by Wood, Karen
‘We might have to stop and put chains on the tyres,’ said Grampy. ‘The road is getting icy.’
No sooner had the words come out of his mouth than a string of flying dogs raced across the road just ahead. A sled bounced behind them like a small boat on bumpy waves. A person wrapped in a big fur coat clung on for dear life. Grampy cursed out loud and spun the wheel of the truck to avoid them.
The next few moments were a blur. Through the cacophony of crazy barking, Ruby thought she heard a scream. Maybe it was her, maybe one of her sisters. The front end of the truck slipped sideways across the icy road.
‘Whoooaaaa!’ cried Grampy as he fought the steering wheel. Suddenly everything was spinning. Silver trees and mounds of snow barrelled towards them.
There was an almighty crunch, and an explosion of white fluff. Everything jolted violently. Shoddy yelped. The horses crashed about as they scrambled to stay upright.
And then everything went quiet. Snowflakes fluttered weightlessly all around them.
Ruby stared ahead, struggling to breathe. A giant tree stood where the front of the truck should have been. Mounds of white pressed against the windows, looking strangely soft and harmless.
‘Is everyone okay?’ asked Grampy.
Ruby undid her seatbelt and took stock of all her body parts. She ran her eyes over her sisters, who both looked shocked, but unhurt. ‘Yes. Yes, I think so.’
‘I can’t move,’ said Analita, pushing at the dashboard in front of her. ‘I’m stuck.’
Grampy also struggled. ‘I’m stuck too.’
‘Are you hurt?’ Kit asked.
There was a fresh flurry of panic as the girls all leaned into the front of the truck. ‘Can we help?’ said Ruby.
Both Grampy and Analita kept wriggling and pushing. But the dashboard was buckled over the tops of their legs.
‘I’m not hurt,’ said Grampy. ‘But I’m stuck. I can’t move at all.’
Analita shifted and writhed. ‘Me too.’
‘What on earth was that?’ said Ruby.
‘I think it was a dog sled,’ said Grampy.
‘It was wildly out of control,’ said Analita.
‘I’m going to check on the horses,’ said Kit, pushing the door open with her elbow.
‘We’ll have to go and get help,’ said Ruby.
‘We’re miles from anywhere and it’ll be dark soon,’ said Analita. ‘I don’t want you walking off on some lonely road.’
‘But we’ll all freeze if we don’t get help soon.’ Already Ruby’s teeth were beginning to chatter.
‘It’s only a few miles to the next town,’ said Grampy. ‘If you jump on the horses and hurry, you might get to a phone before dark. There is no other way.’
Lexie and Ruby pulled out the horses’ rugs and passed them over the front seats to Grampy and Analita, while Kit bridled the horses. All four, thankfully, were unharmed. They decided to bring Chance along rather than leave her alone and cold in the back.
‘Here are some carrots in case you get hungry,’ said Kit, passing some of the horses’ treats into the cabin. ‘Hopefully we won’t be very long.’ She pointed a finger at Shoddy. ‘Stay!’
‘Be as quick as you can and stay together,’ said Analita. ‘And be careful.’
As the girls trotted away from the truck, the snow turned to rain. Ruby hunched her shoulders and the day darkened to night. If it weren’t for Tinker’s fearless stride, and her sisters beside her, she would not have had the courage to keep going. After an hour, she could see nothing through the darkness.
‘Where is this stupid town?’ Kit said. ‘I’m getting soaked.’
‘It can’t be too much further,’ said Ruby, trying to stop her teeth from chattering.
‘Look, a light!’ Kit cried.
Ruby peered out from under the brim of her hat. Some way off, a dim orange glow blurred through the rainy night. She felt her heart lift. Light meant help: shelter, warmth, food. That’s if they were friendly.
She pushed Tinker into a canter, pulling Chance along behind her. The mare, as always, was uncooperative. After a while Ruby gave up and let her loose. Chance trotted along behind, keeping her own pace.
Before long, a short track veered off the road, leading to a small hut by a larger barn.
Kit pulled Kismet to a stop. ‘We shouldn’t knock on strange people’s doors,’ she said.
‘We have no choice,’ Lexie said. ‘Grampy and Analita will be freezing. We have to get help to them.’
