Comet and the Champion's Cup (10 page)

Issie had a brief moment as she turned Comet to begin her warm-up circle when she felt her nerve falter.
What if Comet didn't jump? If the pony suddenly stopped or swerved she might lose her balance and fall. She shook her head, as if trying to shake the bad thoughts out of her brain. She remembered what Avery had told her about staying positive and tried to imagine herself soaring cleanly over each fence.

“Steady, Comet,” she said firmly. The skewbald was tense with anticipation. Issie tried to ride him into a steady canter as she approached the first fence. There was a moment, a couple of strides out from the jump, when it looked like Comet was going to refuse, but he simply put in an extra stride to get deeper into the fence and leapt it cleanly. He took the hog's back too with ease and put in a perfect stride between fence one and two of the double combination.

As they turned to face the hay bales Issie felt herself stiffen in the saddle and the butterflies returned. She looked down at Comet who was pulling like mad against her hands, filled with his own pure love of jumping, and she sat back in the saddle and let him go. Comet put in two huge canter strides, gathered himself up and absolutely flew over the hay bales, giving a high-spirited victory buck as he cantered away on the other side.

“Oh, well done, Comet!” Issie had a grin on her face
a mile wide as she pulled the skewbald to a stop and let go of the reins to give him a pat on both sides of his neck. “Good pony!” The sound of applause from the side of the arena made her look up.

“Excellent round!”

“Tom!” Issie was surprised to see her instructor standing there, clapping vigorously.

“That's quite the horse you've got there,” Avery called out to her. “What's he called?”

“Comet,” Issie said. “His name is Comet.”

Avery ducked down, slipped between the rails of the fence and strode across the arena towards Issie and Comet. He ran his eyes over the horse, his face serious, clearly deep in thought. “Nice solid bone, strong hindquarters,” Avery murmured as he assessed him, “and a scopey jump too. I haven't seen a pony jump like that in a very long time…” He looked up at Issie. “Well, it looks like I got here just in time.”

“In time for what?”

“To start your training.” Avery patted the skewbald's neck. “Issie, Comet is a superstar in the making. We'd better get cracking.” He paused. “That is, if we're going to enter him in the Grand Prix at the Horse of the Year Show.”

Issie was stunned. Did Avery really think that Comet was good enough to jump at the Horse of the Year? Surely her instructor was joking?

“I'm completely serious,” Avery insisted. “This pony is a natural athlete. I was watching him over those jumps and he's got a terrific bascule.”

“What's a bascule?”

“A good jumper will stretch his neck out and tuck up his front feet over a fence so that he almost looks like a dolphin flying through the air,” Avery explained. “That's called a bascule. It's absolutely crucial in a showjumper. Comet has it. With a little training to perfect his technique, that natural ability could be enough to earn him a clear round in the pony Grand Prix at the Horse of the Year.”

Issie vaulted down off Comet's back and landed on the ground beside her pony. The cheeky skewbald was listening intently with his ears pricked forward, as if he knew that Issie and her instructor were talking about him.

“He can clear any fence on the farm,” Issie said as she told Avery about Comet's habit of jumping out of paddocks. “He's totally fearless!”

“Well,” said Avery, “let's see if we can harness his natural talents. We've got two weeks before the Horse of the Year qualifying rounds to get some solid schooling in. I think the best plan is for you and Comet to join in on my jumping lessons with the boys.” Avery saw Issie's uncertain expression. “Is there a problem?”

“It's just that I'm supposed to be working, Tom. I won't have time…”

“Don't worry,” Avery said. “You can fit it in. Hester needs the arena during the day for her riding school anyway so I've agreed with her to use it in the evenings. We'll switch on the floodlights and have jumping practice after dinner each night. That means you'll have time to teach the school during the day–although you'll be pretty exhausted by the end of the day, I should imagine.”

Issie grinned. “That sounds brilliant!”

“Where's my training squad got to anyway?” Avery looked over at the stables. “I asked those boys to put their horses away in the loose boxes ages ago. What is taking them so long?”

