The McIlvoy Residence

"Nah, they're herbivores. I promise they're nice."

Once all three had led their respective horses outside, Kaela stopped, looking to Finn. "Do you want to help Courtney mount? I can show her, and then you can make sure she doesn't fall."
 
Courtney's jaw dropped when she heard the words "mount" and "fall". She wanted to protest, but decided against it. She waited for Kaela's demonstation and said, "I hope it is as easy as mounting a broom for the fist time."
 
Kaela put her left foot in the left stirrup and pushed off of the ground, swinging her right leg over and succesfully landing in the horses saddle. "Finn's strong, he can help you. And if you really want, there's a ladder."
 
Courtney watched Kaela mount the horse and decided it didn't look too hard. She stuck her foot in the stirrup and grabbed the saddle to pull herself up. She then swung her right leg over the horse and was sitting perfectly on the saddle. "Cool, I did it!" She grabbed the reins that were sitting on Hershey's neck. "What are these for?" She asked, trying hard not to pull on them.
 
"Careful," Finn said, grabbing Courtney's hand. Those are what tell Hershey when to go. You pull on them when you want her to walk. Tug left if you want her to go left, right if you want her to go right, and straight back if you want her to go straight. But if pull too hard, she'll stop. Also, if you want her to stop, say 'whoa' and kind of tighten your legs on her."

He walked away from Courtney and mounted Stepper, directed him over to Courtney. "Think you got it?"
 
Kaela rolled her eyes as Finn smiled back at Courtney. She brought Mara around so that she was next to Courtney. "We'll start real slow. Just pull back gently and go forward slowly. Oh yeah, you can talk to her, she'll understand."
 
Courtney followed Kaela's instructions and pulled slowly on the reins. "So I can talk to her?" she questioned Kaela.

"Please go slowly, and don't try and kick me off."

"Kaela, you never mentioned horses at Hogwarts. I had no idea you liked to ride them."
 
Finn watched as Hershey walked forward slowly with Courtney on her back. "Seems I'm not the only one she keeps things from. You're doing good Court."
 
Courtney raised an eyebrow at Kaela and Finn, and then began to laugh. "You guys are hilarious."

She then pulled with her right hand and watched Hershey turn to the right. "You're cool, Hersh."
 
Hershey neighed happily at Courtney and Kaela giggled slightly. "Yeah, we're just spectacular," she said sarcastically. "Think you're ready to go a bit faster?"
 
"You heard her Mara, let's go." Kaela clicked and pulled back on the reins, leading Mara over toward the woods. It was a clear day, not quite as cloudy as usual, and only fairly cool, good sweatshirt weather.

She wasn't galloping or anything, but she had Mara going at a decent trot toward the trail, trusting Finn and Courtney were following.
 
Finn started off slowly, watching Courtney to make sure she got off all right. "You go ahead of me and I'll follow. Don't want you to get left behind."
 
Much to her surprise, Courtney did not have to do much to get Hershey trotting. She seemed to just follow suit after Mara. Courtney looked behind her shoulder at Finn and winked. "You're just saying that because you know Kaela and I could go faster than you!"
 
"Oh really," Finn said as he came to trot alongside Courtney. "That sounds like a challenge if I ever heard one."
 
Courtney laughed, "It might sound like a challenge, but I don't know if Hershey is ready to race yet." She actually meant she wasn't ready, but she didn't want to show weakness in front of Kaela or Finn.
 
"Hershey's not ready, or you're not ready?" Finn grinned at courtney. "I've ridden Hershey before and she can go mighty fast if you let her. But it's not best to try until you're absolutely ready. Wouldn't want you to fall off or anything. Broken bones on Christmas would not be fun."
 
Courtney frowned, "I don't know how you can read minds so well Finn, you sure you don't belong at Hogwarts? How do you deal with broken bones anyways?"
 
"Nah, no Hogwarts for me. I don't read minds, just people. I suppose you have some special spell or potion that heals bones. Here, we put it in a cast. Basically they put a mold around your leg, or arm, or whatever, so that it can't move. And you have to keep it on for weeks while your bone heals itself."
 
Courtney gasped, "weeks? That'd be terrible! Let us stay at this pace! I wouldn't want to let my quidditch team down!"

"I suppose reading people is a good quality, right Kaela?"
 
"Yeah, reading people," Kaela said absentmindedly over her shoulder. She usually went riding so that she could think, bringing her iPod and just tuning out the world around her. There were a lot of things going through her head and she was quite content letting Finn chat it up with Courtney.
 
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