods well enough to know that we'd have a wait until it was Mrs. Mudd's turn to climb Rocky Ridge. I decided that I wanted a better look at where we'd be going before we started climbing it. "Excuse me," I said, walking away from my post. I walked up about 100 yards then gulped. Even from here this looked scary.

Jerry would have loved this. My former boyfriend Benton's cousin Jerry was a rock-climber. Not the kind of rock-climber that went out and climbed rock formations like the mountaineers who climbed tall peaks with ropes, pitons, and other climbing tools, but the other sort: the guys who took Jeeps over the most rugged roads and trails they could think of, ones where even a tracked vehicle would have second thoughts. As far as Jerry was concerned, the more rocks, boulders, potholes and flying gravel, the better. He would have been in Seventh Heaven if he'd been able to come out here with his tricked-out truck. Of course Jerry's Jeep had independent suspension, shock absorbers, fat truck tires, and a four wheel drive powered by a 250 plus horsepower engine.

Me being an Emigrant woman with a wooden-wheeled wooden wagon, I wasn't so enthused. We didn't have a real suspension, we had nothing lock proper shock absorbers, and instead of thick and wide truck tires that could laugh off most shocks caused by our bumping off rocks and into potholes, we had wooden wagon wheels with thin metal tires. I had no real knowledge as to the condition of the wood in Mrs. Mudd's wheel hub, spokes and wheel rim and was none too sure whether it would hold together, fall apart or merely crack. I gulped. This was not going to be fun.

I returned to Mrs. Mudd's wagon.

"Well how was it?" said Mrs. Mudd. I noticed that Martin was up and hugging his mother's skirt.

"Rough," I said.

"Why did the Captain call me Lady Mudd?" she said. "I'm no fancy Englishwoman."

"He told me that there was family of Riverland kings called the Mudds," I said. "He said that they ruled his part of Westeros for over one thousand years."

"Royal kings?" said Martin. Martin looked like he was three or four.

"That's what he said," I replied.

Mrs. Mudd gave me a look that said that she thought that Captain Trout was kidding. "Is he joking?" she said.

"I don't think so," I replied. "Still, it's a fine story whether it's true or not, and if we find some Westerosi Maester on the Trail, I say we wrestle him to the ground and torture his toes until he tells us whether there were any Royal Mudds or not."

Despite her grief, Mrs. Mudd smiled.

We waited as the first several wagons began their ascent, moving ever so slowly and cautiously over the rocks embedded in the earth beneath the trail. After a bit, our captains came down. Two more wagons went uphill. After a time, I their drivers walk partway downhill, stop at a couple of places and wait.

Mr. Fraley came downhill and walked over to Mrs. Mudd's wagon. "Ma'am, Captain Trout asked me to help you with your wagon. May I?" he said.

"Yes," said Mrs. Mudd.

And we began our climb.

-(((O-O)))-

It was hellish. The trail was not only strewn with rocks and boulders on its surface but was built on top of bedrock jutting out from ancient strata below the surface. There was no way of avoiding it, not way of going around it, you had to go through it whether you liked it or not.

I didn't like it. Not one damn bit.

We could and did got around some of the worst of the remaining boulders, thanks to Mr. Fraley's driving. The oxen didn't stumble, but our wagon wheels would climb over rocks, roll forward for a little bit, then fall back down onto the soil with a jolt as we went forward ever so slowly, ever so carefully up the grade.

We then might or might not have a respite of a few yards where travel might almost seem normal, then the trouble would start up all over again. Perhaps this time the bedrock was smooth below on one wheel and rough on the other and the wagon would lurch and tilt, before it either descended slowly or fell back down with a crash. Perhaps we'd have a yards-wide strip of rock that we couldn't avoid and had to climb over. I felt my heart thumping so hard it felt like it had jumped to the back of my throat and was then staying there. More than once I looked over at Mrs. Mudd and saw that she was as anxious as I was.

