by Stacy Gregg
There was no sign of Mystic when she peered outside though, and Issie somehow knew that her pony wouldn’t be coming this time. Things had been different lately. She had been dreaming about Mystic a lot—always the same dream—and yet the grey pony was never there when she woke up.
She pressed her face up to the glass and stared out once more. It was growing light outside. What time was it anyway? Issie checked her alarm clock: 6.03 a.m.
She couldn’t just lie around in her room for hours and wait until breakfast. She could make out the shadowy outline of the stable block in the distance. She wiggled restlessly underneath the duvet. She was dying to get to the stables. When they had arrived at Havenfields last night, the girls had been desperate to go and meet the horses, but Avery had told them it would be better to wait until morning when the other riders arrived.
Surely Tom wouldn’t mind though? If she walked down to the stables now, Issie could have a quick look and be back again before anyone missed her.
She got out of bed and pulled on her jeans and a T-shirt. The other bed next to hers hadn’t been slept in. Issie’s room-mate was due to arrive that morning. Avery had decided it would be a good idea to split the Chevalier Point girls up for once. When the other New Zealand girls got here, one of them would be sharing Issie’s room. But until then, she had the whole place to herself, so no one would notice that she was gone.
The buzz of cicadas filled the air as she walked down the driveway towards the stable complex. The dirt beneath her boots was so dry, little clouds of dust rose up with each step she took.
The stable complex was functional, not flashy, the buildings constructed from cedar weatherboards that had bleached silver-grey in the harsh Australian sun. Issie walked up to the sliding door, leaning hard against it to push it open, until the gap was large enough for her to step inside.
The first thing she noticed was the familiar warm smell of horses. She took a deep breath and held it, enjoying the sweet aroma. Then she looked around at the four open stalls and, beyond those, to the stalls that were bolted shut.
She felt like a kid about to open a chocolate box and find out what flavours lay inside. In front of her were eight stalls, each with a horse inside. One of those horses would be hers for the next two weeks, to groom and care for, and to train and compete on. But which box held her horse?
Issie stepped forward to slide the bolt back on the first door. She got a bit of a shock as the top half of the door was shoved open from the inside and a bay horse with a white stripe down his face thrust his muzzle over the partition to greet her.
“Well, hello there! You’re keen, aren’t you?” Issie giggled at the bay’s enthusiasm and his trick of opening the door by himself.
The bay nickered a friendly hello and Issie stepped closer to his stall so that she could look inside. At a quick glance, she could see that the horse was a gelding, heavily built, with perhaps a bit of Clydesdale in his bloodlines. Yes, definitely Clydesdale, she decided on closer inspection. The gelding’s feathers, the long hair on his fetlocks, and his solid cannon bones were a dead giveaway.
Clydesdale blood could be a good thing, Issie thought. Clydesdales were draught horses, but if you mixed their bloodlines with Thoroughbred they made a good sport horse. They had strong bones and although they were bred to pull wagons, they were also surprisingly bold jumpers.
In fact, in many ways the bay horse would have been perfect for her to ride for the next two weeks. However, she quickly discovered that there was a problem. How could Issie possibly choose him when every horse in every stall at Havenfields seemed equally perfect?
As Issie worked her way down the row, opening the doors one by one, each horse had something special and seemed better than the last. In the second stall there was a gorgeous chocolate dun. He was only about fourteen-three hands, but he was sturdy, a solid hunter-type with a dark chocolate coat, and a pretty blond mane and tail.
The next horse was a leggy grey gelding, almost sixteen hands. He was pale grey with a mane and tail that were so dark they seemed black, contrasted against his pearly coat.
The horse in the next box was a grey as well, dappled with a silvery mane and broad aquiline nose. Next to him was a Skewbald, a bright bay colour, covered with big white patches.
All the horses so far had been geldings, but when Issie reached the sixth stall, the horse inside was a mare. She was a glossy chestnut, about fifteen hands high, with a bright white star on her forehead and a perfectly pulled mane. “Aren’t you beautiful,” Issie murmured admiringly. The mare seemed pleased with this assessment, and thrust her head over the partition so that Issie could admire her some more.
