Derby Dreams (Acropolis #1)

Chapter 10

The snow kept falling and another foal arrived down at the Hera Barn. The new foal was cute but no one could take their eyes off the new, royal arrivals. The two colts were quickly gaining strength and had both stood to nurse, the smaller of the two had had to stretch up to reach his mother's milk but he'd managed it at a stretch. Mr Hart thought that as they grew older they would require formula so as to lower the pressure on Willow but it was important that the newborns drank from their mother to develop resistance to disease. Kat had quickly left to tell those up at the house, the phone lines were down. There had been delight and several bottles of celebratory champagne, it wasn't often they defied odds like that. As she headed back outside, Kat took a slight detour. The morning was young, no stars could be seen through the thick snow cloud above, and the cool air was beginning to sting her cheeks. She didn't mind it though, she barely felt it. Willow had survived what had surely been a death warrant and if anyone deserved to know it was the father, proud by nature and with an abundance of talent.
The stallion yard was silent and the watchman gave a single nod to Kat as she stepped inside.
"We won't get any horse thieves in weather like this." He told her with a smile, "No one could make it up here."
"Very true." Kat agreed. She stepped across the deep snow on the grassy quad in the middle of the yard, stepping over to the mahogany door that enclosed her first real champion. Mischief was awake, he rarely failed to notice someone arriving in his yard. Kat could just see the glint of his eyes in the faint gleam from one of the night lights. His silhouette moved as he stepped away from her. Clearly, he was feeling indifferent at this moment.
"Hello Missy, how are you boy?" Kat crooned softly, the stallion stamped once in reply. Kat smiled and felt a slight rush in her blood, something close to adrenaline but mixed with euphoria.
"She did it, you've had your first foals of the season and they're precious. Beyond two in a million. They're like her in colour and heart but they'll show us that you're in there. I'm sure of it. They're so special, they give me that feeling that you did." The stallion seemed to understand because he stepped up to the door and Kat reached up, grasping the cheekpiece of the headcollar and looking into the illuminated cocoa eyes.
"You were good on the track but you're not done are you?" Kat asked him. Mischief held her stare for a moment then jerked his head up and gave the proud clarion call of a stallion who was just about start setting his own rules.

Slowly, the snow stopped and even more slowly the thaw began. At first it was just a couple of drips from the trees, sending horses flying at the icy drops. Foals kept coming and the horses felt the warming temperature in their blood. Every morning Kat would wolfwhistle as Mischief took off across his paddock, kicking and bucking with snow fever. The winter sun made him glow like a golden angel of a horse but his shrill whinnies could be seen floating through the air behind him as mist. Willow too was feeling the new warmth, she had recovered like a champion from a tough race. She'd lost weight but she'd dropped into her role as a mother with patience and sweet mindedness. As soon as the snow and ice was off the ground then she would lead her new foals into one of the nursery paddocks where Fiona would take at least a million pictures to show what an amazing pair they were. The younger of the two seemed to have more fight than the other, he struggled more but he pulled through every time. The older had proven to have a trickier disposition and was growing with miraculous pace. When the roads were passable the vet joined them and eyed them with disbelief. He agreed that the second colt was more typical of a twin, he was smaller and weaker, but the first was like any other foal.

Light had broken by seven o clock, it was the sign that the new season was one it's way and that any horse that wanted to race this year needed to be getting fit. And thus, it was time to get back in Dove's saddle. Kat had been dreading the moment. The filly seemed fighting fit, she'd been lunging like a dream and Kat knew that the second sh sat on her all that energy would be transformed into an attempt to throw her. Nonetheless, it had to be done. Morning workouts went past frighteningly quickly and she found herself rechecking her body protector and helmet as she waited in the warm up arena for Brooke to bring the filly up. The doors were closed on both sides and half the staff were hiding behind a rail at the far side, well out of the way of the 'flying filly'. Dove announced her presence at the door with a loud whinny of excitement, she'd felt the saddle on her back and hadn't stopped prancing since the girth tightened. Brooke was clinging to the lead chain, looking mildly intimidated by the mare. Kat, on the other hand, didn't looked fazed.
"She looks fresh." She ran a hand over the mottled shoulder.
"Oh, she is." Brooke agreed warily, "You want to get up?"
"Yeah, Richie!" Kat called for the manager of the Fillies and Mares Yard. He stepped out from the crowd, he was six foot four and built like a rugby player. He looked like a brute but there was no better man for gently handling a tricky filly. He held a lunge line which he clipped to Dove's headcollar, resting underneath the bridle.
"Give her a leg up." He told Brooke as she slipped off her chain, "When you're ready Kat."
"Okay." Kat stepped up to be level with the saddle, she placed a hand on the filly's withers and kept it there for a moment until Dove had run off the steam that the touch generated in her. She knew what that hand meant and adrenaline was flowing through her blood now. Kat bent her knee and Brooke grasped her leg and all but chucked up. Kat landed with expert grace, her feet slipping into the irons without prompt. Within a nanosecond of landing she was in position, ready for take off. It took Dove only a second to realise what had happened. She gave one snort, one step forward, one flick of her tail and one toss of her head before she took off like a steam train. Kat sat back as the filly rocketed forward from beneath her.
"Easy, easy." Kat spoke firmly as the filly was checked sharply from her straight line by the lunge. Dove gave a big kick in protest and set off in the circle that the lunge allowed, springing off her haunches with the power of a kangaroo. It wasn't pretty but it wasn't the fireworks they'd expected.
"Shall we bring her in?" Richie asked but Kat shook her head.
"I want to get the nonsense out of her, she'll throw something soon and want to see if I can withstand it."
"Fair enough." Richie kept the lunge line relatively taut as the filly continued to canter then she dropped back to a trot without Kat even asking her too. Kat's eyebrows were knitting together, this was most unlike the filly.
"Change the rein." She told Richie and together they maneuvered so that the filly was trotting on the other rein.
"Still nothing." Richie sighed, "We don't want to overwork her, I'll give you twenty seconds more."
"Okay." Kat pressed the filly on for a moment but Dove just leaned against the bit lazily.
"Whoa..." Richie called after twenty seconds and almost instantly his voice was drowned out by pounding hooves. Kat's body was wrenched forward as Dove dropped her head in between her fore legs and lifted her backside in the air for two massive bucks, barely having broken stride. Whilst half of her subconscious was screaming in terror as the massive filly went wild, she was the craziest filly she'd ever sat on and that was saying something, another part of Kat was infinitely relieved. Dove was back to her good old self and making hell. There was only one small problem; when Dove got going, it took a lightning strike to stop her.