Comet and the Champion's Cup (11 page)

Comet was a talented jumper, but he wasn't the easiest horse to control. He was inclined to get a little hot and excited when he jumped. “You need to use your seat to control him,” Avery told Issie as she took him around the course. “Sit back in the saddle if you want him to slow down. Don't fight him with the reins or he'll just get stroppy with you. Work with him; focus on being a partnership.”

Issie worked hard, concentrating on what Avery told her to do, and by the end of the second week she felt like
her bond with Comet had strengthened even more.

On Saturday, after the riding school had gone home for the weekend, Avery's riders gathered in the living room of the manor for a squad training meeting.

“The qualifying competition is being held tomorrow,” Avery said. “We'll be trucking the horses into the local Gisborne pony-club grounds at 6 a.m. so everyone needs to set their alarm clocks for 5.30 a.m.” There was a groan from the riders.

“Meanwhile,” Avery continued, “I thought we'd better get the paperwork sorted.” He picked up a stack of papers and handed them to Aidan. “You all need to fill in one of these. Can you pass them around please, Aidan?”

“What is it?” Issie asked.

“Your entry form for the Horse of the Year,” said Avery.

Issie looked at the entry forms in front of her. Her eyes scanned the long list of competitions and categories.

“I'm thinking of entering Destiny in the Horse of the Year novice category,” Aidan said.

Dan, who was also riding hacks now and could no longer enter the pony ring, glared at Aidan. “That's the event that I'm entering on Madonna.”

“Then I guess I'll be riding against you,” said Aidan gruffly.

“Suits me,” Dan bristled.

“What's this one here?” Stella tried to pronounce the word, “The pussy-ance?”

“It's pronounced pwee-sonce,” Avery said. “The word ‘puissance' is French–it means powerful. It's a high jumping competition basically. The riders jump a brick wall, which gets higher and higher with each round. There are five rounds and it's a knockout competition. If you don't get over the wall, you're out. The idea is to keep jumping until everyone is eliminated. Whoever gets over the highest wall in the last round will be the winner.”

“How big can the wall get?” Ben asked.

“The highest a horse has ever jumped in a Puissance competition is two and a half metres.”

“Ohmygod!” Stella was amazed. “That's huge!”

Avery stood up and stretched out his arm as far as it would go above his head. “It's about another half a metre taller than my hand,” he said.

“I think I saw a Puissance on telly once,” Stella said. “The wall was so big you couldn't see the horse at all–all you could see was his ears sticking over the top before he jumped it!”

“How can they jump if they can't even see over it?” Ben boggled.

“The Puissance is all about courage,” said Avery. “Once the fence gets to that kind of height, your horse must be truly brave and have faith in his rider because he won't be able to see what's on the other side.”

Issie looked back at the entry form and finally found the event she was planning to enter. “This can't be right!” she said. “It says here that the pony Grand Prix has prize money of $15,000! Is that a misprint?”

Avery shook his head. “No. There are over half a million dollars in prizes at this year's Horse of the Year. This is the richest show in the hemisphere. There'll be riders from all around the world competing.”

Issie felt her tummy churning with nerves. “Maybe we should enter something else?”

Avery shook his head. “If you qualify, I definitely think it's worth a shot to take on the pony Grand Prix. The jumps are big, but Comet has the ability to do it.”

Issie felt her heart racing. “Really? Tom, do you think so?” She looked back at the entry form: $15,000 in prize money! If she won she'd make enough money to help Aunt Hester save Blackthorn Farm!

For a moment, Issie felt so elated at the thought that
she could barely breathe. And then her eyes went to the entry details at the bottom of the form and she felt as if someone had punched her hard in the stomach and knocked the wind clean out of her. There at the bottom of the form was a list of fees. The numbers were quite clearly printed in large black type. Entry fee: $500 per rider, per event.

Five hundred? That was crazy! She didn't have five hundred dollars and she had no way of getting that much money. Her plan was over before she even had a chance–probably her last chance to help her aunt save Blackthorn Farm.