As he said this Dan and Ben emerged from the stables with halters in their hands. When Dan saw Issie his face lit up. He gave her a wave and began to run across the arena towards her. Then he caught sight of Aidan, who was still working Destiny around the showjumping course, and his expression suddenly turned dark.

Aidan had caught sight of Dan too and didn't look pleased to see him either. He took Destiny over one last fence and then pulled the stallion up and trotted back over to join the group.

“Aidan!' Avery said. “Good to see you again! You've got Destiny going very nicely.”

“Thanks, Tom,” said Aidan.

“You know Dan and Ben, don't you?” asked Avery.

“Yeah.” Aidan reached down from his horse to shake hands with Ben and then put his hand out to Dan. Dan hesitated for a moment and then reluctantly took his hand and shook it as the boys exchanged a gruff hello.

“I was just asking Issie if she wanted to take part in Horse of the Year training in the evenings now that we're
here,” Avery told Aidan. “Do you want to join us too? We'll give the horses a day to settle in and then our first training session will be on Monday.”

“Absolutely,” Aidan said. He stared directly at Dan. “If Issie is doing it then I'll definitely be there. I wouldn't miss it.”

On Sunday night, when the Blackthorn Riders had returned from their weekend at home, everyone sat around the dinner table and discussed Avery's training sessions.

“What about us? Can Kate and I do it too?” asked Stella. “I mean,” she added grumpily under her breath to Issie, “unless it's just you and Aidan, like a date.” Issie felt the sting in Stella's comment, but Avery didn't notice the tension between the two girls.

“Absolutely,” he agreed. “I'm sure Coco and Toby are both capable of jumping the heights we'll be doing at the training sessions if you girls both want to join in.”

The younger riders seemed very excited by the idea of proper showjumping training.

“What about us?” Arthur asked. “Can we all come and watch?”

“I don't see why not–if that's OK with you, Hester?” Avery said.

“I think it's a great idea,” Hester agreed. “We'll make sure we have an early dinner and then you can meet up at the arena. You'll learn a lot from watching other riders. I'm sure all of you will pick up some excellent technique tips.”

Kelly-Anne looked doubtful about this. “I don't want to watch,” she said. “I want to ride too.” There was silence and then a giggle from some of the other kids.

“What?” Kelly-Anne glared at them. “I've done loads of showjumping and it's easy. I could totally compete at Horse of the Year if I had Comet instead of stupid old Julian!”

“No, you couldn't!” Arthur said.

“I could so!” Kelly-Anne snapped back.

“Gee, Kelly-Anne,” George rolled his eyes. “You are such a fibber!”

“I am not!” Kelly-Anne's face was red with anger. “You don't know anything about horses anyway!” There were daggers in her eyes as she pushed her chair out from the kitchen table, stood up and stomped out of the room.

Kelly-Anne wasn't the only one who was in a dark mood at dinner. Stella was clearly in a huff with Issie. As for Aidan, he was barely speaking for some reason and kept glaring at Dan across the table.

“Did you notice that too? He's, like, so totally jealous!” Kate insisted when the girls were gathered in Issie's room later that evening.

“But why?” Issie said. “I've already told him that Dan isn't my boyfriend.”

“Maybe,” replied Kate, “but it's hard not to notice the way Dan keeps looking at you all the time. And did you see the evils Dan was giving Aidan? He's just as bad!”

“Well, I wish they'd both stop it,” Issie sighed. “They can't carry on like this for the next three weeks.”

It wasn't just the boys who had Issie worried though. How long could Stella carry on being in a bad mood? Ever since Issie had mentioned her date with Aidan, Stella had been acting really weird. Something was definitely bothering her. She had been really quiet lately. And Stella was never quiet!

Stella would talk to Issie if she needed to, like in the arena when they took the riding lessons. But she wasn't her normal perky, chatty self, and whenever Issie tried to talk to her about what was wrong, she just shrugged and
walked away. Issie didn't know what to do. It had seemed like such a good plan for Issie to come here and help Hester. But was she really helping? Right now everything Issie did just seemed to make matters worse.

“Right!” Avery said, eyeing up the riders who were standing in front of him. “I hope you're ready for a workout tonight. We need to get these ponies and horses really fit over the next fortnight–and the best way to do that is lots and lots of circles and flatwork to supple them and get them listening, and then gridwork with the cavaletti so that they develop muscle and rhythm.”

