Winter Wonderland #5 (4 page)

Comet nibbled at the hay with his strong young teeth. “It is very warm and safe here. Thank you,” he whinnied.

“You’re welcome!” Preeti smiled, pleased that Comet liked his cozy new stable.

“Preeti! Where are you?” Viren bawled impatiently from the garden. “I’m getting bored by myself.”

“I’m just cleaning up!” Preeti called to him. She sighed.
What a mess!

She was just about to start tackling it when she felt a strange tingling sensation flowing down to the ends of her fingers. Bright violet sparks ignited in Comet’s silky mouse-brown coat, and his dark gray mane crackled with tiny lightning bolts of power.

Preeti’s eyes widened. Something very strange was about to happen.

She watched in amazement as every last scrap of the scattered straw twitched up into the air.
Swoosh! Crackle!
It swirled around for a few seconds before gathering together and forming the shape of a large straw robot.
Rustle!
He marched across the
barn to where the straw bales were stored and jumped on top of them.

With a soft whispering sound, the straw robot collapsed into a neat heap, just as every last bright spark faded from Comet’s coat.

“Wow! That was amazing!” Preeti said. “It would have taken me ages to clean all that up. Thanks, Comet.”

“You are welcome. Now you can go and have fun in the snow, too.” Comet leaned forward to push his satiny nose into her hands.

Preeti’s heart melted as the magic pony huffed warm grass-scented breath over her fingers. She felt a surge of fondness for him. Comet hadn’t been here for long, but she already loved him to pieces.

As Preeti made her way through the garden, it finally stopped snowing. The sky was milk-white above the rooftops.

Viren was on the small lawn outside the sitting-room window. He was puffing and panting as he piled armfuls of snow into a big mound.

“That took you forever,” he complained moodily. “I bet you wanted to
stay there with Comet, so you had him all to yourself. He’s mine, too, you know!”

“Actually, I was cleaning up the mess
you
made!” Preeti exclaimed. She bit back an even ruder reply as she silently counted to ten. “Never mind. Let’s build this snowman,” she said more calmly, bending down to scoop up some snow.

Thump!
A snowball hit her on the arm.

“What a shot!” Viren crowed.

“Hey!” Grinning, Preeti threw one back at him.

Suddenly, they were pelting each other with snowballs. In all the fun of the fight, Preeti forgot for a while to be mad at her brother. Her breath was steaming out in the cold air, and her cheeks began to glow.

“Truce!” she gasped finally as another snowball hit her on the head, and powdery snow dribbled inside her coat collar. “We’d better stop now or we’ll never finish this snowman!”

“Okay,” Viren agreed. “But I won!” His cheeks were flushed, too, and his dark eyes shone mischievously.

“If you say so,” Preeti said.

“I do!” he shot back, having the last word.

They made a big pile of snow and patted it into shape. Soon they had the snowman’s body. Preeti showed her little
brother how to roll a snowball around so that it gathered snow, and it soon grew to the right shape and size for a head.

“Should we give him a face?” she asked.

“Not yet,” Viren said, his eyes sparkling. “We have to make some legs.”

“Legs?” Preeti raised her eyebrows; then she remembered his earlier plan to make a snow dinosaur.

They made four stumpy legs and put them on so they stuck straight out from the snowman’s body. They looked a little weird, but Viren nodded in satisfaction. He began forming two small triangular ears on the top of the head and shaping the face into a longish muzzle.

“That’s the funniest-looking dinosaur I’ve ever seen!” Preeti said, starting to laugh.

Viren frowned. “It’s not a dinosaur. Can’t you tell what it is?”

“Give me a clue!” Preeti said, putting her head to one side.

“Just a minute.” Viren went and scrabbled in the snow beneath a small tree and then returned with a handful of twigs. He jabbed a clump of them between the lumpy ears and placed the
rest of them in a line that marched down the back of the neck.

“Now can you tell what it is?” he asked.

“A snow alien?” Preeti spluttered.

Viren scowled with annoyance. He put his hands on his hips. “No, you dummy. It’s a snow pony!
Obviously
!”

“
Obviously
—not!” Preeti replied—it looked like a very odd pony to her.

“I’ve made a friend for Comet. I’m going to tell him,” Viren said, heading back toward the barn.

“I’ll come with you,” Preeti said, breathing on her gloves to warm her cold fingers. “Then I think we should go and get some hot chocolate. I’m freezing.”

“Okay. Maybe Comet’s cold, too. We could bring him some hot chocolate.”

“Ponies only drink water,” she told him,
not really concentrating. “And he’ll be fine in the barn. He said that he likes it there, because it’s cozy and warm.”

“How did Comet tell you that?” Viren scoffed. “Ponies can’t talk!”

“Um . . . no, of course they can’t. I was . . . er, just thinking that’s what he’d say if he
could
talk,” Preeti said hastily, realizing that she was going to have be more careful about keeping Comet’s secret.

“It’s so cool having a pony to look after,” Viren declared excitedly. “I’m going to spend every moment I can out here with Comet. I might bring my sleeping bag out so I can sit and read to him. And I could . . .”

Preeti’s heart sank as Viren chattered on. The way her little brother was taking over completely was really annoying and
presented her with a big problem.

“I can’t see how I’m going to slip away by myself so we can search for Destiny,” she whispered to Comet. “He’s even talking about camping out in the barn!”

Comet’s deep-violet eyes twinkled, and he swished his gray tail. “I believe in you, Preeti. I know you will think of a way,” he neighed confidently.

As evening fell, the snow began falling again, and it soon covered the tracks Preeti and Viren had made through the garden earlier. The news on TV showed pictures of people stranded on highways, and planes unable to take off from airports. Everything was at a standstill.

“The trouble is, we’re not used to this weather in this part of the country,”
Mrs. Nimesh said, switching channels with the remote control. “If we were, there’d be special measures in place to deal with it, like enough snowplows to clear the main roads.”

Grandma glanced out of the sitting-room window at the snow pony on the lawn. It seemed to glow faintly in the moonlight. “He is very beautiful. He could be there for a long time in this freezing weather,” she commented.

Preeti was curled up in a chair, reading
a book of pony stories. She loved the feeling of being warm and cozy inside the house when everything was white and frozen outside. Comet was safe in the barn, and there would be no school for a while, so she could spend a ton of time with him.

If only she could think of a way of distracting Viren for a few hours, everything would be perfect.

She looked up to smile at her grandma and saw that she looked a bit worried. “Is something wrong?” she asked.

“I was just thinking about Mr. Linford. He lives alone and his relatives are very far away. I hope he will be all right.” Mr. Linford was an elderly gentleman whom Grandma had met while she was giving lessons in Indian cooking at the local
community center. They often met to talk and share a pot of tea.