Galloping Gold Read online

  Soda—Ann’s blue-black horse. Unlike Sugarfoot, he’s a good therapy horse when he’s had enough exercise.

  Buckin’ Baxter—blue roan in training as a cow horse and I can stay on him!

  Prettypaint—used to be my mom’s horse, but now she lives with Tutu. She’s pale gray with bluish spots on her heels, and silky feathers on her fetlocks. She kneels for Tutu to get on and off, not like she’s doing a trick, but as if she’s carrying a queen.

  Mistwalker—is Patrick’s horse. She’s a beautiful black-and-white paint—bred by Jonah! He could hardly stand to admit she was born on ‘Iolani Ranch, which is silly. Her conformation is almost pure Quarter Horse and you can see that beyond her coloring. And what he doesn’t know about Mistwalker’s grandfather (probably) won’t hurt him!

  Honi—Cade’s mom’s gray pony. Her name means “kiss” and she really does kiss. Cade jokes that his mom likes Honi best. He also says Honi is “half Arab and half Welsh and all bossy.” And, she likes to eat water lilies!

  Snowfire—an amazing mustang from Sky Mountain. He reminds me of Tutu’s story about Moho, the god of steam—Pele’s brother, too, I think—who could take the form of a powerful white stallion. Snowfire’s conformation is like Black Lava’s. He looks just as wild and primitive, and though they’re about the same size, Snowfire just seems wiser.

  PLACES

  Lehua High School—the school Megan and I go to. School colors are red and gold.

  Crimson Vale—it’s an amazing and magical place, and once I learn my way around, I bet I’ll love it. It’s like a maze, though. Here’s what I know: From town you can go through the valley or take the ridge road—valley has lily pads, waterfalls, wild horses, and rainbows. The ridge route (Pali?) has sweeping turns that almost made me sick. There are black rock teeter-totter-looking things that are really ancient altars and a SUDDEN drop-off down to a white sand beach. Hawaiian royalty are supposedly buried in the cliffs.

  Moku Lio Hihiu—Wild Horse Island, of course!

  Sky Mountain—goes up to five thousand feet, sometimes snow-capped, sometimes called Mountain to the Sky by most of the older folks, and it’s supposed to be the home of a white stallion named Snowfire.

  Two Sisters—cone-shaped “mountains”—a borderline between them divides Babe’s land from Jonah’s, one of them is an active volcano.

  Sun House—our family place. They call it plantation style, but it’s like a sugar plantation, not a Southern mansion. It has an incredible lanai that overlooks pastures all the way to Mountain to the Sky and Two Sisters. Upstairs is this little apartment Jonah built for my mom, but she’s never lived in it.

  Hapuna—biggest town on island, has airport, flagpole, public and private schools, etc., palm trees, and coconut trees. It also has the Hapuna Animal Rescue barn.

  ‘IolaniRanch—our home ranch. 2,000 acres, the most beautiful place in the world.

  Pigtail Fault—near the active volcano. It looks more like a steam vent to me, but I’m no expert. According to Cade, it got its name because a poor wild pig ended up head down in it and all you could see was his tail. Too sad!

  Sugar Sands Cove Resort—Aunt Babe and her polo-player husband, Phillipe, own this resort on the island. It has sparkling white buildings and beaches and a four-star hotel. The most important thing to me is that Sugar Sands Cove Resort has the perfect water-schooling beach for me and Hoku.

  The Old Sugar Plantation—Tutu says it’s a dangerous place. Really, it’s just the ruins of A-Z sugar plantation, half of which belonged to Patrick’s family. Now it’s mostly covered with moss and vines and ferns, but you can still see what used to be train tracks, some stone steps leading nowhere, a chimney, and rickety wooden structures that are hard to identify.

  ON THE RANCH, THERE

  ARE PASTURES WITH NAMES LIKE:

  Sugar Mill and Upper Sugar Mill—for cattle

  Two Sisters—for young horses, one- and two-year-olds they pretty much leave alone

  Flatland—mares and foals

  Pearl Pasture—borders the rain forest, mostly two-and three-year-olds in training

  Borderlands—saddle herd and Luna’s compound

  I guess I should also add me…

  Darby Leilani Kealoha Carter—I love horses more than anything, but books come in second. I’m thirteen, and one-quarter Hawaiian, with blue eyes and black hair down to about the middle of my back. On a good day, my hair is my best feature. I’m still kind of skinny, but I don’t look as sickly as I did before I moved here. I think Hawaii’s curing my asthma. Fingers crossed.

  I have no idea what I did to land on Wild Horse Island, but I want to stay here forever.

  About the Author

  Terri Farley is the author of the wildly popular Phantom Stallion series, which has sold one million copies. For her new series, Wild Horse Island, Terri volunteered on a horse ranch in Hawaii for three weeks. After much coaxing, she returned to her husband in Verdi, Nevada, where she lives and writes.

  To learn more about Terri’s books and the wild horses of Nevada and Hawaii, visit her online at www.phantomstallion.com.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  Check out the

  Phantom Stallion

  series, also by Terri Farley!

  1

  THE WILD ONE

  2

  MUSTANG MOON

  3

  DARK SUNSHINE

  4

  THE RENEGADE

  5

  FREE AGAIN

  6

  THE CHALLENGER

  7

  DESERT DANCER

  8

  GOLDEN GHOST

  9

  GIFT HORSE

  10

  RED FEATHER FILLY

  11

  UNTAMED

  12

  RAIN DANCE

  13

  HEARTBREAK BRONCO

  14

  MOONRISE

  15

  KIDNAPPED COLT

  16

  THE WILDEST HEART

  17

  MOUNTAIN MARE

  18

  FIREFLY

  19

  SECRET STAR

  20

  BLUE WINGS

  21

  DAWN RUNNER

  22

  WILD HONEY

  23

  GYPSY GOLD

  24

  RUN AWAY HOME

  Read all of Darby’s adventures!

  Phantom Stallion

  WILD HORSE ISLAND

  1

  THE HORSE CHARMER

  2

  THE SHINING STALLION

  3

  RAIN FOREST ROSE

  4

  CASTAWAY COLT

  5

  FIRE MAIDEN

  6

  SEA SHADOW

  7

  MISTWALKER

  8

  WATER LILY

  9

  SNOWFIRE

  10

  FARAWAY FILLY

  Credits

  Cover art © 2009 by John Rowe

  Copyright

  PHANTOM STALLION: WILD HORSE ISLAND #11: GALLOPING GOLD. Copyright © 2009 by Terri Sprenger-Farley. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  Adobe Digital Edition March 2009 ISBN 978-0-06-188983-7

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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