And The Children Shall Lead

by Michael J. Bowler

  †††

  The following day dawned clear and sunny, but cool––a typical December day in Southern California. The boys all had breakfast in the dining room before returning to their rooms to dress in their Indian clothes. Arthur placed a call to the Equestrian Center and talked with the director explaining that he was sending a delegation to take out Llamrei and some other horses for a ride, but to keep them away from the general public as much as possible. Llamrei, he knew, had become something of a recognizable celebrity in her own right. The director agreed immediately.

  After donning their Indian regalia, and with Chris “In disguise,” as he kept saying, with an extra large beanie covering his hair, the boys all descended the stairs to meet Ryan and Gibson in the Throne Room. Jenny gasped with surprise upon seeing her sons.

  “Wow,” she said, and Arthur smiled at her reaction. She immediately put the boys together for some photos, using a new Canon DSLR she’d been given as a wedding gift. Then she put all five boys into a shot with Arthur, and lastly asked Gibson to take a family portrait.

  Lance rolled his eyes. “C’mon, mom, we’re not goin’ to the prom or something.”

  Jenny grinned. “I don’t care. I want a family shot with my boys. Oh, and James, you, too.”

  Ryan looked startled. “Me?”

  Lance laughed. “Of course, nino. You’re my godfather, aren’t you?”

  Sheepishly, Ryan joined them, standing beside Arthur. The three boys stood in front of the adults and Gibson snapped off a few shots.

  Then it was into Ryan’s sedan for Lance, Ricky, and Chris while Gibson took Dakota and Kai in his beamer.

  †††

  The Los Angeles Equestrian Center wasn’t far from New Camelot, technically in the city of Burbank, right at the northern tip of Griffith Park. At seventy-five acres, it was the largest such venue in Southern California and boasted trail riding, cricket fields, training rings, the Equidome Show Ring for Olympic-style events, and acres of barns and stables, grass and dirt, and lots of large shade trees, all surrounded by two-tiered white fencing.

  Lance and Ricky had never been there. It had always been Arthur or his rotating knights that visited Llamrei, or the horse had been driven to New Camelot. Lance was impressed by the sheer immensity of the center as Ryan pulled in through the gigantic, barn-shaped entry and into the parking lot. Gibson’s beamer slid into an empty spot beside them and everyone piled out.

  He could see by their faces that Dakota and Kai had never seen anything like this, either. As he looked around, Lance spotted several sleek, beautiful horses being put through their paces by trainers. He glanced back at the others, all in their fancy Indian regalia, and grinned. Dakota’s hair hung loose down his back as always, restrained by a colorful headpiece, while Kai wore his hair in his usual braids with a traditional headband as adornment. With all four sporting bows and quivers of arrows slung across their backs, they’d absolutely call attention to themselves, but not as Knights of the Round Table.

  As had been pre-arranged by Arthur, one of the directors of the center met them in the parking lot. He eyed the boys and their attire with curiosity, but didn’t ask questions. Arthur had explained that they were Native American knights who were also expert horsemen and the director simply led the group past numerous horse stalls in search of Llamrei. The Indian boys could not take their eyes off every horse they passed, and Lance could tell they wanted to stop and interact with each one in turn.

  Finally, they saw a white head sticking out of a stall window, long flowing mane flicking lightly from side to side as Llamrei shook her head at some annoyance or other. Lance broke into a huge grin.

  “Llamrei!” he called out, and pelted toward the mare. Upon hearing her name, she turned her massive head and whinnied. Lance stopped just in front of her and grinned. He hadn’t seen her in such a long while and didn’t want to spook her.

  “I’m sorry, girl, for not visiting,” he apologized quietly as the others joined him. “Can you forgive me?”

  Llamrei neighed and stuck her head out further, rubbing her muzzle against the boy’s cheek and causing Lance to laugh with delight.

  “I guess that’s a yes,” Ricky said with a grin, reaching out to stroke the silky mane before him.

  Kai let out a soft breath of amazement. “She’s beautiful.”

  Dakota stepped forward and held out his hand to the mare. Llamrei sniffed it and then immediately began rubbing her snout into his palm.

  Lance was impressed. “Wow. She likes you.”