Ben looked crushed by the idea of flatwork and cavaletti for two weeks. “But aren't we going to do any big jumps?” he grumbled. “The horses will have to do big jumps in the competition, won't they? Isn't that what we should be practising then?”

Avery nodded. “Absolutely–we'll be doing a few big fences, but not too many. It's important not to overjump these horses. There's too much risk of an injury or making them sour on it. We're going to build up with some smaller courses before the qualifying rounds in a
fortnight, and after that we'll start to put the jumps up a notch and tackle some big courses.”

Ben didn't look convinced by this argument. You could see he was just itching to take Max around the course of painted rail fences that Avery had set up at the far end of the arena.

“Now, I see you all have your stirrups at jumping length already,” Avery smiled. “Very good. But tonight you needn't have bothered.”

“You mean we're not jumping at all now?” asked Ben, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice.

Avery shook his head. “No, Ben, you will be jumping–you're just not going to be using your stirrups. We're going to ride without them.” He walked over to Ben and quickly slipped both the leathers and irons off his saddle so that Ben had his legs dangling with no stirrups.

“Can you all strip your leathers off the saddle please and hand them over to me?” Avery told the rest of the ride.

“Ohmygod! This feels weird,” Stella said as she slipped her stirrups off the saddle and let her legs hang loose down at Coco's sides.

“How are we going to jump without any stirrups?” grumbled Ben.

“You don't need stirrups,” Avery insisted. “In fact, relying on your stirrups can teach you bad habits. Learning to jump without them is good for you. It will teach you not to get too far out of the saddle as you go over the fences and you'll be forced to balance and use your knees effectively.”

He turned to the riders. “Are we all ready? Let's start work then. Aidan? Can you lead the ride please. Get them working around the arena at a walk and then do a sitting trot in the corner of the arena and come through the cavaletti in your two-point position without stirrups.”

There were a few shrieks from Stella and a bit of giggling and bouncing about as the riders got used to trotting without stirrups. But then things got serious as they did the cavaletti course for the first time and they could all see what Avery meant. Without stirrups they were relying on their own body to hold their position and stay in the saddle, and after a few drills back and forth through the cavaletti all of them had a much better seat.

“Excellent,” said Avery. “Keep your eyes up, Stella! That's it! Good stuff!” He called all the riders back into the centre of the ring. “Now,” he told them with a straight face, “knot your reins please.”

Stella couldn't believe this. “You mean we're going to jump with no stirrups and no hands!”

Avery grinned. “Trust me, Stella. It's not as scary as it sounds.”

As the horses came bouncing back through the cavaletti at a trot, all the riders managed to stay in the saddle despite having no stirrups and knotted reins. Issie had to hold Comet back as they approached the cavaletti. The skewbald could still get a little fizzy and overexcited when he was taking fences, but as he settled in with the rest of the ride he began to calm down and soon he was trotting the poles like a dream.

“How is he feeling?” Avery asked her as Issie pulled Comet up when they were all getting their stirrups back.

“Really good!” There was a huge smile on Issie's face. “He's a bit hard to hold sometimes though.”

“He'll settle down,” said Avery. “He's just fresh, that's all.” He turned around to the other riders. “That'll do for tonight!” he called out to them. “Good lesson, everyone.”

“I can't believe it!” Ben muttered. “When are we going to do some really decent-sized fences?”

It seemed Avery was in no hurry to use the showjumps that were set up at the other end of the arena. For the rest
of the week he kept up the same routine, drilling his riders over the cavaletti so that, by the end of it, all of them were quite happy jumping without their stirrups or reins.

The following week, it looked like Ben was finally getting his wish. Avery began to set up a proper jumping course for them to ride. But if the riders had been expecting to jump huge fences, they were disappointed. Avery had built the course with the jumps set low, at a metre high. “We don't need big jumps,” he reasoned. “This week is all about learning arena craft. You must be able to ride a showjumping course with technical skill and take the best possible line at a fence. Then, no matter what height you are jumping, your horse will always be in perfect balance.”