They slipped off their horses and led them along the track. Before they reached the hut a gang of dogs burst into howling. A door swung open, revealing a thin old woman with stooped shoulders. A long plait of silvery red hair and a set of hooped earrings fell out from under a colourful beanie. She wore a fur-lined cowl and coat, and the hands that held the door open were gnarled with age.
‘Why it’s a herd of gypsy cobs,’ said the woman in a thick accent. She smiled as she spoke, revealing a golden tooth. ‘Who brings such horses to the Silver Mountains?’ Her eyes went straight to the necklace around Ruby’s throat and her expression changed. Some small spark of recognition flashed in her eyes. ‘And in the middle of the night too.’
‘You!’ said Ruby, recognising the fur coat.
The woman turned to walk back inside. ‘Come in. I cannot stand here with the door open all night. Too much cold air. Too much arthritis. You go and put your horses in the barn.’
‘You ran your crazy dogs in front of our truck,’ said Lexie, refusing to go in. ‘Did you know you caused an accident?’
‘Truck? What truck?’ The woman turned back to the door.
‘Our truck!’ said Ruby.
‘Oh dear,’ said the old lady. ‘We don’t get snow very often. The dogs are a bit out of practice.’ She frowned. ‘Remind me never to put that dog at the lead again.’ She tapped a finger to her temple. ‘Nothing up here, you know what I mean. I hope no one was hurt.’
‘Our mother and our grandfather are still trapped in the front.’
‘Your grandfather?’ The woman’s eyes narrowed and for a moment she looked troubled.
‘They need help,’ said Kit. ‘We need to call the emergency services.’
‘My phone is not working,’ said the old lady, ‘and it’s an hour’s ride to town. Much quicker if I help.’
‘But …it’s an emergency!’
The woman didn’t seem to hear her. Ruby didn’t like the way her eyes stayed on her necklace. She seemed mesmerised. Ruby pulled her collar up to hide it. The woman’s lingering glance travelled to Kit and then Lexie. She scanned their faces with a keen eye.
Ruby could feel Lexie and Kit’s unease.
‘I think we made a mistake,’ said Lexie. ‘We shouldn’t have bothered you.’
All three girls began backing away.
‘I think we should get the police,’ said Ruby out of the side of her mouth. ‘This lady is batty.’ She followed her sisters and leapt onto Tinker. The girls rode back into the darkness.
Before long, they heard the baying of dogs and the rattling of a sled. The old woman’s voice rose above the din. ‘Marshe, Cloudy. Hike, Rascal. Gee, Benifex!’
The dogs wheeled around to the right.
‘On by!’ she yelled, as her team of dogs overtook the horses. They pushed their shoulders into their harnesses as they hauled the sled. The old woman held up an iron bar as she bounced past the girls. ‘Ruby, Kit, Lexie, follow me!’
‘How did she know our names?’ asked Kit, clutching at her reins while Kismet whirled about in fright of the dogs.
‘I don’t know, but I’m going to find out,’ said Ruby. She turned Tinker and took off after her.
‘Wait for me,’ said Lexie and Kit together, pushing their horses to keep up.
The girls followed the howling dogs back into the night.
The woman was already at work by the time the girls caught up with her. Hunched over the iron bar, she wrenched at the door of Grampy’s truck.
&nb
sp; ‘How do you know our names?’ said Ruby as she jumped off Tinker.
‘Never mind that,’ was the answer. ‘Help me with this.’
The triplets took hold of the bar together and pulled. Once the door came open, they began on the dashboard, first freeing Grampy and then Analita. They rolled into the snow with the horse rugs wrapped around them. Shoddy fell out too.
‘Oh, thank goodness you girls are alright,’ said Analita. ‘I was out of my mind with worry.’
‘Thank goodness you’re alright,’ said Ruby.
Grampy looked anything but thankful. ‘You nearly got us all killed, you senile old woman,’ he snapped as he pulled himself out of the snow.
‘There’s gratitude for you,’ the old lady said. ‘You haven’t changed much.’
Grampy scowled. ‘And you’re still running those crazy dogs. At your age!’
The girls gaped from Grampy to the old lady. ‘You know each other?’