  Dakota grunted, but said nothing more. He placed his hand on her neck and stroked it, softly and with reverence. Llamrei loved it. She turned her head to eye the boy, and Dakota eyed her right back. No words were spoken, but Lance could instantly see a connection.

  “I wish to ride her,” Dakota said, his deep voice soft and respectful.

  “That’s why we’re here,” Lance said, petting Llamrei, as well.

  The director had the stable hands saddle Llamrei and another horse for Kai. Lance and Ricky wanted to see what the boys could do, and after they’d demonstrated their aptitude as horsemen, then other mounts would be brought around for Lance, Ricky and Chris to take a trail ride through Griffith Park.

  Ryan and Gibson stood on high alert, suspiciously observing anyone who even looked in their direction. As it was morning on a weekday, there weren’t many visitors. Dakota eased up onto Llamrei’s back as though he belonged there, and Lance could tell the mare was smitten. Ricky had been right––Dakota was some kind of horse whisperer. He deftly directed the mare out of the stable area with barely a command and cantered her out to the nearest training circle. She instinctively knew what he wanted. Lance was deeply impressed.

  Kai was almost as proficient with his own mare named Lady, a brown American quarter horse with a short tail and mane compared to Llamrei, four white socks and a white snout. As with Dakota, the horse instantly slipped into the boy’s rhythm and they became a single entity as he trotted her around the open area alongside Dakota.

  Lance and Ricky watched Kai and Dakota direct their horses into one of the training circles and execute easy, fluid moves with their mounts.

  “Yep,” Ricky muttered, “that’s horse whispering all right.”

  He tousled Chris’s hair and Lance chuckled as they observed the boys put their horses through a series of trots, gallops, and reverses.

  After several minutes, Kai and Dakota happily cantered over to where Lance and Ricky stood with the others. The director began telling them what impressive riders they were when he was suddenly flung backwards with a strangled “Oomph!” and fell sprawling to the ground, dazed.

  Everyone spun quickly to see several golf-cart type vehicles plowing up the road toward them, each carrying two men, one man in each cart with his arm outstretched aiming a long-barreled handgun straight at them. Everything seemed to happen at once. Ryan grabbed Chris and they dropped to the ground as Gibson pulled his gun.

  “Lance!” Dakota called out. Lance spun to see the Indian with his hand outstretched, and instantly understood.

  “Ricky, with Kai,” he shouted as he stretched out his hand and clasped Dakota’s. The Indian pulled as Lance leapt and suddenly he was up and into the saddle behind the other.

  “Lance!” he heard Ricky yell even as Kai trotted up to him, hand outstretched.

  “Do it, Ricky!” Lance yelled and suddenly Ricky’s hand was in Kai’s and he was up and into the saddle behind the other boy.

  Terrified, never having been on a horse before, Ricky clung tightly to Kai. He glanced at Lance, whose own arms encircled Dakota’s waist, and then the two Indians dug in their heels and the horses bolted.

  Ricky almost lost his balance, but managed to hang on, noting in his peripheral vision that Lance was having an easier time.

  Behind him, Lance heard Gibson fire his gun and then they were away from the practice circle and galloping headlong down the road toward an open gate. Lance felt something whiz pa
st his head and knew they were being shot at. He glanced over at Ricky, clinging desperately to Kai as the quarter horse paced Llamrei, and then turned to look over his shoulder.

  The three golf carts were chasing them now, leaving Ryan and Gibson scrambling in the distance for some way to pursue. Lance saw Gibson raise his phone as Ryan yanked Chris to his feet and began running sidelong toward some other golf carts parked by the fence.

  Their pursuers were gaining, but he couldn’t get a clear shot facing forward. Another bullet whizzed past him as Dakota rode Llamrei in a zigzagging pattern.

  “Dakota!” he called out against the wind, flinging the dangling feathers away from his eyes. “I’m gonna flip around so I can shoot. When I do, throw the reins over me and tug tight so I don’t fall.”

  “You got it!” he heard, but Dakota’s eyes remained forward. By now they were out of the Equestrian Center and galloping onto the light traffic of Riverside Drive, dodging and weaving in between cars and creating a spectacle for so early on a weekday.

