Third chapter of my story. I have found a new pen name, and it is....Charlotte Bronte. Please let me know if it is already taken, and if it is, I will change it.
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Ryan disapproved of the stranger, but against his own consceinece, he hired him. No one had been able to get close to that beast of a stallion since Charlie had stopped riding. And he hadn't seen a person like that since Charlie...and since his wife.
"Uncle Ryan?" Savannah's voice broke throush his thoughts like sunlight slanting through rain. "What?" he asked gruffly. "Can I go down and exercise Dream?" "Yes. Wear a helmet," he said. Strawberry Cream Dream was a little pony that Savannah loved. He was a red roan with a white blaze, and he had eyes the colour of coal. It would have terrified Ryan to see her on one of the bigger, more fiery tempered Throughbreds or Mustangs, but on the short, somewhat fat, Dream he didn't have to worry.
Charlie had disappeared back into the house, but Ryan curtly suggested that Cieran come with him and Savannah down to the stables. Cieran accepted with a curt nod, and the two of them walked up towards the barn behind the bumbling Savannah. The day was already beginning to become hot, and the grass crunched brown and dry under their feet.
The barn was warm and smelled of the sweetness of hay and leather and the ever-definable musk of horses. The sound of pigeons taking shelter in the rafters, the hiss of hay being pulled from a haynet, the wuffle of horses as they greeted the new-comer and the old man. Savannah already had Dream cross-tied in the aisle, his heavy Western saddle and bridle hung on the saddle hook. She circled the curry comb over his reddish coat, then swiped away the dust with a dandy brush.
Ryan walked slowly down the aisle, showing Cieran each horse and identifying them by name. The black in the first stall was Blue, the bright bay mare across from him was the pretty but tempermental Sheila. There was the huge brown gelding that Ryan had claimed for his own, with hooves the size of dinner plates and a name that suited him: Gentle Giant, also known as Gent. And of course Pilgrim, the pretty little quarter horse that had belonged to his wife.
Cieran looked at each horse gently and quietly, without a single word. He scratched the horses gently and fondly, as if he had known them all his life. Ryan noticed how he acted almost like a horse himself, making rumbling noises in his throat and blowing into their nostrils in greeting. Ryan knew this greeting and used it himself; an old Navajo Indian trick used to a greet a horse in a friendly way. Horses greet each other by blowing, and it's the gentlest way to do so.
Savannah had tacked up Dream and was trotting him in figure eights out in the paddock by the time Cieran and Ryan had finished looking over each of the horses. The stallion still had not returned; Ryan couldn't see the house, but he guessed that this was where the stallion was, standing centinal at the door. If only Charlie still admonished the stallion, then it would be easier to get him back up to the stable.
Meanwhile, Charlie sat at the kitchen table eating a slice of toast and drinking another glass of juice. She was alone in the house now; every noise reached her ears like a shout and it was beginning to make her feel a little creepy. She wished she could find solace in knowing that, indeed, the stallion still was outside, but she could not.
She shut her eyes and tipped her chair back, resting her heels on the ground. An image flashed into her mind, of the stallion's face framed with blue sky and the crackling sound of fire in the background- and then a scream. Charlie jerked upright. Pain shot through her leg and she clutched her knee, gritting her teeth. The scream had been from her dream- that dream that she had held deep inside herself for so long.
Feeling mad, she dumped the rest of her toast and juice into the sink and stalked back upstairs, into her room and shut the door. She sat down on the bed feeling sorry for herself, then she heard something that made her retreat across the hall and into the far bedroom. She parted the curtains for the third time that morning and what she saw terrified her beyond belief.
Her father was seated high upon Gent, riding next to Cieran, who was on Blue. What struck her was that Cieran was an excellent rider; an arrow straight back, dropped heels, toes pointed outwards and one hand clasping the reins gently but firmly. Ryan also was a good rider, but she hadn't seen someone rider like Cieran in years.
Blue pranced in place around the stallion, who still grazed unheeded in the front yard. Old Gent was completely unperterbed, and dropped his head as he walked by, chewing his western bit slowly and walking right by. But the younger, spunkier Blue, gave a little buck in the stallion's direction, and was reward with a sharp nip from the stallion. Blue shot forward at a canter, but Cieran immedietly dropped his hands and tugged on the reins, bringing Blue in a tight circle down to a walk.
Irked, the stallion switched his tail uneasily and continued to graze. Blue was a spunky little colt, a fine little two year old Ryan had bought as a yearling, but the stallion, though young and barely topping six years, felt himself older, wiser then the still-spindely foal. He dropped his head and continued to graze, looking as regal and full of himself as a king on his throne.
Charlie watched and almost laughed, catching herself before the first giggle could escape her well-guarded heart. Then she let the curtains fall, and retreated back to her own room.