How was Issie going to come up with $500? “There's no point in worrying about that yet,” Kate pointed out to her. “We've got to make it through the qualifying rounds before they'll even let us enter Horse of the Year.”

The event on Sunday was the last of the district jump-offs. With the finals happening the following weekend, this was the one and only chance for Avery's riders to qualify. The riders were all feeling the pressure as Avery pulled the truck up at the Gisborne Pony Club grounds that morning.

“Only the top ten riders in every event will gain enough points to make it through to the Horse of the Year,” Avery told the girls, who were riding in the front with him. “If you don't make it through today's
competition then you're out. End of story.”

“So there's no pressure then?” Stella said sarcastically. She was busily studying the schedule for the day's events, although Issie suspected that she was mostly reading the schedule as a way of avoiding talking to her. Her long silences during the trip to the club grounds had made it pretty clear that she was still barely speaking to Issie.

“You're lucky!” Kate told Issie when they got out of the truck and began unloading the horses. “It was much worse being in the back with the boys. Dan and Aidan just keep getting at each other all the time! Honestly,” she shook her head, “I don't understand boys!”

Things only got worse once the riders saddled up. The running order for the competition was divided into hacks–that's horses fourteen-three hands high and over–and ponies, which are fourteen-two and under. Dan and Aidan were both riding hacks, and that meant that they were riding first.

Both boys were taking the contest really seriously. Their rivalry had been obvious all week at training, but it finally came to a head when they were warming up in the practice arena. There was one jump, a blue and white crossed rail, set up for the riders to practise over before it was their turn in the ring.

The competition was getting hot and Dan was due to ride next. He'd been waiting for his turn and circling Madonna in the practice arena. At the last minute he decided to try one last practice jump and lined up the chestnut mare to take the crossed rails. He didn't seem to notice that Aidan was already riding towards the same jump from the other direction.

“Hey! Get out of my way!” Aidan shouted as he saw Dan riding straight at him. Dan had to put in a last-minute change of direction, yanking at Madonna's head to swerve to get out of Aidan's path.

“Hey, watch it!” he shouted angrily back at Aidan.

“What?” Aidan said. “You're kidding? That was totally your fault! You knew I was going to take the jump. You should have stayed out of my way.”

“Well, maybe I'm sick of staying out of your way,” Dan shot back at him. He pulled Madonna up to a halt. “I've got to ride now. We'll finish this later,” he said coolly.

“Count on it,” Aidan replied.

Issie, who was back at the horse truck getting Comet ready, had no idea about any of this. She didn't see the
fight at the practice jump and she didn't see Dan and Aidan ride their event. In fact, she would never have found out about what happened next if it hadn't been for Comet's saddle blanket. She had been saddling the skewbald up when she realised she had left her usual blanket behind at the farm.

“Don't worry,” Avery had said. “I've got a couple of spare numnahs that should be perfect. They're in the crawlspace above the kitchen.”

Horse trucks always have a crawlspace in them–a platform that is built at the top above the living area. Often, when riders go away on long trips in their trucks to compete, they will sleep on a mattress in the crawlspace. Avery had been planning to sleep there himself on this trip, but since they'd had a change of plans and he was now staying at the manor, he'd shoved all sorts of things into the empty space–including spare saddle blankets.

Issie had climbed up the ladder to the crawlspace and was lying on her belly, feeling around in the half-light for the saddle blankets, when she heard the stomp of footsteps in the living space underneath her. She could hear two voices quite clearly and she recognised them immediately. It was Dan and Aidan, and if they sounded mad with each other before, now they were furious.

“You could have lost me the competition today with that stunt over the practice fence,” Dan fumed.

“Me?” Aidan was flabbergasted. “Dude! You cut me off. And you did it on purpose!”

Dan snorted. “That's ridiculous. Why would I do that?”

“You know why,” Aidan said. “Because Issie chose me and you can't stand it.”