  “Head into the park!” Kai called out as the roadway took them over the L.A. River, and Dakota yelled, “Right!”

  Ricky watched in horror as Lance looked over at him. Bouncing up and down was already giving him a headache, but hearing what Lance intended to do scared the crap out of him.

  Lance slipped his right leg up and behind Dakota’s back carefully, his arms remaining around the other boy’s torso. He let out a sigh of relief when he was over and sitting sidesaddle behind the Indian youth. Then, with a desperate grin at Ricky, Lance flung his left leg up and over Llamrei’s rear, reaching behind desperately for Dakota’s body to hold on to. He overshot the move slightly, and began to slip.

  “Lance!” Ricky screamed in horror, but Dakota’s right hand let go the reins and flung back to grab Lance’s arm, righting him on the horse.

  “Thanks, man!” Lance called out, his heart pumping with momentary terror. “Now toss me the reins!”

  Dakota flung the long circular rein over his and Lance’s head. Lance caught it and tugged, signaling Dakota to pull taut, which he did. Lance felt the tightness of the reins against his midsection, and knew he wouldn’t fall. Now he could fight back.

  The carts were gaining on them, but being electric vehicles and not street-legal, he figured they couldn’t make more than fifteen or twenty miles per hour. Lance slung his bow off his back and reached behind for an arrow, nocking it with ease. The up and down motion of the horse forced him to aim more carefully, but his eye was excellent. He let the arrow fly and it struck the left front tire of the first cart, piercing it and sending the cart veering off to the side of the road. Cars screeched around it as it careened into the embankment.

  Lance looked over at Ricky, who gazed at him aghast, his own hair and headpiece flapping wildly in the wind, and flashed a thumbs-up. Ricky grinned and slipped off his bow, snatching an arrow and doing his best to load it while not toppling off the bouncing, zigzagging horse. Kai dodged in between cars, just as Dakota did, and suddenly the 101 freeway loomed overhead. Horses and riders flew beneath it and they were into the park, veering sharply left onto Forest Lawn Drive.

  Lance was dismayed to see that the other two carts managed to avoid being crushed by the cars and had plowed into the park after them. Suddenly, another cart flew at them from the side. Lance caught sight of it in his peripheral vision, but couldn’t take a clean shot. “Ricky,” he shouted. “To your left!”

  Ricky’s head spun quickly and he saw two men in the cart, heading straight for him on a sideways collision course. One man raised his arm and the gun gleamed vilely in the morning sun. Without even thinking, Ricky swung his arms up and over Kai’s bent head and took aim at the man, letting loose his arrow without hesitation. The arrow struck the man in his upper arm, causing him to cry out and drop the gun, which clattered and skipped along the pavement of the roadway.

  “Yes!” Ricky called out, using one hand to desperately grab Kai’s arm for stability. By then Lady was past that fork in the road and galloping neck and neck with Llamrei as they headed deeper into the park.

  Lance grinned over at him. “Nice shooting.”

  Ricky grimaced, hoping the bouncing wouldn’t make him seasick.

  Then Lance raised his bow again, strung another arrow and let it fly. It struck the man in the cart directly behind him full in the chest. The man flinched, but the arrow just bounced off. Lance’s breath caught in his throat. What the hell…

  He nocked another arrow and fired at the other man, the one raising the gun. The arrow struck, again straight to the chest, but the man barely flinched before raising his gun arm again.

  Another arrow flew past Lance and struck the man’s hand, drawing spouts of blood and sending the gun flying back into the road.

  Lance looked across at Ricky, who’d turned awkwardly to fire, and grinned. “Thanks, fool.” And then he understood. “Ricky, they’re wearing bulletproof vests or something. Aim for the arms or the head!”

  Ricky smirked, despite his fear. “I think I already figured that out, fool!”

  “Hang on, Lance!” Dakota called back, his body-length hair blowing back and practically blinding Lance as he turned his head. “I’m taking her off the road and it’s rocky.”

  “You, too, Ricky,” Kai anxiously called out. “Hang on!”

  And then both horses were off the paved road and galloping frenetically across the empty grass toward the hilly, rockier terrain dead ahead.

