A/N: There are a couple time jumps in this chapter and I haven't smoothed it out very much, but at least it's in order and not all over the place like it was before. Let me know what you think!

* I hopped off and adjusted my riding pants that were getting too tight and way too short because I had gotten them almost a year ago when I was eight.

"Wren! How'd you like him?" Christie asked with raised eyebrows. I looked back to the blue grulla Fjord I had ridden for the last hour.

"He's nice... I like his colors." I approved, having a hard time sounding completely positive.

"You looked great on him." She said in confusion, sensing something was wrong. Her face had dropped. "He looked good!" She argued.

"You don't like him?"

"He's not very energetic. Not like Raven." I shrugged, referring the little bay that I had been riding until recently. I patted Aragorn and rolled up my stirrups.

"Wren, you're outgrowing poor little Raven." She repeated as she had many times before.

"I don't know. He's a little chubby..." I laughed.

"He's in pretty good shape for a Fjord." Christie laughed, making me think of another Fjord I had ridden bareback that was like riding a barrel as soft as a couch. I smirked, as we walked in through the grey sliding door out of the fading sun into the warm yellowy light of the barn.

"Well, maybe we'll take him jumping tomorrow and that'll change your mind." Christie chirped, making the twenty or so people within earshot look up from what they were doing. It was the end of a long day and one of the busiest times at the barn. Most of the people with Boarding horses were tending to their personal horses and were in the aisle grooming while the lesson horses and ponies were near the other side of the barn and were being fed by volunteers and employees.

"How was the new horse?" Gretchen questioned me from where she stood next to the black Giara horse that I had named Cobra Starsnip that belonged to the barn.

"He was good." I answered, trying to sound like I wasn't disappointed because I knew Christie was only trying to do something nice for me.

"You sound convincing." Hayden said with sarcasm.

"He's so unique. He's even got little stripes on his legs." Sadie smiled from where she was waiting for her parents to pick her up.

"I like him." I tried to convince the others. I could see the look on my sister's face like she thought I was disappointed and felt bad.

"We can always use him as a lesson horse if you don't want him." Christie told me quietly, putting a hand on my shoulder comfortingly before striding off to see how far the volunteers and workers had gotten with the lesson horses.

I felt horrible as I set to work untacking Aragorn and I heard the familiar whinny of Cherokee, my friend Hayden's peppy chestnut tovero Pinto pony, as she walked by me with his hay to feed him his dinner.

The 12 hand Caspian horse I had been leasing, Raven, had been moved to a different section of the 'lesson' side of the barn and I was missing him already. I really liked to ride him, but I was getting too tall for him and Christie wanted me to have a horse that I could stay with for the next couple of years. I hoped she was right about the Fjord that I had renamed Aragorn, that he would be fun once we started jumping. Raven loved to jump and I shared his energy and excitement, which had made us a good match.

"Oh, stop being a cry-baby." Addison's voice came from behind me as I started sponging off Aragorn. She had an air of impatience as she strode by with her new horse, a grey roan jumper named Crystal Unicorn. I knew she was being a hypocrite. When she started riding, her parents bought her a fancy British Spotted pony named Windsor Castle and Addison decided she didn't like riding her very much so they sold her to the stable and Windsor became a lesson horse.

With over a hundred stalls, Silver Willow Stables, located in eastern New York, permanently housed about thirty lesson horses and ponies and fourty boarding horses. The extra stalls were used for visiting horses and temporary boarders. In addition to the many horses and people that frequented Silver Willow, there were also ten to fifteen canine companions that visited with their owners. Despite the presence of these often boisterous companions, the barn played host to nine or ten barn cats that had the very important job of keeping mice and other rodents out each of the six grain rooms as well as the three huge haylofts.

Horses were constantly being led in and out, from being turned out into one of the many paddocks to coming in from one of the six large arenas or one of the many small practice rings. The most popular of the riding locations were the two indoor arenas. The smaller one was located on the lesson side of the barn near the offices and the larger one was right off the boarding side of the stable. From Aragorn's new stall, the boarder indoor that we had named the 'Ariat' after the ads on the walls was only a short walk past a few more stalls, then through the grooming and tacking stalls where Aragorn was cross-tied, and finally through a small alcove with a sliding door on either side for access to the paddocks.

The coaches at Silver Willow all excelled in various fields of equitation and eventing including show-jumping, cross country, and dressage. There were also a small number that rode western for pleasure, using one of the rings for barrel-racing and other games. Silver Willow hosted all kinds of events including hunter-jumper circuit shows, eventing and schooling days, and even polo matches every once in a while. My favorite of the events was the yearly Renaissance Fair.

