Horses' Night Out Read online

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  For Brian, Adam, Brett, and Seth—Sibley Miller

  For Norman, for enthusiastic, educated, manly input

  —Tara Larsen Chang

  For Danny, who patiently listens to all of my horse tales

  —Jo Gershman

  Meet the Wind Dancers

  One day, a lonely little girl named Leanna blows on a doozy of a dandelion. To her delight and surprise, four tiny horses spring from the puff of the dandelion seeds!

  Four tiny horses with shiny manes and shimmery wings. Four magical horses who can fly!

  Dancing on the wind, surrounded by magic halos, they are the Wind Dancers.

  The leader of the quartet is Kona. She has a violet-black coat and vivid purple mane, and she flies inside a halo of magical flowers.

  Brisa is as pretty as a tropical sunset with her coral-pink color and blond mane and tail. Magical jewels make up Brisa’s halo, and she likes to admire her gems (and herself) every time she looks in a mirror.

  Sumatra is silvery blue with sea-green wings. Much like the ocean, she can shift from calm to stormy in a hurry! Her magical halo is made up of ribbons, which flutter and dance as she flies.

  The fourth Wind Dancer is—surprise!—a colt. His name is Sirocco. He’s a fiery gold, and he likes to go-go-go. Everywhere he goes, his magical halo of butterflies goes, too.

  The tiny, flying horses live together in the dandelion meadow in a lovely house carved out of the trunk of an apple tree. Every day, Leanna wishes she’ll see the magical little horses again. (She’s sure they’re nearby, but she doesn’t know they’re invisible to people.) And, the Wind Dancers get ready for their next adventure.

  CHAPTER 1

  Rise and … Shine?

  In the sleeping stalls of the Wind Dancers’ apple tree house, all was quiet.

  Well, sort of quiet.

  Kona was snoring noisily from beneath her horse blanket.

  Brisa was giggling her way through a funny dream.

  Sumatra’s feet were tap, tap, tapping on her stall’s wooden floor as she dreamed she was dancing in the air.

  And Sirocco’s stomach was growling. Loudly.

  “Mmmm,” Sirocco murmured in his sleep, his closed eyes smiling. “A second helping of shoofly pie? Don’t mind if I do. I hate flies, but I love pie!”

  As Sirocco bit into the pie in his dream, his actual teeth began click, clack, clicking.

  His lips smacked wetly.

  And he swallowed dramatically with great, big galumphs, even though all he was really swallowing was air.

  “Yum!” said the sleeping horse.

  Of course, in real life, Sirocco’s belly was still empty. His stomach was so noisy, in fact, that it woke him up!

  As Sirocco’s eyes blinked open, he smacked his lips again. Then he sighed.

  Too bad, he thought to himself. I can’t taste that shoofly pie at all. I guess I was dreaming, for sure.

  In the glow of his night-light—actually, a few friendly fireflies—Sirocco looked over at his sleep buddy, a fuzzy green and orange stuffed frog named Jeepers. The cute little toy was plunked on top of his stall wall.

  “Well, Jeepers,” Sirocco said, “if I can’t have dream pie, I might as well get me some real breakfast. I wonder what Kona’s making this morning!”

  Sirocco was so eager to start a new day—and to start it with food—that he reared back in his stall with a happy whinny. His kicking front hoof caught Jeepers and tossed him into the air. The frog did a quick double flip before landing on the floor with a plop!

  “Ha, ha, ha!” Sirocco laughed at Jeepers’ gymnastic move. Then he trotted out of his stall.

  “See you later, Jeepers,” he called over his shoulder.

  His stomach still growling loudly, Sirocco galloped upstairs to the kitchen.

  “Good morrrrning,” he neighed as he approached the kitchen door. “What’s for breakfa—”

  Sirocco skidded to a stop. The kitchen was empty! Well, except for even more fireflies, which were circling the ceiling and giving off a pretty yellow light. No horses were pouring oats into feed buckets or mashing apples into applesauce or drawing nice, cold rainwater into the water trough. And there was, for sure, no shoofly pie.