‘My long-lost brother-in-law,’ said the lady. ‘The crystal ball told me you were coming. It didn’t tell me you would wrap yourself around a tree in the middle of a blizzard.’
Analita stepped forward and smiled. She took the lady by the hands. ‘Ruby, Kit, Lexie,’ she said. ‘Meet your Great-Aunt Zelda.’
All three girls spoke at once. ‘We have an aunty?’
‘Great-aunty,’ Zelda corrected. She held her arms open to them. ‘I’m your Grandma Levinia’s sister.’
The triplets looked at each other and then to their mother. ‘Really?’
Analita nodded.
Kit went forward first, then Ruby, then Lexie. They cautiously gave the old woman a hug.
‘Come back to the hut and get yourselves warm,’ she said, giving them a squeeze. She smelled of lavender and wood smoke. ‘You won’t find anywhere else to stay tonight. You can put your horses in the barn.’ She turned and looked down her nose at Grampy. ‘You can stay here.’
Grampy glared back. ‘Your dogs just took off again.’
‘Oh, blast and blizzards,’ the old woman cursed. ‘Argh, that dopey Benifex; he’s got nothing up here, nothing!’ She tapped her finger against her temple.
‘Oh no,’ moaned Kit. ‘Shoddy has gone with them!’
The old labrador’s yellow tail disappeared around a bend in the track.
Aunt Zelda smiled at the triplets. ‘Come; he will follow my dogs home.’
The next morning, Ruby opened her eyes without stirring. She and her sisters had bedded down in Zelda’s barn with the horses and dogs. Kit and Lexie slept nearby with Shoddy. Streams of light poured through a small window, and heat emanated from a pot-bellied wood heater in the middle of the barn. The horses rested in stalls at the other end.
Ruby rose and opened the door of the heater to feed it. The blackened coals beneath the burning logs made the shape of a walrus moustache. In a sudden vision the moustache muttered and murmured and whispered secrets. Ruby leaned in to try and hear the words, but they were snatched away by the sizzle and pop of the fire. Then the coals changed shape and the muttering stopped.
Ruby touched the necklace around her throat and shook her head. Strange. Maybe she hadn’t woken up properly yet.
She thought about her adventures last night. Grampy and Analita had mounted behind Kit and Lexie. Zelda had ridden on the back of Tinker. She had talked about Levinia all the way back to her hut. ‘She knew you were coming and that you would be special,’ she said. ‘She wrote notes to you, letters to you.’
‘We still have them,’ said Ruby.
When they got to the barn, Ruby had pulled out the leather-bound diary. Zelda had cried as she held it, while the room around her glowed with mysterious light. ‘Her heart, all her love is in here,’ she wept. ‘It has been so long, but still I miss my sister.’
She read all three girls’ palms and spoke of their hope, courage and compassion. ‘You’re just like Levinia said you would be,’ she marvelled.
Now, in the swag next to Ruby’s, Lexie rose slowly. ‘We have to go and register today,’ she said. ‘So we can be in the parade tomorrow.’
Zelda appeared with a tray of tea and pikelets. The dogs sprang to life and began leaping about excitedly. After fighting her way through them and placing the tray on some hay bales, she shooed the dogs outside.
While Ruby drank her tea she told Zelda about her vision in the fireplace.
‘Perhaps if you find a man with a walrus moustache, he will lead you to the colt,’ Zelda said as she poured tea for the others. ‘He might be at the registration day today.’
Later that morning, Ruby gave Chance a pat as she said goodbye. ‘We will be back this afternoon,’ she said to the mare. ‘We’ll do our best to find your boy.’
The Tricketts rode into town to join hundreds of parade entrants in a large field on the outskirts of Silverton. There were dancing troupes and marching bands, people carrying drums and holding dogs on leashes. Fire twirlers lined up alongside magicians and clowns. Many of them, Ruby guessed, were going to perform about the town today as well.
The triplets rode onto the registration field bareback. People with bright orange vests ticked off names and gave out numbers. ‘Trickstars, you will go down the back,’ said a lady with a clipboard. ‘Here is your number. Sign these forms, please.’
‘Look, there are the miniature ponies,’ said Lexie, while Grampy took the lady’s clipboard and signed the papers. The tiny ponies were clipped like poodles and dyed bright colours: pink, orange, purple and blue.