*

It was near the end of fourth grade, during my school's April vacation, Vati had taken me on a plane to a tropical place and I had spent most of my week with Laura going to the beach while Vati did some 'business'. I was annoyed that Christie couldn't come with us. She had gone on the school trip for her senior year of High school to Italy and Greece, but before she left, she had promised that she had gotten me an early birthday present that I'd get when I got back. Grannie didn't travel anymore so she didn't come.

I came back to New York with a tan and Vati looked tan too when he and I sat in the back of the black BMW that came to pick us up on the tarmac when we got out of the jet.

"Did you have fun Wren?" he asked me.

"Yes, Vati." I smiled, brightly. He smiled back and then his phone rang and his face turned stern as he answered in German.

"Was ist los?" 'What's wrong?' he asked.

"Nein, stellen Sie sicher, dass er nicht davonkommt!" 'No, make sure he doesn't get away.' He said after a moment.

"Gut. Ist das alles?" 'Good. Is that all?' He said before hanging up. "I have to drop you off at home and then I have another meeting." He told me.

"Okay." I answered.

I was glad Christie was home when we got there. One of the drivers had gotten Christie from the airport and she was really happy to see me when Laura and I appeared in the doorway.

"You're so tan, Wren!" she laughed.

"I spent a lot of time on the beach." I laughed.

"You had fun in Mexico?" she asked.

"Yeah. I wish you could've come though." I told her.

"Let's go to the barn. I have to give you your gift." She told me, with an excited look on her face.

"Okay!" I answered.

*

It was a Sunday. I had slept on the plane that had left early that morning and Christie told me she had gotten back Saturday night and had already gone to the barn to make sure my gift was happy. That's how I knew she had gotten me some kind of animal. The barn was always pretty busy on weekends and it was midday when Christie drove me in her white BMW. People always looked when Christie's car drove up. I had always thought it was just because it was white and pretty, but I didn't realize that it was because Christie had inherited the barn that year after she turned eighteen. Not much had changed, but Christie had helped the new barn manager, Abigail, hire a few more people and everybody that worked and rode there knew she was the owner.

She had on some new beige breeches, clean paddock boots, and a blue collared button-up. I was still wearing my shorts and a bright blue flowy tank top that Vati had bought me in Mexico. My hair had been braided half in cornrows because I thought they looked cool and Vati and Laura didn't really like it but I met a couple nice girls on the beach that did. They let me play volley ball with them and they gave me some soda.

"I bought you a baby horse, Wren." Christie cheered as she brought me to a paddock where there were three adolescent horses of different colors. My eyes went immediately to the grey and gold one with the black mane and tail. I turned back to Christie with wide eyes and she nodded. "Yes, the dun is yours!" she told me. I was breathless and I hugged her so tight she just laughed. "You can name him whatever you want. His breeder's name is Espíritu Valiente, which means brave spirit in Spanish. He's a breed called a Lusitano. Sometimes they call them PRE's which stands for Pura Raza Espanola which means pure Spanish horse. He's going to have a nice neck like you like and apparently he's a little wild so I think he's going to be just what you're into."

"He's perfect!" I squeaked with my fists pressed to my lips in excitement. When I turned to the paddock, he came walking over curiously with the little bay horse following him. I reached and he let me pet his soft nose and he nibbled on my finger as I looked into his dark reddish-brown eyes in awe.

"They haven't worked with him much so Abi and I are going to help you train him yourself." She started. She went over how to start working with him and told me she had gotten me Aragorn so that I'd have a horse to ride while my new baby horse was being trained before he could be ridden.

"Hey!" my friends called to me when they came sprinting over. They looked like they had just come from one of the paddocks.

"Hi, guys!" I said as the three of them gave me a hug.

"Did you meet your horse?!" Hayden asked, bobbing in excitement.

"Yeah. Wait, who are the others for?" I asked turning back to Christie who smirked.

"One's mine!" Hayden grinned.

"Wow, which one?" I asked turning back to the three horses to guess.

"The chestnut. I have to come up with a name still." She told me.

"I got the bay for sort of a project horse." Christie told us. "But I figured he'd be good for teaching you guys how to train a horse." The bay was about the same size as the chestnut, while my dun was a little bigger. Both the bay and the chestnut had skinny necks compared to mine and my horse went trotting around and tossing his head after the other two. He put his head down like he was smelling them out and it reminded me of a dog or a wolf.