I walked over to the side and looked down-grade. By now, our companies' captains felt confident enough to let the wagons begin their assaults in groups, howbeit widely-spaced groups, instead of one wagon at a time. That didn't help much: we could hear their wagons climbing and crashing over rocks and obstacles on the trail. A rifle went off in one of the other wagons. I cocked my revolver and scanned the terrain for hostiles. No hostiles behind me. I walked around the wagon to the other side and didn't see anyone there either.

Mr. Fraley chuckled. "Somebody's gun going off," he said.

"Excuse me, I need to get something out of the wagon," said Mrs. Mudd. Mr. Fraley brought the wagon to a halt. Mrs. Mudd stepped up and pulled out a muzzle-loading hunting rifle I hadn't seen, then looked at Mr. Fraley. "I've got it," she said.

"All right," said Mr. Fraley, and our climb resumed.

Shortly afterwards we had a respite. Mr. Fraley looked at our expressions and grinned. "How are you ladies feeling?"

"All right," said Mrs. Mudd.

"Ask me later," I replied. "I'm still shook up." We rolled forward a couple of hundred feet, then the stress resumed. Our oxen climbed over one rock and then over the other, our wagon wheels climbing and coming down from the rock lying beneath our tires. We continued forward as I made a note to myself to look over our wheels and axles when we stopped later on. We passed another line of rock, then the trail began to smooth out, or at least smooth out compared to what we'd just been through.

After a while I saw some of our wagons up ahead and noted that they'd pulled off to the side. We weren't climbing rocks any more, either. I'd first heard or read the saying that all things must pass: I probably read it. Perhaps we were clear of most of it. Mr. Fraley smiled and turned to Mrs. Mudd and myself. "All right, ladies, I think we're past the worst part," he said, then brought Mrs. Mudd's ox team to a halt.

"Thank you," I said.

Mrs. Mudd looked at him, tears in her eyes. "Thank you," she said.

"Least I could do," he said, then turned away.

I was still a basket of nerves. I paused and counted to sixty. When that didn't work, I counted to one hundred. I looked at Mrs. Mudd, who still looked badly-shaken. "Do you want to drive or should I?" I said.

"You drive," she said. She blinked back tears, no doubt remembering when Mr. Mudd stood beside her. Young Martin stepped over and hugged her skirt.

She looked so alone. I'm not prayerful person, but I couldn't stop myself. Mr. Mudd, wherever you are, I hope you got to see this, I thought.

I walked over to the oxen. They weren't familiar with me and they gave me dubious looks. I must have learned something from the Trouts, though. Despite the fact that I still considered myself to be a novice teamster and that neither I nor Mrs. Mudd's oxen were familiar with each other, I got them to move.

We made camp a couple of miles beyond Rocky Ridge. It had been a difficult climb and everyone felt worn out. I wasn't quite sure where we were but we were within a day or two of the Ninth Crossing of the Sweetwater and the turnoff for the Lander Road.

Author's Notes:

While searching for a title for this chapter, I wondered what Westerosi emigrants would name Rocky Ridge. I decided that they'd pick something other than Rocky Ridge. I decided that they'd probably call it The Dragon's Spine instead.

Rocky Ridge was an underplayed obstacle on the Rocky Mountain section of the Oregon and California trails. Most companies had to cross it until 1854, when the Seminoe Cutoff was opened south of it.

I decided that Daria and the Trout Company would still have to deal with it because the turnoff for the Lander Road is off the older part of the trail and Emigrants taking the Seminoe Cutoff and then seeking to take the Lander Road would have to climb to almost two miles to the summit of South Pass, then backtrack for several miles to take the Road.

Some readers may wonder why I included the passages about firearms. I included it because one of the major causes of death and injury along the trail was accidental shootings.

I only have a few more chapters to write before I set this project aside for a while. I do want to get Daria onto the Lander Road. I should also resume work on the "Back at the Ranch" segment as well as deal with what happened to Orrick Trout's oldest son Rolph and his family back in the Riverlands.