‘Look, there are the Hexleys!’ said Ruby, excitedly.
Even from such a distance, Silvanus and Sabina Hexley were unmistakeable. Their hair was as red as newly kindled fire. Seth was dressed as a ringmaster in a blue top hat with golden trim and red coat-tails. He stood with his back to them.
‘So they are the circus act,’ said Lexie. ‘I’m glad we will be at opposite ends of the parade tomorrow.’
‘Maybe they know something!’ said Ruby.
But before anyone could get near them, Silvanus and Sabina wandered off and disappeared into the crowds. The triplets handed their horses to Analita and followed on foot.
Thousands of people swarmed the streets, eating fairy floss and looking through the stalls. Children with painted faces held balloons. Everyone was in a costume of some sort. There were fairies and elves and storybook characters.
Every time Ruby thought she saw a moustache, she quickly lost it again. They stopped and asked stallholders, but no one knew anything about a black colt. After an hour of wandering through the markets, all three girls felt tired and disappointed.
Ruby gave a sigh as she vaulted onto Tinker’s back to leave. From high on his back she had a much better view of the town.
And that’s when she saw it. Across the field, the Hexleys were sitting under a tree eating hot dogs. Seth took off his top hat and wiped his brow. His hair was brilliant orange. Then he reached to his top lip and tore a big fake walrus moustache off his face, wincing as the glue pulled at his skin.
Ruby nudged Kit in the ribs. ‘You go and talk to him.’
‘Why me?’ Kit said.
‘Because he owes you a favour, remember?’ said Ruby. ‘You healed his horse when it went lame at the Summer Festival.’
‘And if I go over there, I’ll say something I’ll regret,’ Lexie said. She curled her top lip and clenched her fists. Ever since Silvanus Hexley put a Phantosmia spell on Lexie and tried to claim her golden belt buckle, she hadn’t liked the Hexleys very much.
‘What will I say?’ asked Kit.
‘Just ask him if he’s seen Destiny. Or if he knows anything about Chance,’ said Ruby.
‘Okay,’ said Kit. She squared her shoulders and took a breath.
‘Let’s eavesdrop,’ Ruby said to Lexie. ‘We can hide behind the trees over there.’
‘What if they see us?’ said Lexie.
‘Then we’ll wave,’ Ruby replied.
The girls led their horses behind the bushes and crouched shoul
der-to-shoulder.
Kit walked boldly towards the Hexleys. ‘Hi, Seth,’ she said with a smile.
Seth was in his late teens, the oldest of the Hexley High Flyers. He looked shocked to see her. ‘Err, hi,’ he said, wiping tomato sauce from his chin and finishing his hot dog.
Sabina and Silvanus looked up when they heard Kit’s voice.
‘You?’ said Sabina. ‘What are you doing here? I thought we agreed to stay away from each other.’
‘No,’ said Kit politely. ‘You agreed to leave Kulnara.’
Silvanus smiled. ‘I have more bloodroot and baneberry, if that’s what you’re after.’
‘Very funny,’ said Kit.
Behind the bushes, Lexie growled. Those were the herbs Silvanus had used to curse her with phantom odours. It had made her dinner smell like wet dog and fish food.
Kit turned to Seth, who was by far the friendliest of the family. ‘I just came to ask how Blacky’s leg was. Did the poultice work?’
‘Yes, it did,’ Seth answered, shooting a look at his siblings. ‘Go and give that poor horse a drink,’ he ordered.
Silvanus and Sabina rose to their feet and led the black horse away.
‘Why are you here?’ Seth asked Kit.
‘We’ve come for the winter solstice parade,’ said Kit. ‘But while I think of it, do you know anything about a gypsy mare that went through the Silver Plains horse sales a while ago?’
Seth shrugged. ‘No, why?’
‘Well, she had a foal, and we’re trying to find it …just …you know …while we happen to be here for the parade.’
Seth gave her a puzzled look.
‘We bought the gypsy mare, but then we found out it was stolen,’ Kit quickly explained. ‘Then the owners came and took the foal she had. We just want to know if he’s okay.’
‘Oh, really?’
‘Yes,’ said Kit. ‘We think the mare was by Magnifico.’