Issie had almost reached the end of the loose boxes and in the seventh one, next to the chestnut mare, Issie found a horse that was the most spectacular so far. At first glance you might have thought that he was a grey. His coat was pale and milky, but it was too creamy to be called grey. Also he had the most haunting blue eyes. Issie knew exactly what he was. She had seen a horse like this once before at a gymkhana and Avery had told her it was a cremello. He had explained that cremellos were like albinos, with the same pink skin and white hair, but instead of pink eyes, the cremello’s were a startling sky-blue.
This cremello was big—probably sixteen hands high at a guess. Issie noted that he was built like a warmblood, with well-muscled shoulders and haunches that were tailor-made for jumping. As the horse stepped forward and put his head over the door, Issie stroked his nose and noticed he had the remnants of some sticky white goo on his muzzle.
Sunblock, she thought. The cremello probably wore it to protect him from sunburn when he was grazing outdoors.
“I think you’re my favourite so far,” Issie whispered to him. Then she moved on to the last box. Her heart was racing as she slid back the bolt and opened the stall.
The horse inside the last stall was brown. Just brown and nothing more. No white markings, stars or stripes—just plain brown with a mealy muzzle. Compared to the exotic cremello, the pretty dun and all the others, the bland, brown coat of this horse couldn’t have been more boring. And yet Issie instantly liked him. Experience had taught her to look beyond colour and sense the quality that lay beneath.
The gelding was a Thoroughbred, built for speed with a fine-boned, well-muscled body. He stood at around fifteen-three hands and had an elegant head, well-set on his neck and, Issie noted, the most thoughtful, intelligent eyes she had ever seen. You could tell so much from a horse’s eyes, and the eyes of this gelding made an immediate connection with Issie. There was something special about this horse.
“Hello, boy,” Issie murmured. “You’re lovely, aren’t you?” She reached out a hand to stroke the horse. “What’s your name, eh?” she cooed.
She was startled when a voice responded.
“You’re early.”
Issie spun around. There was a woman standing right behind her!
“Ohmygod!” Issie giggled. “You gave me a fright!”
The woman didn’t smile back. She stood there stiffly with her arms folded and her brow furrowed into a frown. Despite her gruff expression, Issie could see that she was quite beautiful with glossy, walnut-brown hair, delicate, tiny freckles over her cheekbones and bright green eyes.
“You must be one of Avery’s riders,” the woman said this as if it were a statement, not a question. “I thought you weren’t due at the stables until after breakfast.”
“I’m not…I mean, we aren’t…” Issie faltered. There was something about this woman that made her nervous. She was sure she had seen her somewhere before. “I’m here from Chevalier Point Pony Club. My name’s Issie…Isadora Brown.”
“So which one is it?” the woman asked coolly. “Issie or Isadora?”
“My friends call me Issie.”
The woman raised an eyebrow. “I see. Well then, I’ll call you Isadora.” She paused and then added, “My students at the Blainford Academy call me Voldemort. I don’t know why. Apparently, it’s got
something to do with Harry Potter…Anyway, they think it’s hilarious.” The woman looked at Issie with cold eyes. “Do you think it’s funny?”
“Ummm, yes…I mean…no…ummm, I don’t know,” Issie stammered nervously.
“It’s because I’m the toughest teacher at the college,” the woman said, clearly unperturbed by her gruesome reputation. “I expect that once you’ve been through one of my cross-country lessons you’ll agree with them. Although,” she continued, “I’d prefer it if you called me Tara.” She stuck out her hand for Issie to shake.
“Tara Kelly.”
Chapter 3
Issie had never really thought of Tara Kelly as a real person. In her mind Tara was like a superhero, impossibly fearless, dressed in her pale blue jersey and helmet, riding that cross-country course on her enormous grey horse as if her life depended on it—which it probably did, considering the size of the jumps at Lexington. Even though Avery had told the Chevalier Point riders that Tara would be instructing at Havenfields, to actually be standing here face to face with her in real life came as a shock.
