Prince of Ponies. Stacy Gregg

up again. They were deeper into the heart of the forest now and had left behind the broad, sandy avenues where they usually walked.

      We should go back. We’ll get lost and no one will ever find us … Mira was thinking this when Rolf stopped in his tracks, and the leash in her hand went slack.

      They were here.

      They were standing on the ridge of a hill looking down through the trees to a clearing below. To the right was the pitched shingle roof of a small house, with what looked like a barn attached to it. In front of the buildings, two large yards for exercising horses, with a sandy loam surface, were enclosed by posts and rails.

      Rolf cocked his head and let out a whimper as the doors to the stables opened. From inside Mira could hear the echo of horses’ hooves on the cobblestones, then a loud blowing snort and a moment later the grey stallion appeared through the doorway. He came out and as soon as his hooves touched the sand he broke into a high-stepping trot, his strides so elevated and bouncy it was almost as if he floated above the ground. He carried himself in a taut composition of muscle and sinew, his neck arched and his eyes on the woods beyond, his tail held erect so that the silken plumes of it trailed out behind him like gossamer as he circled the yard. He swept along right beside the rails as if he were looking for an escape route, and Mira noticed as he did this that the fence round the yard had been altered. The whole yard had been painted with dark brown fence stain, but there was a newly added unpainted rail that had been roughly hammered on at the top of the fence, which added another half a metre at least to the height of the barrier.

      The stallion did two laps of the enclosure, and then, with a sudden prop, he slammed on his brakes, making the sand come flying up from beneath his hooves. He came to a dead stop, pivoted on his hocks so that now he was facing the opposite direction, and broke into a gallop. As he raced across the yard making for the rails, Mira really thought he was going to jump. She was reminded of the effortless way he’d popped in a single stride to vault the fence in the forest. But this fence now was almost twice that size. Mira watched as the stallion came up on to his haunches and then, reconsidering, he dropped down again with a jolt and drove his front legs deep into the sand to stop himself, ploughing a channel as he skidded and crashed into the rails, pivoting on his hocks to turn, bouncing away in frustration, then circling round the fence, snaking his neck and tossing his mane in consternation.

      Then he halted, sides heaving like bellows, and looked up at the ridge where Mira and Rolf were watching. His ears pricked forward. He’d seen them! From the yard, he raised his elegant head and gave a clarion call, whinnying out to them.

      Mira hesitated for a moment and then she gave the leash a yank. “Come on,” she said to Rolf. “We’re going down there.”

      They scrambled down the bank together, a tangle of limbs and dog leash, until they reached the bottom, both of them panting, with hearts pounding. Mira picked Rolf up and felt his little feet waggling in mid-air as he tried to jump down again. She didn’t want him to scare the horse, so it was better perhaps if she went alone from here. She took Rolf’s leash and tied the dachshund to the fence. The stallion was standing perfectly still watching them, his dark eyes wide and calm.

      Rolf growled a little, as if he were cautioning Mira when she stepped away from him and circled the fence to move closer to the horse.

      She climbed up the rails and the horse stepped closer to her. Then he craned his elegant neck so that his muzzle was only a metre or two away from Mira’s face. She reached an arm out to him. The horse didn’t shy away from her, but stepped in again, stretching his muzzle to her hand. Mira wished she had a treat to offer him instead of her empty palm.

      The horse stepped closer again and now he was standing almost side-on to her. All she needed to do to get on to his back at that moment was to stand up on the fence rail and turn sideways a little and make the leap. If she did so, she would find herself sitting on the horse’s back!

      Behind her, she could hear Rolf give a low warning growl, but she didn’t turn to see what the dachshund was grumbling about. Her total focus was locked on the horse that stood there in front of her. She stood up, wobbling a little as she found her balance, perched on the rail on the balls of her feet, her hands still clinging on to the top rail. Her heart was pounding as she shimmied herself along the rail a tiny step or two, so that now she was in the perfect position just next to the horse’s broad, silver-grey back.

      As she leapt, two things happened at once. The first was that the horse did not stay still as she’d expected him to do. Instead, he gave a startled snort at the sight of the girl propelling herself through the air, and he bolted. The second, more remarkable thing, was that Mira found herself suspended in mid-air and then abruptly jerked backwards again, so that when the horse disappeared out from under her, she didn’t fall to the ground. She had been grabbed from behind and now she found herself not falling but being held in strong arms and eased down gently to the earth.

      And then, in her ear, louder than the sound of her own heart pounding, came the staccato bark of a woman chastising her in furious German. Mira turned round to see that the person who’d taken hold of her was an old woman, and the lady was yelling at her in rapid-fire language, speaking so quickly that Mira couldn’t possibly hope to keep up with the words.

      It was hard to believe that this frail, elderly figure in front of her had been the one who’d just pulled her back from her daredevil leap. And yet that seemed to be the case as she was now standing there, arms waving wildly as she gave Mira a piece of her mind!

      The old woman was dressed in an ancient flowery silk blouse tucked into faded green tracksuit trousers. She had brown knitted woollen slippers on her feet and her fine white hair was swept up into a loose bun that was twisted and pinned with a wooden clasp at the back. She was still barking away in German but it had at least slowed down from the rapid-fire shouting to a mild yelling. Mira tried to understand her, listening hard to decipher what was being said. Something about a king? No, not a king exactly. An emir! And then the penny dropped and Mira realised: that was his name! The horse – his name was Emir, and the woman was talking about him.

      “What did you think you were dealing with here? Some tame riding school pony?” she was asking. “Emir is sensitive, powerful, highly strung. You are lucky that he did not kill you! If I had not got to you in time, this would have ended very badly for you.”

      “I’m sorry,” Mira muttered.

      “You should be!” the woman snapped. “Now clear off! Get out of here. This is private property, you know. Not the public forest. If you want a riding school, there is one in Grunewald near the Waldsee. Go there instead!”

      “I …” Mira was too terrified to respond.

      “Go on! What are you still here for?” the woman barked. “Are you simple-minded? I told you to leave!”

      “I need … to untie Rolf,” Mira replied. She pointed over the woman’s shoulder to the little dachshund, who was still hitched up to the fence post. Rolf, seemingly unaware of the tension between Mira and the old lady, was standing up on his hind legs rather adorably and, at the sound of his name, he began yipping and wagging his great plume of a tail.

      His foolish antics made the old woman lose a little of her bluster. “Yes, well,” she harrumphed in a gentler tone. “Of course. Fetch your dog and go.”

      “He’s not my dog,” Mira said.

      “What?” the old woman growled.

      “Rolf is not mine,” Mira said. “I take care of him for Frau Schmidt. I’m not allowed a dog of my own.”

      “Why on earth not?” The old woman frowned.

      “A dog is another mouth to feed.” Mira was repeating her mother’s words, the phrase she used whenever Mira had asked for a pet.

      “Who cannot afford to feed a mouth this small?” the old woman scoffed. “Typical, though, I suppose. People always think of themselves first, never of the animals who suffer …” Tutting and muttering away, she bent down and patted Rolf. The dachshund, oozing charm now, stood up on his hind legs