A Stolen Life

Part 5

When dinner is over he takes me out of the forest and to a huge meadow. He hides behind some bushes and points at the meadow, "You see those horses over there?"

I follow his finger to see small specks in the distance, "I think so, what about them?"

He smiles proudly, "I'm going to teach you how to tame and ride one. So you better watch carefully."

He climbs out of the bushes and starts walking towards the horses. I follow closely behind him. When we get closer I can see that there are five horses. There are two brown horses with dark brown hair, two light brown horses with black hair and a black horse with white hair. I scratch my head, "That horse is different from the others."

He pats me on the back, "It's perfect for you!"

He crouches down and starts sneaking closer to the horses. I speak under my breath, "Yeah thanks..."

When we are close enough to the horses to see their eyes I notice that the black horse has green eyes. Hunter puts his arm on my shoulder, "You should pick that one."

I sneak closer to it, "She has such beautiful eyes."

He smiles brightly, "Just like you. Mentioning that, I thought I told you to stop hiding behind that hood of yours."

I look down with a frown, "But what if I scare them?"

He sighs in disappointment, "If they judge you for your looks then that's their loss. Sure some people might be frightened at first, but once they get to know you then they'll see you're a good person."

I scratch my head, "Even so, it will probably scare away the horses."

He thinks for a bit before nodding, "Probably, they do scare easily. Anyway, watch me closely. (He points to a light brown horse) See that horse? I'm gonna tame him."

He slowly sneaks up to a horse trying to stay away from their back legs while not being seen. The horse is grazing on some grass when he jumps onto its back. Spooked it starts running around scaring the other horses. The black one ends up running closer to me but I don't think she sees me. He hangs on as the horse tries throwing him off. He start petting the horse to comfort it and show that he's not a bad person. They keep this up for about 15 minutes before the horse finally calms down. I clap quietly, "Good job. That was so cool."

He rides it over to me, "Alright, now you try."

I take a deep breath and start sneaking over, but she sees me. She doesn't run though, just stares as if looking into my soul. Suddenly a gust of wind catches my hood and throws it off. Instead of running away, the horse just walks up to me. I slowly stand up and reach out to touch her forehead. She flinches back a bit. I slowly reach out again and she places her forehead against my hand. It's as if she chose me. I start petting her, "You're not afraid of me?"

She shakes her head with a neigh. Hunter laughs, "I've never seen this before! I think she likes you. She has chosen you as her rider, you should be honored."

He jumps off his horse, "She looked into your eyes and saw you for who you really are."

I look at my hands, "For who I really am?"

The image of Arnela dying enters my mind. Then the look on Malakai's face as he killed her. I shake my head and walk to the side of the horse to jump on. When I'm properly on her back she suddenly start running around the meadow at full speed. Hunter jumps back on his horse and chases after us, "Hold on! She is testing you! Don't let go!"

I start laughing, "Woo-hoo! You're one fast horse! Can you go faster!?"

She suddenly dashes faster for a short amount of time as if answering me. Hunter yells out, "SLOW DOWN! YOU SHOULDN'T BE SO CARELESS! YOU'RE JUST STARTING OFF YOU MIGHT GET HURT!"