Read Little Horse on His Own Online
Authors: Betsy Byars
Little Horse on His Own (2 page)
Little Horse lay where he had fallen. The storm raged around him. There was rain and tiny stones of ice.
The only thing about Little Horse that moved was his heart. It had never beat so fast.
Finally, the sounds of thunder grew more distant. The rain stopped. There was no more lightning. The only sound he heard now was water dripping from the leaves overhead.
Little Horse found that he could lift his head. He moved his leg. There was room. He began to wriggle through the leaves. Inch by inch he moved forward.
The stable was broken. The fence that had held him was crushed. Little Horse crawled over the pieces of broken wood.
He ducked under a limb of the tree and took a deep breath. The air was cool and fresh. It was like the air in the Valley of Little Horses.
This gave him strength. He fought the rest of the limbs and leaves. With one final burst he was free.
Little Horse stood and looked around him. There was a lot going on. The two-legged animals were running, shouting. To Little Horse's surprise, no one noticed him.
Keeping close to the fallen tree, he made his way to the stable where the big horses slept.
There, curled up in the straw, with the big horses to watch over him, Little Horse slept.
When Little Horse awoke, it was morning.
The big horses were being led out of the stable to graze. Little Horse got up. He was hungry, too.
Little Horse did not make it through the door. An animal blocked his way. Little Horse froze.
Little Horse had seen this animal before. He knew those sharp golden eyes.
But the animal's eyes were not on him. They watched the straw on the floor.
The straw twitched. The animal pounced. A smaller animal scurried out of the straw. It darted across the floor and disappeared into a hole.
The big animal reached into the hole with her paw. She felt nothing. She turned and began to lick her paw.
At that moment, she saw Little Horse. Her tail twitched. She took four steps toward Little Horse. She went into a crouch.
Little Horse ran for the door. But, the animal was there before him.
He turned. He darted this way, that way. The big animal was faster.
Then Little Horse saw he was in front of the hole. He remembered the small animal had escaped there.
He fell to his knees and began to wriggle through. He was almost inside when a large paw pinned his tail to the ground.
Little Horse kicked with his hind legs, hard. His hooves hit the side of the hole, and he fell downward, landing on his side.
He was safe for the moment, but his heart still pounded. As he lay there, he became aware of his surroundings. He was in the nest of the small animal.
But it wasn't straw he was lying on. It was something soft, something that moved. The animal's young!
Little Horse struggled quickly to his feet. He gave a snort of surprise. One of the young had climbed onto his back.
Little Horse had seen the big horses carry two-legged animals around. Until now he had not known how the big horses must have suffered.
He bucked. The rider stayed on. He came down hard on all hooves. The rider stayed on. He reared. The rider stayed on. Little Horse rolled over. That did it. As quickly as the ride had begun, it was over. The rider lay with the other young. Little Horse was free.
Little Horse poked his head out of the hole. He looked this way, that way. Golden Eyes was gone.
Carefully, Little Horse squeezed himself out of the hole. The way to the big horses was clear.
Little Horse ran out of the stable. The grass was tall. It hid him as he moved to the meadow.
He paused at the fence and watched the big horses graze. Then, slowly, he trotted to the brown horse. He neighed.
The brown horse lifted his head. It was as if he had heard a horse neigh in the distance.
Down here! Down here! Little Horse wanted to cry. He neighed again.
The brown horse took two steps forward. When his hoof touched the ground, it was inches from Little Horse. It left a print in the soft earth.
Little Horse darted away. Now the brown horse saw him. He threw back his head. He snorted.
Little Horse knew that sound. The horses in the valley snorted like that when something spooked them.
The horse reared.
The other horses caught his alarm. They snorted. They began to canter around the meadow.
Little Horse ran for the fence. As he ran, he knew what had startled the horse. He had.
He!
He had thought of the big horses as his friends. Now he knew he had no friends. Little Horse ran for his life.
At the end of the day, Little Horse saw a welcome sight. He saw the stream. It ran beside the Valley of Little Horses, his home. But one sad day he had fallen into this stream. It had brought him here.
The setting sun turned the water to gold. It did that in his valley too.
Little Horse found an opening in the roots of one of the trees. He moved inside. He was careful. There might be a nest with young inside.