Angel and the Flying Stallions Read Online Free Page A

Francoise replied as she strode forward to meet them. “I should have anticipated his reaction. They say that horses do not remember as you and I do, but this is not always true. Some memories run so deepthey cannot be erased. He has not forgotten you, Isadora. That is quite clear.”
    As if to confirm this, Storm gave another nicker and rubbed his handsome face up against Issie, using her as a scratching post just as he had always done in the padddock back home.
    “Storm!” Francoise chastised the stallion. “Where are your manners? An El Caballo stallion doesn’t behave like that!”
    Francoise took the lead rope and jiggled it to make him step back. Storm got the message and stood obediently while Francoise embraced Issie in the customary French way with a kiss on each cheek before adding a hug of her own.
    “Welcome back to El Caballo Danza Magnifico, Isadora,” she smiled.
    “It’s good to be back, Francoise,” Issie grinned.
    Issie had been hoping that perhaps they could saddle up straight away. She was desperate to ride Storm for the first time and Francoise seemed to be reading her mind. “There will be time for riding soon enough,” the Frenchwoman said as she grasped Storm’s lead rope and began to guide him down the corridor back towards hisstall, “I don’t think Roberto would be impressed if I took his guest out for a gallop straight away. We should go back into the house and get you settled in.” She smiled at Issie. “That is, if you can possibly bear to be apart from Storm again!”
    Issie laughed at this, but really she would rather have stayed out here, exhausted, grubby and jetlagged, and fallen asleep beside her horse on the straw in his stall than go to the luxury and comfort of her room in the Nunez hacienda. But Issie knew that would have sounded ungrateful, so she followed Francoise as she led the stallion back to his loose box.
    “He has grown up so beautifully, hasn’t he? Look at his topline!” Francoise gestured at the ridge of muscle along the stallion’s neck just beneath the glossy, black mane. “You can see by the developing muscles that we have already begun his training in the dressage school. He is still too young for the advanced haute école manoeuvres. They will come later. We are taking things gradually, but already my riders think he shows great promise. Once he learns collection and paces he will be ready to progress to the ‘airs above ground’.”
    Issie felt herself tense up. Francoise was talking aboutStorm as if he still had more training to come. But how could that be possible when they were here to take him home to Chevalier Point? Francoise was acting as if he wasn’t actually going to leave El Caballo Danza Magnifico!
    “We’ll keep training him when we get him home, of course,” Issie said, hoping that she was subtly making it clear that she expected to take the colt back with her, “but dressage isn’t really my priority. Avery believes Storm will be a great prospect as an eventer.”
    Francoise looked serious. “We have had long discussions about this, Tom and I. When you first agreed to keep the colt with us, it was so that he could be schooled as a classical dressage horse. And, as I have been trying to impress upon Tom, his training has not yet finished.”
    “What do you mean, he hasn’t finished?” Issie was getting edgy. “I’m here to take him home.”
    Francoise frowned. “But surely you know about this? I made it clear to Avery that I could not permit you to take Storm away now. The stallion’s basic training has begun, but he has yet to learn the truly advanced moves of dressage. It would be wrong to drag him out of the best classical school in the world when you could notpossibly complete his training back home in Chevalier Point. Only an haute école rider will do for a horse such as Storm. That is why we came to the arrangement.”
    Issie was taken aback. “Arrangement? What arrangement?” This couldn’t be happening!