CHAPTER EIGHT
Full jolly knight he seemd, and faire did sitt,
As one for knightly giusts and fierce encounters fitt.
Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, Book I
It was a bitter, windy day and the sun was hidden behind layers of dark, low-hanging clouds that threatened rain. Sage was being legged up onto Skylark in time for second lot and was in an uncharacteristically bad mood.
Although her bruises had been mending on their own in the three weeks since she had left Panama, dissolving her marriage was proving a lot less simple.
The straightforward divorce papers that her grandfather’s lawyers had drawn up for her had been emailed back by Santiago, containing numerous added clauses stipulating his access to Hal being so that he could spend time with the Deverills in Panama.
It would turn into a battle, Sage thought grimly, if Santiago did not give in – for she was going to fight with everything she had.
The thought of sending Hal off to Finca Azucar alone filled her with icy fear.
Santiago clearly wanted to punish her more than pursue a relationship with his son.
He had never really shown much interest in bonding with Hal, but she could envisage his wounded pride and knew it would make him dangerous.
If it was to turn into a lengthy legal campaign, she would need some serious finances and she had no idea how she could raise the necessary funds in time.
One thing, however, was certain: she would not accept the money from her grandparents.
As if to confirm her instincts, she heard her phone bleep in her pocket.
It was just one of a nasty series of texts Santiago had already sent that week.
Sage had stupidly left a message on her old Panamanian number with her new English one in case anyone from Panama had needed to contact her.
Now she cursed herself. Why had she bothered?
There was no one she wanted to hear from there.
The clunky, cheap, pay-as-you-go that she’d bought bleeped again, impatiently.
If you don’t come back to me, you’ll die alone.
Then followed quickly by another.
Nobody else will want you. You’re damaged and all used up.
Sage shoved the phone back into her pocket, trying to focus on the lively filly beneath her.
Skylark had missed the first race in which she had been due to run earlier that month.
She hated the rain and Dennis had consequently withdrawn her on the morning of racing as it had been bucketing down.
She virtually went backwards when asked to gallop in the wet and there was simply no point in expecting her to do so.
There were now only five days until her long-awaited maiden run; she was full to the brim with oats and in tip-top condition.
Sage and Skylark had continued to develop an understanding between one another, and she was the only one to have ridden the filly who had not – yet – been unseated.
The striking chestnut was on her toes today, more than ever, humping her back and jinking from side to side and Sage, normally a patient and sympathetic rider, kicked her hard in the ribs and told her to ‘get on’ in an unusually grumpy tone.
Sage’s temper was short this morning and when the filly leapt into the air at a flapping plastic bag, she yanked on her soft mouth with uncustomarily hard hands.
Skylark laid her ears back, flat. The rain began to fall in a persistent, cold drizzle.
Another text message sounded from Sage’s pocket and she pulled it out roughly; seeing Santiago’s name again she turned the phone off without reading the message.
When they got down to the crossroads that led onto the Heath, Skylark, unsettled by Sage’s unfamiliarly stiff and angry body, suddenly raked her head down to the tarmac, dropped her shoulder and whipped around in revenge, turning on a sixpence.
Sage came off hard and landed painfully on the damp pavement.
‘Skylark! What the hell are you playing at!’
But the filly, freed from her bad-tempered rider, merrily clattered off down the road towards the clock tower roundabout, her reins flapping about around her knees and her exercise rug adding a splash of colour to the dreary morning as she started to streak along.
Clenching her teeth in panic, Sage struggled to her feet.
The danger that Skylark was now in was all-consuming.
Coarse grit, which had been spread on the roads and pavements in order to prevent the horses from slipping, had gone through her ripped gloves and torn the knees of her jeans, but she wiped the blood off her hands hardly feeling the pain now, dread rising in her chest as the filly cantered down the road.
‘That was quite a tumble. You all right, Sage?’ Dillon had been riding alongside her.
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak, and swallowed, and he moved off after the rapid filly on a bemused and quietly protesting Dear Morris.
They had been on their way for a gentle gallop to prepare Skylark for her racecourse debut and he knew this turn of events was going to seriously upset the guv’nor and his carefully laid plans for the horse.