Dan glowered at him. “You're dreaming, man. I don't know where you get the idea from that you're her boyfriend, but you're wrong.”

“Why don't you just back off and leave me and Issie alone?” Aidan said, his face dark and brooding under his black fringe.

“I was about to say the same thing,” said Dan. Then he looked Aidan square in the eyes. “Listen, it's time to settle this, right? So how about we do it in the arena?”

“What do you mean?”

“The Horse of the Year,” Dan said. “We've both qualified to ride in it, right? So what about if we make a little bet?”

“What sort of bet?”

“I should have thought that was obvious,” Dan replied.

Aidan looked at him. “You mean bet on who gets Issie?”

“Uh-huh,” Dan said. “Whoever wins the competition gets to be her boyfriend.”

Aidan looked at him. “So if I win, you'll back off and leave me and her alone?”

“Yeah,” Dan said. “If you win. Which you won't.”

Aidan bit his lip, then he shook his head. “This is stupid. Issie will never agree to it anyway.”

“Then we won't tell her,” said Dan. “This is just between you and me.” He put out his hand. “Or are you too scared to take me on?”

Aidan looked Dan in the eye. And then he took his hand and shook it hard. “You've got a bet.”

Upstairs, in the crawlspace of the truck, Issie felt herself trembling. She was shaking partly out of fear–she would have hated to have been discovered right now–but mostly out of pure anger. How dare those boys bargain with her as if she were a Bella Sara card to be traded? They were totally crazy! She held her breath and lay perfectly still in the crawlspace for another minute or so and then slowly stuck her head out to make sure they were gone. There was no one there.

As she backed out down the ladder her heart was still
beating like mad. She couldn't believe what she had just heard! At moments like these, Issie realised, there was only one person in the world that she could talk to about stuff like this. She needed her best friend right now. Unfortunately, Stella wasn't speaking to her.

Issie looked at her watch. She was due at the arena to compete in ten minutes. That didn't leave her much time. But she knew she had no choice. Stella was her best friend. How could things have got so messed up? She needed to talk to her desperately and straighten things out. Issie couldn't possibly concentrate on the competition and riding her horse until she had made things right with her best friend.

Luckily for Issie, Stella wasn't too hard to find. Her red curly hair was easy to spot across the fields. Issie could see her by the main arena, leaning over the railings by herself and watching the last of the hacks compete in the open classes.

As Issie approached Stella she thought of everything she wanted to say. She wanted to say that she never meant to make Stella feel left out. She wanted to let Stella know that she was her best friend in the world and that she would never let a boy come between them. She wanted to tell Stella that they were best friends forever and it was a silly
fight and she missed her. But, in fact, when she arrived at Stella's side with tears shining in her eyes, all she said was, “I'm sorry!” and that was enough. Before Issie knew it, Stella had said she was sorry too and the two friends were hugging and giggling and saying, “Let's pretend it never happened, OK?” And Issie was telling Stella the whole story of the contest between Dan and Aidan and they were pulling faces over how crazy boys were and then laughing so hard they were gasping for air.

“Ohmygod!” Stella said. “This is like the best thing ever! They've made a bet and the winner gets to be your boyfriend? What planet are they on?”

Issie shook her head. “It's like they're medieval knights in a jousting match and I'm the fair maiden.”

“Well, fair maiden.” Stella did a little bow and a curtsey. “Who dost thou think will win your hand?”

“I don't know,” Issie said.

“Well, it doesn't matter who wins, does it?” Stella said. “They don't get to decide who gets you. You should be the one who gets to choose.”

“Stella, that's just the problem,” Issie looked serious. “I guess I've been trying for ages. You know, to choose between Aidan and Dan…”

“And?”

Issie sighed. “I don't know. I can't decide.”

“Well, if you want to know who I'd choose…” Stella was about to offer her opinion when Issie froze and looked at the arena.

“The open hack event has finished!” she said. She checked her watch. “Ohmygod! The pony Grand Prix qualifier is next and I haven't even got Comet saddled up!”