  “Well,” Sirocco said to himself, “I can do something about that!”

  He turned around and clop, clop, clopped down to his friends’ sleeping stalls, yelling, “Wake up, sleepyheads! Time for breakfast!”

  Sirocco whinnied into Brisa’s stall first, then Kona’s, and finally Sumatra’s—until all three fillies reluctantly woke up. Shaking their heads sleepily, they dragged themselves out of their cozy stalls and loped up to the kitchen.

  Dangling from Brisa’s teeth was her sleep buddy, a tiny horse with a comb-able mane and tail named Brisina. (“Because she looks just like me,” Brisa had told her friends when she’d named her toy horse. “Only teeny-tiny and not quite as pretty.”)

  Kona’s teddy bear—whom she’d given the nice, sensible name Charles—was perched on her neck like a little jockey.

  And Sumatra’s small security blanket—which she’d woven with her satiny magic ribbons—was draped over her back.

  “Sirooooccco,” Brisa complained, shaking her tousled, blond forelock out of her eyes. “Why did you drag Brisina and me away from our beauty sleep?”

  “For breakfast, of course!” Sirocco said.

  “I’m too tired to eat,” Sumatra said through a giant yawn. Her green eyelashes drooped and her tail hung listlessly.

  “And I’m too tired to make anything to eat,” Kona said. All the flowers in her magic halo were tightly closed. They were still sleepy, too.

  Sirocco stared at the fillies in disgust.

  “What do you mean tired?” he demanded. “You’ve been sleeping all night! The day’s going to get away from us!”

  Sumatra gazed out the kitchen window for a moment. Then she frowned and turned to the colt.

  “Sirocco,” she said sternly, “there is no day!”

  “What do you mean?” Sirocco said. “We’re awake, aren’t we? So it must be day.”

  Sumatra looked out the window again and used her nose to point through it.

  “Look,” she said wearily.

  Sirocco trotted over and peered out the window.

  “Look at what?” he said impatiently. “I can’t see anything.”

  “Exactly,” Kona said, joining Sumatra and Sirocco by the window. “You can’t see anything because it’s dark out. It’s still night-time!”

  “You woke up early, Sirocco,” Brisa said with a sleepy shrug. “Let’s go back to bed.”

  “Aw,” Sirocco complained. “I can’t go back to bed now. I’m awake. And so are all of you. Who cares if it’s daytime or night-time? We should go do something.”

  Sumatra stopped yawning and stretching and stared at the colt.
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br />   “Sirocco,” she scolded, “horses stay awake during the day and we sleep at night. It’s the way things are! You can’t just go switching things around!”

  “Why not?!” Sirocco challenged her with an impish grin.

  “Here’s why!” Brisa piped up. She placed Brisina on the kitchen table and anxiously stroked the toy horse’s mane with her nose. “We’ve never been out at night. It might be scary out there.”

  “Please,” Sirocco said, waving his hoof at Brisa. “I’ve heard there are lots of animals who stay up all night—owls and bats and raccoons. If it was so scary at night, they’d stay home!”

  “But we don’t know those owls and bats and raccoons,” Sumatra pointed out. “That means they’re strangers. And you know what they say…”

  “No, what?” Sirocco asked.

  “Stranger danger!” Sumatra replied, looking frightened.

  Sirocco’s eyes went wide. His mouth began to tremble.

  “When you put it that way…” he began.

  The fillies glanced at each other hopefully. Maybe they’d finally persuaded Sirocco to let them go back to bed!

  “… that makes me want to go out more than ever!” Sirocco finished with an excited whinny.

  “Okay, so he’s not scared,” Kona muttered to Sumatra and Brisa.

  Sirocco tapped his hooves impatiently and shot longing looks at the window.

  “You know Sirocco,” Sumatra whispered to the other fillies. “When he’s this excited, there’s no stopping him.”