Sage, ignoring her bloodied hands and screaming muscles, gave chase as the filly skidded in and out of the traffic which was steadily flowing both ways along the Bury Road.
Ahead of her, a bewildered Dear Morris suddenly planted stock-still on the road, refusing to run the gauntlet of rush-hour traffic.
Dillon held up his hands in surrender and grimaced apologetically.
There was no other choice. Sage ran on, terror clutching at her throat.
Rafe had finished watching his horses work up the Warren Hill gallop and was following the string back past the Severals.
He was whistling softly, happy with what he had seen, when Warhorse pricked up his enormous ears and turned his head.
Rafe swivelled in his saddle to catch sight of a chestnut filly with a distinctive flaxen mane and tail flying down the middle of the busy road.
‘Oh, damn.’ Rafe’s heart sank as he recognized Skylark in Dennis’s initialled rug.
His apprentice was down to ride her at Chelmsford on Saturday and apart from the obvious – and considerable – danger to her life, the situation could be catastrophic for her racing prospects.
Looking up and down the road for any sign of mounted help and not finding any, he set after her himself.
Clicking to his clever horse, he swung Warhorse about and, heading in the opposite direction to his string, nudged him softly into a canter.
Horse and rider cautiously wove their way through the cars, whose startled drivers were shocked to find not one, but two horses now amongst them.
A Volkswagen Polo pulled out at the roundabout; its driver slammed on her brakes when she saw Skylark galloping down the middle of the road, her fragile legs sliding about on the painted white lines.
The horse was headed on a collision course with the car.
The brakes locked up and it swung broadside across the road; if it had not been for Skylark’s athleticism, she would surely have been hit.
Instead, she somehow managed to slither out of the way and ended up standing, petrified, in the middle of the roundabout.
Rafe was left with no option. Warhorse was cantering purposefully and with full momentum in the filly’s wake, and he knew that asking the large horse to stop on the slippery road would be more dangerous than encouraging him to go forward.
The traffic had ground to a halt all around them and they had space to take the car on.
He squeezed his long legs tightly around Warhorse and, leaning forward slightly, spoke urgently into a big, white ear: ‘Up, boy!’ The brave gelding soared over the little car with ease and landed light as a feather, a few strides away from the terrified, shaking filly.
Rafe slid off, patted him gratefully, and slowly approached Skylark.
Telling Warhorse to wait for him, he let go of the reins and motioned for the standstill traffic to give him a moment to get closer to the filly.
He edged nearer, softly talking reassuring nonsense to her all the while.
‘Hold hard now, you silly girl. There’s a good filly. Well done, little one. What in heaven’s name have you done with your mistress? I hope you haven’t left her tangled up somewhere. Well done. Take it easy, filly.’
Skylark’s sides were heaving in and out.
She was blowing hard, her nostrils dilated and their red membrane iridescent where the veins stood up in a network of lines like a braille roadmap.
Her neck was dark with sweat, and white foam had lathered up where the tack met her orange velvet coat.
Her eyes rolled in distress as she watched Rafe creep ever closer.
But her ears flicked backwards and forwards – she was listening to him.
At last, very gently, he managed to slip a finger through the hanging reins, still gabbling away soothingly.
‘Clever girl … Well done, pet. I am going to lead you now, my beauty. Warhorse, old chap – you can follow on behind, quietly please.’
He led the exhausted, shivering filly through the traffic and back up towards Dennis’s yard, thanking the slack-jawed drivers for their patience with a respectful nod of his head and touch of his cap, while the huge grey horse followed behind like a well-behaved elephantine Labrador.
Sage caught them up halfway along the Bury Road, by which time she was hardly able to breathe. She could find no words as she jogged the last few yards to finally close the distance between her and Skylark. Humiliation surged up inside her.
‘Are you OK?’ asked Rafe, full of concern.
Sage nodded, still panting.
‘Leg up?’ he asked, curious to see if she would want to get back on the temperamental filly.
She nodded again and Rafe gently lifted her up onto the saddle.