Hellrider: Secrets

Secrets

Hellrider Novel - Book 1

I inhale deeply, shortening my reins. I've been so so sooo looking forward to this moment for ages yet now I can feel the butterflies settling inside my tummy, especially seeing as mum, dad and my younger eleven-year-old sister Libby should've been here ages ago.

I peer at the crowd worryingly. A stablehand from the stables has volunteered to take me. But I haven't seen hide nor hair (though that sounds a bit posh) of them since the crowds started rolling in. They couldn't take me as dad was busy at the garage first (he's a mechanic). There are quite a few people here, but mum had specially promised to be here for me and there is no way on this Earth that they'd be this late. But I can rant at her later (if they don't come at all, because for all I know, they might just be a tad bit late).

Now's the time to focus. Both me and Warrior (my thoroughbred stallion - yes, I have my own horse, no, I'm not exactly rich, or spoilt blah blah blah blah) have been training for this for months. We're competing against people my age - not exactly amateur though (I'm fourteen and have been riding since I was five), and I am determined to win this show jumping comp.

"Whitney Thompson on Warrior!" That now-irritating-woman's-voice booms through the speaker. She says it in the same dreary fashion as she has had for the last few hundred times (ok, not literally, only four competitors have competed so far, but you get the picture). Besides, it seems like ages. I try to relax, pat Warrior and whisper,"You up for it, big boy?" And I swear I feel his muscles tense up as if he's ready. I kick his sides and we casually walk into the arena, butterflies fluttering within my stomach whilst the crowds cheer a little. We're actually out in the arena now, and I kick his sides twice into a canter and we begin, heading for jump number one. Gracefully, we leap over it and land on the other side; then I wheel him around towards jump number two - a double oxer. But then suddenly horrifying images come flying into my mind, distorted, everything all jumbled up like a jigsaw I just can't quite connect together.

A big flashy black car is speeding after my family in their silver Toyota on a dual carriage way. The guy in the black car winds down his window and cocks out a gun, but I can't see the guy very well at all; he's all fuzzy and blurred up. I can't make out his features very well. A gunshot bellows through my mind and everything goes all fuzzy and jumbled up like a fuzzy T.V screen that can't get signal. All I see is heaps of scarlet in my family's car. My dad's speeding away, and is about to pull in a lay-by, but the guy's car gets too close and he practically slams into them, until he rams right up into the back of the car - on purpose. Libby screams out in pain as the impact of the car hits her, jamming her between herself and dad's seat and smacking her head against the window knocking her out stone cold, and dad has a nasty cut on his forehead. Mum, however, is drooped there, lifeless, spatters of her blood sprayed onto the windows with an entrance wound from where the bullet hit her in the back of her head.

NO!

I let out a terrifying shriek right out loud, frightening poor Warrior as we sail over a jump and as we land I feel his legs buckle beneath him, causing Warrior to whinny out in pain and collapse. I roll out across the ground, hitting the ground real hard, with my right arm in an awkward position. I scream quietly in agony, being unable to move my right arm at all. The pain shoots through me like Red Bull energizer. Suddenly I feel my stomach lurch as if I'm gonna puke up and my whole body completely ceases up. This excruciating pain begins to devour me, rocketing right up through my body from the tips of my toes. I clutch hold of my stomach desperately as I lay there, unable to move. The last thing I can see is a beautiful, intricate, elaborate swirly tattoo - the swirls entwining together to closely resemble a snarling wolf's head - glowing with pure radiance on the inside of my left wrist.