  “And it will be hard to get back to sleep after all our chitchat,” Brisa whispered back. The jewels in her magic halo had brightened. They looked almost as ready for adventure as Sirocco was.

  Kona shrugged.

  “Okay!” she announced to Sirocco. “I guess we’re going out!”

  “Yeah!” Sirocco cried. “Hey, before we go, can someone make me some shoofly pie for breakfast? It was so yummy in my dream.”

  Sumatra gaped at Sirocco.

  “Don’t push your luck, night owl!” she blurted.

  Sirocco laughed.

  “Hey,” he defended himself, “you can’t blame me for trying!”

  The fillies laughed, too, as they threw together a much-easier-than-shoofly-pie breakfast: some apples, oats, and carrots. Then—chattering excitedly—they tromped up to the tree house’s top floor and gathered at the front door.

  As the horses got ready to take flight, Sumatra used her teeth to tie her ribbon-y security blanket around her neck.

  Kona twisted her head around and tucked her teddy bear tightly under her flower necklace so he wouldn’t fall off while she flew.

  And Brisa used her teeth to hook Brisina’s sparkly reins over one of the jewels in her magic halo.

  “Why are you all bringing your sleep buddies?” Sirocco asked with a teasing grin. “You’re not scared of the dark, are you?”

  “No!” Kona said defensively. She turned around and gave Charles a protective nuzzle with her silky soft nose. “It’s just … you never know when you’re going to need your teddy bear, that’s all.”

  Sumatra and Brisa nodded emphatically.

  “We’re not scared,” Sumatra agreed, snuggling her blanket. “We’re prepared.”

  “Don’t you want to bring Jeepers?” Brisa asked Sirocco.

  “Nope! Why would I do that?” Sirocco scoffed, waving his hoof at Brisa. “Let’s go already,” he urged the fillies. “It’s time for a little night adventure!”

  CHAPTER 2

  Ghost Story

  As Sirocco and the fillies flew into the night sky, they gasped.

  “Everything is so different than it is in the daytime!” Kona said.

  At least, Sirocco was pretty sure it was Kona who’d said this. In the dark night air, lit only by silvery moonlight, the violet-black filly was hard to see! Sirocco could just make out her snowy white forelegs as she flew.

  Other night-time things felt odd to Sirocco, too.

  The full moon floated eerily in the sky. Sirocco felt like it was staring down at him! And the stars were so distant, they made Sirocco feel even tinier than he already was.

  The dandelion meadow felt huge, too. During the day, Sirocco could see the entire field, from Leanna’s tidy farmhouse to the horse paddock to the forest. Now, Leanna’s yellow house had been reduced to the faint glow of the front-porch light. Sirocco couldn’t even see the paddock. And the forest was a dark blot on the horizon.

  While Sirocco tried (a little desperately) to get his bearings, Sumatra sighed happily.

  “I think this must be what it’s like to swim in the ocean,” she said, gliding lazily on an air current. “You’re just floating around in a whole lot of nothing.”

  “Ooh, you’re so right,” Brisa agreed pleasantly.

  Yeah, you are right, Sirocco thought—not so pleasantly.

  “You know the strangest thing about being out at night?” Kona said. “It doesn’t feel scary! In fact, I kind of like it out here!”

  You do?! Sirocco thought as he warily eyed the giant moon.

  “I know!” Sumatra replied in surprise. “I feel the same way. Sure, the air’s a little chilly, but my buddy blanket is keeping me warm.”

  Sirocco, who didn’t have a blanket or a buddy, just shivered.

  “The only thing I don’t like about the night,” Brisa noted, “is that nobody can see how pretty I am in the dark.”

  “Oh, that’s not true,” Kona said kindly. “Your pink coat gives off a beautiful glow in the moonlight.”

  “Really?” Brisa cooed. “Well, then I love night! And so does Brisina.”

  It was Sirocco’s turn to say how fabulous the dark was. The only problem was—Sirocco couldn’t think of anything fabulous to say!