“Is there something wrong?” Tara asked. This time when she spoke, Issie noticed that her cool voice had the burr of a soft American accent. She couldn’t believe it. She was really standing here, right next to Tara Kelly!
“I used to watch you riding on TV when I was little,” Issie told her.
“Well, that makes me feel positively ancient!” Tara said. Her face remained stiff and unsmiling. Issie couldn’t tell if she was joking or if she was really offended. Suddenly she felt all flustered, standing there saying the wrong thing to one of her idols.
“No! I mean you don’t look really old…” Issie groaned. Every time she opened her mouth it got worse.
Tara Kelly arched an eyebrow. “Thanks—you don’t look that old either. You must have been pretty young when you watched me on TV—I haven’t ridden competitively in a long time.”
“I was eight, I guess,” Issie said. “I’m fourteen now. I’ll be fifteen in a month or so.”
“And are all the riders in the New Zealand squad the same age as you?” Tara asked.
“My friends Kate and Stella are fourteen like me—Morgan is too, I think. Well, maybe she’s already fifteen. I don’t know about the others—they’re not from my pony club. But you have to be under seventeen, don’t you?”
Tara nodded and looked down the row of loose boxes, noting that the top doors of the stalls had been swung wide open.
“You’ve seen all the horses then?” she said to Issie. “Have you decided which one you’d like to ride?”
“Ummm…” Issie felt like she’d been put on the spot. “I think they’re all amazing.”
“But,” Tara said, looking at her intently, “you must have a favourite.”
“I guess so, well, kind of,” said Issie. “It’s hard though, before I see how they move and feel what it’s like to ride them.”
“If you had to choose one right now,” Tara Kelly persisted, “just by looking, which one would it be?”
Issie hesitated. “I like the cremello. He has strong hindquarters and muscle in all the right places. He looks like he’d be a good jumper…”
“You’re right.” Tara seemed impressed by this assessment. “The cremello’s name is Floyd, and yes, he’s a brilliant jumper. He’s already been intensively schooled by Andrew Hoy, the Australian rider who won a gold medal for eventing at the Olympics.”
Issie continued. “I like Floyd, but I like this brown horse too. He has a completely different body, much leaner and built for speed, which would make him good for cross-country. Plus, he’s got a really honest face and I like his eyes. I think you can tell a lot about a horse from his eyes.”
“His name is Victory,” Tara said. “Victory was schooled by Andrew as well, but as you say, he’s a completely different type to the cremello.”
“He’s a Thoroughbred?” Issie asked.
Tara nodded. “He raced on the track, but never won any decent prize money. When he was four and clearly wasn’t going to make them a fortune, his trainers decided to try him as a steeplechaser instead. They raced him over hurdles for two seasons without much success, before selling him on to the Hoy stables when he was five. He’s eight years old now. He’s been schooled to medium dressage and been over three-star cross-country courses. He’s what you’d call a ‘schoolmaster’—and a very good one too.”
Tara Kelly looked at Issie. “Two good horses. So, if it was up to you, which one would you choose?”
Until now Issie had been looking at all the horses in the stable with a clinical and rational eye. But at that moment, when Tara asked her to choose, she went purely on gut instinct.
“Victory,” she said softly. “I’d choose Victory.”
“Really?” Tara said. Issie felt like she had just sat a test—but she had no idea whether she had passed or failed.
“Well,” Tara continued briskly, “we’ll come back to the stables after breakfast with the others for a try-out. We’ll see if you still feel the same way once you’ve ridden him.”
“We’re trying out the horses this morning?” Issie couldn’t believe it.
“What did you think you’d be doing?” Tara Kelly shot back. “This isn’t a holiday camp, you know.” She still wasn’t smiling and Issie was beginning to think that the students at the Blainford All-Stars Academy were right. Tara Kelly, aka She Who Must Not Be Named, was going to be a tough taskmaster.