  Lance watched as the carts veered off-road in pursuit, but began quickly losing ground as the land became more uneven. He saw one man raise a walkie-talkie to his mouth and somehow knew that couldn’t be good.

  Trails wound in and among the hills and dipping little valleys, but the Indians felt on safer ground by avoiding these. They were correct, too, because the carts had to veer onto these paths and come at them from obtuse angles, which made shooting a trickier prospect.

  That was when Lance and Ricky both heard it. A loud whup whup whup in the air above them. Facing backwards, Lance saw it first. A helicopter, easily as large as any police chopper he’d ever seen, rising up over the trees and bearing down on them. It sported a nasty-looking machine gun-type weapon attached to one side, but Lance could make out nothing of the pilot.

  “Dakota, faster!” he shouted, brushing his and the other boy’s hair from his face and nocking another arrow. “Hang on, Ricky!” he called out as the copter veered down and swung around after them. He took aim and fired. The arrow struck the shield protecting the pilot, but merely bounced off and drifted harmlessly to the ground.

  “Oh, shit,” Lance mumbled as the machine gun took aim and began firing. Dirt kicked up from the ground behind them as the bullets struck, but Dakota and Kai executed a sideways maneuver that took them down into a slight gulley before sending them up in another direction. The chopper changed course to follow.

  Suddenly they were out of the rough terrain and galloping across a huge expanse of green grass with trees on either side. Lance heard Llamrei’s frantic panting and saw the frothing of Lady alongside. They had to find shelter quickly or they’d all be dead.

  The helicopter picked up speed even as Dakota flung the reins side to side in an effort to keep Llamrei weaving back and forth and make her a more difficult target. Kai attempted the same with Lady, but she was smaller than Llamrei and appeared to be tiring. Kai and Ricky fell behind and to his horror Lance saw the helicopter targeting them. The gun resumed firing. The grass kicked up divots in a line heading straight for Ricky.

  “Ricky, look out!” Lance shouted at the top of his lungs, his heart in his throat.

  The other boy turned to look just as a bullet struck Lady in the flank and she reared, neighing wildly in pain. Caught by surprise. Ricky toppled off her back even as Kai struggled to control the frantic mare.

  “Ricky!” Lance screamed as the boy landed hard on the ground and rolled a few times before lying motionless. Without hesitation, Lance tossed the reins up an
d over his head and leapt from Llamrei’s back, landing hard on his feet and crumpling to the grass.

  The whup whup whup was coming back. Lance scrambled to his feet even as the helicopter circled for another run at Ricky. Lance didn’t hesitate. He bolted forward, bow still in hand even as Ricky began to stir on the grass twenty-five feet away.

  “Ricky!” he called out in terror, and his heart nearly skipped a beat when Ricky pushed himself to a sitting position and looked at him with confusion. Then he grinned sheepishly. “I just fell, fool.”

  Then Lance was there, his arms around this most precious person in the world. “Oh, thank God, I thought you got shot!”

  The helicopter noise got louder. Both boys looked up in horror. It was nearly upon them. Lance scrambled to his feet and dragged Ricky up. “You go for that propeller thing in the back,” he ordered, “and I’ll take out the gun.”

  Ricky shook his head to clear it, snatched up his fallen bow and arrows and nocked one, even as Lance did the same. Both boys took careful aim––Ricky at the rotor in the rear of the chopper and Lance at the gun barrel itself.

  “Now!” Lance ordered, and both arrows flew. Lance’s slipped right into the barrel of the gun as it began firing, and the entire unit exploded in a shower of sparks and flying shrapnel. Ricky’s arrow connected with the rear rotor and they heard a screeching of metal, as though the chopper cried out in pain.

  “We got it!” Ricky shouted gleefully and moved to high-five Lance. But Lance’s mouth hung open.

  “Oh, shit!”

  Ricky looked and saw the damaged copter spinning out of the sky––right toward them!

  “Run!” Lance screamed, and they both turned to sprint as fast as they could along the grass.

  “Where the hell’re Kai and Dakota?” Ricky called out breathlessly since neither horse was in sight.

  Lance was wondering the same thing when he heard the pounding of hooves against ground. He glanced over his shoulder. The Indians were charging their horses side-by-side right in their direction, the falling helicopter spinning out of the sky straight at them.