"Hello Pepper, my lovely!" The large, fat horse walks over to me and shoves his muzzle into my chest, searching for food. "I must say you're looking very, er, well-fed!" I affectionately slip him the apple I brought for him, and put on his head collar. Then I slip the extra piece of rope which acts as a bit into his mouth to give me a little more control over him: Pepper goes where Pepper wants to go, when Pepper wants to go there.
I give a tug on his head collar, and when he refuses to budge, looking at me innocently, I tug harder, and then stop suddenly. Pepper walks forwards. It works every time.
We have our customary wrestle at the gate in which Pepper eats the hedge and stands on the end of my wellie, while I fail spectacularly to open the gate, and then once I've closed it on the other side, he takes off at a trot towards Poppy's water trough. I jet-ski through the patch of constant mud by the gate on the end of his rope, and then have to stand and wait while Pepper drinks. I'm not sure if he's doing it on purpose to be annoying, or whether he was just suddenly desperately thirsty, but after he's done, he comes the rest of the way willingly.
"I'm going to Spain later!" I inform him as we continue through Poppy's field and on into the 'Trailer Field'. "With Amanda. You know, my mentor. The one who's terrified of you!" Pepper snorts, and stops to rub his nose on his knee. "All the adults and Hollie are in a meeting. Hollie could have stayed with me and helped with the horses but she chose to sit in a stuffy room with no air conditioning and have a boring meeting instead. She's weird." Pepper steps on my foot again as I lead him through the gate onto the yard, and then makes a dive for the empty hay net on the fence. I tie him up there, and let him sniff it disappointedly.
It's a hot day, so I fetch him some water and accidently-deliberately spill some down my front to help me to cool down too. Then I get out my brushes and tackle his tangled mane, tail, and the feathers around his hooves.
The girl who's going to be riding him turns up ten minutes early and helps get his tack on, and then all the adults come out of the meeting in the portable cabin, including Mary, the riding instructor, who also happens to be treasurer of our chapter. The riding school, although a fully functioning riding school, also disguises the Chilterns South chapter of the society.
Mary and Jess take Pepper up to the arena, and I silently pity Jess. No one should have to ride Pepper on a boiling day like this.
"Hey, Alex!" Hollie turns up just late enough not to have to wrestle Pepper up to the school. She leans on the fence. "Why are you wet?"
I grin. "I accidently-on purpose spilt water down myself."
"How very skilfully-careless of you!" She laughs. I feel my black jodhpurs starting to burn in sun and I move into the shade, leaning against the door of a stable. Whoever invented jodhpurs must have done it in winter, with no consideration for people dealing with Pepper in summer. Either that or they lived at the North Pole. Hollie sits down on the bench beside me, scooping my collection of brushes to one side.
"Amanda wanted me to show you this." Hollie hands me a page of the Society's informal newspaper. "She'd show you herself, but she's discussing the finances of your trip with Richard and Faye." Richard is head, or "chair", of our chapter.
"Ok," I take the paper from her, and read.
Huge forest fires devastate massive expanses of the Northern Costa Brava, Spain. Suspected involvement of Kullervo's forces.
Huge expanses of Mediterranean Forestland have burnt so far this summer, with even more fires forecast. The blazes have been put down to the high temperatures and lack of rain, but local society chapters suspect a more sinister cause. Many of Kullervo's forces fled to the nearby Pyrenees Mountains, and although they have stayed relatively quiet, Elias Velasco, Society leader for Catalunia, suspects their involvement. We would like to appeal to all creatures and companions listed over-leaf, to, if possible be on hand to help if the situation develops. We would appreciate one companion and creature from each chapter. Continued on page 3.
Scribbled below in Marj's handwriting are the names of the people she wants to go.
Phoenix - Amanda and Alex, Storm-Bird – Faye
"Well," I say, handing it back to her, "that would explain my holiday then!"
"Yeah, it would!" she replies. "You are so lucky!"
"What, 'cause I get to go to Spain?"
"No, because you get to experience what a combat zone is like! I really need to have that experience if I'm ever to get a position of authority in the Society." She sighs rather wistfully. I'm pretty sure she's aspiring to be a trustee or something, the way she talks about gaining experience and insists on going to meetings.
"I'm sure there'll be other opportunities," I say.
"Yeah, I guess." Then she stands up. "Look, there's the others! You ready to go?"
"Yeah!" We hi-five, because this is exciting, despite the fact Hollie isn't going.
We join Richard, Amanda and Faye – a Storm-bird companion – and head up to the small gravelly car park. Faye moves her ample amount of luggage into Amanda's car, and Hollie and I lean on the arena gate, cheering on Jess and she perseveres in asking Pepper to trot.
As she finally wins the battle, Amanda calls that it's time to set off, and I hug Hollie excitedly goodbye, and wave to her as she runs all the way along the driveway beside us to open the gate at the bottom. I wave out of the back window as we pull out onto the main road, and then suddenly start to feel very nervous as Hollie and my riding school disappear out of sight around a bend.
I decided to re-edit this to make it shorter and a bit more relevant! And I can now also say that all the other chapters have also been edited, and I might even re-edit them too if I can.
Also, my friend ImpossibleHazelnut and I have decided on one story which we aim to finish before our exams at Easter next year (2015). I chose this one. So I should actually be uploading fairly regularly! Yay!
And please review! ;D
Sandy