After her early-morning interrogation, all Issie wanted to do was go back to her room and hide under her duvet. She never got the chance, however, because when she opened the bedroom door, there was already a girl in her bed. Or at least on her bed, sitting there nonchalantly ferreting her way through the contents of Issie’s duffel bag.
“Oh, hi!” The girl dropped the bag like a hot potato and gave Issie a smile. “You must be Isadora. It’s so great to meet you! I’m Dee Dee. I’m going to be your roomie!”
“Er, Dee Dee? What are you doing?” Issie asked. “Were you looking through my bag?”
“Oh!” Dee Dee was taken aback. “Oh—no!” She shook her head vigorously. “I wasn’t looking. I was just packing it for you.” She smiled sweetly at Issie. “You see, I like to sleep next to an open window, but when I got here, I noticed that you’d taken the bed right next to the window and the other bed is all the way over by the wall, and so I thought to myself, Dee Dee, I’m sure your roomie won’t mind if you swap beds with her. And so then, since you weren’t here, I decided to move your stuff over for you, so that you’d be all settled into your new bed by the time you came back.”
Issie screwed up her face. “But, Dee Dee, I don’t want to swap beds. I like being by the window too.”
Dee Dee didn’t seem to know what to do with this new information. She had large, owlish features with cropped, curly black hair, enormous dark brown eyes and a beakish mouth. When she realised that Issie was going to be stubborn about swapping beds, the beakish mouth pushed out into a sulky pout.
“How about if we move both the beds?” Dee Dee suggested, refusing to give up. “We can shove them sideways and arrange them so that we both have our heads near the window…”
“Dee Dee, I don’t think we’re supposed to be moving the furniture around,” Issie countered. She sighed with resignation. “Listen, if it really matters to you that much, you can take the window bed. It’s no big deal.”
“Really?” Dee Dee squeaked. “Oh, you’re the best roomie! This is going to be so neato, sharing a room for two whole weeks!”
Elated, Dee Dee went back to her task, gleefully throwing Issie’s clothes into her duffel bag.
“It’s OK, Dee Dee,” said Issie, moving forward hastily. “That’s my stuff. I’ll do it…” But it was too late.
“Oops!” Dee Dee squeaked. “I think I just put your nail polish in there without a lid on!”
“Ohmygod!” Issie scrabbled through her bag and retrieved the polish. Sure enough, Dee Dee had l
eft the bottle open and it had promptly spilt all over Issie’s favourite grey marl T-shirt.
“Dee Dee!”
“My bad!” Dee Dee said with a giggle.
“How did the lid get off my nail polish anyway?” Issie asked, holding up the bottle of dark purple polish so she could see how much was left. Then she looked across at Dee Dee and realised she had the same shade on her fingernails.
“You’re wearing my nail polish?!”
“I thought you wouldn’t mind,” Dee Dee shrugged. “Since we’re roomies and all…”
Issie was so stunned she didn’t know what to say. Barely able to control her anger, she put down the bottle of polish on the dressing table, grabbed her bag and began stuffing in the contents that Dee Dee had been rummaging through a moment earlier.
“Here! Let me help!” Dee Dee lunged forward over the dressing table and somehow managed to bump a leftover cup of tea so that it splashed all over Issie’s bag.
“Dee Dee!” There was tea in Issie’s bag now, as well as nail polish!
“I’ll clean it up!” said Dee Dee brightly.
“Don’t!” Issie snapped. “It’s fine! I’ll do it later.” She flung the bag on to her new bed, out of the reach of Dee Dee, the walking disaster.
“Whatever you say, roomie.” Dee Dee put her suitcase down on Issie’s old bed and gave her a grin. “Ready for breakfast?”
The others were already at the table when Issie and Dee Dee arrived. Tara Kelly was with them.
“Good morning,” Avery said. “Issie, I see you’ve met Dee Dee—and Tara tells me that the two of you have already met as well. I was just doing introductions and explaining the training itinerary. Why don’t you girls sit down and we can get started?”