  “Uh, Sirocco?” Kona asked. “Are you having fun on our night out?”

  Sirocco jumped.

  “Of course, I’m having fun!” he brayed.

  Or rather, he tried to bray. But the sound that came out was more of a … squeak.

  A frightened squeak.

  But that’s impossible! Sirocco thought to himself with a frown. I’m not scared. I can’t be scared. I don’t do scared.

  And just to prove the point to himself—or to any other Wind Dancer who might be watching—Sirocco did a loop-de-loop in the cool, damp night air.

  “Ha, ha!” he laughed. This time, his voice sounded a bit stronger.

  See! he told himself triumphantly. I’m not scared at all—

  Suddenly, Sirocco’s thought froze in his mind. His body went cold, as well. And his wings began to flap in panic.

  He’d seen something!

  Something skimming silently along the grass beneath him.

  It was black.

  And swift.

  And it pulsated madly, like a beating heart!

  Sirocco pointed a trembling hoof at the ground.

  “There’s a g-g-gho—” he stammered to his friends.

  “What, Sirocco?” Brisa asked breezily, as she swooped around in the dark.

  “Look down,” Sirocco gasped, his little horse knees practically knocking together. “It’s a g-g-gho—”

  “Wow, look at that!”

  That was Kona. And she was pointing down at the gliding ghost! But instead of being terrified, she was smiling!

  Sirocco wasn’t sure what was going on. And he would definitely have said so if he wasn’t scared speechless by the ghost—which was still directly underneath him!

  Inexplicably, Kona chattered on.

  “Sirocco’s shadow looks so neat in the light of the moon,” she said. “It almost looks like a ghost!”

  “Eeek! I’m scared!” Brisa joked, while Sumatra laughed along. The two of them began giggling and swooping around in the air, hooting like ghosts.

  Sirocco looked again at his “ghost.” He waved one hoof at it. It waved back at him! Sirocco’s mouth dropped open.

  My ‘ghost,’ he thought to himself, was nothing more than my shadow?!

>   Sirocco snuck a glance at the fillies. They were still playing.

  Whew! Sirocco thought in relief. His friends had been so busy having fun, they hadn’t noticed his fear.

  Then he looked again at his shadow, which now seemed perfectly harmless.

  You know, he mused in his head, maybe I was a little scared when I thought my shadow was a ghost. But mostly I was … just getting ready for action.

  And—as Sirocco joined his friends, swooping and hooting himself—he almost believed his own story!

  * * *

  “What should we do now?” Sirocco asked exuberantly after the Wind Dancers had almost worn themselves out flying in the night air. All memories of his fright had by then melted away.

  “Well,” Kona said thoughtfully, “shadows are so different at night. Let’s go see what else is different when it’s dark out.”

  “Ooh, let’s!” Brisa agreed.

  “We’ll go to the woods,” Kona declared. She flapped her wings eagerly. Charles the teddy bear, who was still perched on her neck, seemed to nod.

  But Sirocco felt himself get a little shivery.

  “The woods?” he asked. “Um, I thought you preferred Leanna’s farmhouse, Kona. You know, the one with the lights.”

  “Isn’t the whole point of this adventure to be out in the dark?” Sumatra pointed out. “You’re not scared, are you?”

  “What?” Sirocco said quickly. He felt his face go hot. “No! Of course I’m not scared. No way! Not me! Not even a little bi—”

  “Okay, okay,” Sumatra interrupted with a laugh. “You’ve made your point, Sirocco.”

  Triumphant, Sirocco grinned at the fillies.

  “Okay, so we’ll go to the woods,” he said brashly. “In fact, I say we race. I’m sure I’ll win. You guys are going to be slowed down by your teddy bear and blanket and toy horse.”

  Brisa turned toward Brisina, who was still dangling from a jewel in her halo. She gave the doll a sweet nuzzle with her nose.

  “Don’t listen to him, Brisina,” Brisa said loudly. “Sirocco’s just saying that because he misses Jeepers.”