"I haven't named mine either. I was hoping you'd help me come up with one." Christie laughed, looking at me. A bunch of other riders started coming over to see what we were looking at. "Oh, and they need to have a good show name." Christie added as her friend James leaned on the rail next to her.

"Ah, you haven't named them yet?" he asked. "Get on it, Christie!" He said with an air of superiority to his voice. Christie wasn't offended by his seemingly mean attitude and she just gave him a look.

"I want to call him Wolf." I spoke up, as Jensen and his youngest brother Justin came over.

"But he's not a wolf. He's a horse." Justin pointed out.

"Duh, Captain Obvious!" Jensen exclaimed in exasperation. "She means his name."

"Oh..." Justin laughed.

"Hey, Captain Obvious is sort of a cute name." Gretchen commented quietly, eyeing the little bay trot with his knees high.

"Yeah, you're right, Gretchen. I like it." Christie nodded, looking back into the small paddock.

"Wren, what's your show name going to be?" James asked me. I pursed my lips as I thought.

"Uhh, House of Wolves? Wolf bite? Uh, Spirit of the Wolf? I don't like any of those. Let me think..." I murmured. He just smirked unhelpfully. I could tell he was holding back from telling me my ideas were stupid.

"Wren, how about Raised by Wolves?" Christie suggested.

"That's good. I like it!" I said, giving her a high five.

"God, you guys are so quick!" Hayden complained. "I can only think of barn names." She frowned.

"Like what?" Christie and I asked at the same time as a few more riders came over to admire our little horsies, which weren't really that little since they were a year old.

"I like Willy and Ace and Bandit." She listed with her finger on the corner of her mouth.

"My mom has a horse named Ace." James said, sounding bored.

"Okay, well how about the others?" Hayden asked.

"I like Bandit. You could make a cool show name out of that." I commented.

"Hey! How do you like him?" Coach asked in a booming voice making me spin with a smile to see him and Abigail come over.

"I love him!" I told him, accepting a big hug from Coach and then Abigail pulled me into another hug.

"We've already picked a name!" Christie said as her friend Anna joined her with curiosity. "Raised by Wolves. His barn name's going to be Wolf." Christie smiled.

"Espíritu Valiente Raised by Wolves. Has a ring to it." Abigail said with a smile.

"Fancy!" James joked in a fake British Accent getting a chuckle from Anna.

"Should I have named him in Spanish?" I asked with a laugh.

"Nah, I had a horse named in Spanish and the announcers always pronounced his name wrong." Abi told me in exasperation, making a few of us laugh.

*

Hayden's whole family had helped her come up with Bandit's show name. They decided since he was a Thoroughbred, his show name would be 'Clean Getaway' and since he was bred from horses at Silver Willow his full name was 'Silver Willow's Clean Getaway'.

Christie had settled on 'Captain Obvious' for the sweet bay colt and she decided she could change it later if she felt like it. She ordered plaques for Wolf and Bandit's stalls with their full show names and the three yearling colts were placed in stalls all in a row near Aragorn, Bezah, and Cherokee.

*

Christie taught me how to lunge Wolf in one of the three round rings. She showed me and Gretchen with Captain and then when Captain was being good, she left Gretchen alone and helped me with Wolf. Wolf was more stubborn and faster than Captain. I had been petting him and giving him treats in his paddock a lot so he kept coming to the center to see if I was going to give him a treat. Wolf had a lot of energy and my arm was aching all the way up to my shoulder when Christie came to get me.

She had us walk them both around the whole barn and in the parking lot to get them used to seeing all the different sights and sounds. I cringed when Wolf took a bite out of the seat of the old tractor and Gretchen laughed. Going near the road made me jumpy and it started to make Wolf jumpy since I was jumpy so Christie helped lead him with me and we made our way around the outside of the mare paddocks. Wolf and Captain were interested in the mares and the mares came trotting over to see them.

Christie graduated high school and spent the whole summer with me going to the barn every day. She did a few shows and competed on Bezah and she brought me and entered me with Aragorn. Hayden's family did shows too and Jensen and Coach competed a lot on their horses while Hayden competed at my level with Cherokee. Gretchen did a couple shows competing on Cobra, but her foster parents took their four foster children on trips over the summer so she sometimes wasn't around for weeks at a time. Sadie came to a few shows too and her mom and sometimes her dad even accompanied her.