not, when he completely shut it! She didn't understand. He was supposed to be her friend. Had he decided he didn't like her anymore.
"But mum! You don't understand! He would usually do anything to go to the beach.
And he told me that he doesn't have anything to do or anywhere to go on Saturdays!"
"Now Rosie. You can't expect everyone to hop to it every time you want to do something. Besides, you might get sick of each other and fall out. It's good to have a break sometimes." her mother said, stirring the sugar into her tea. Rosie knew she had to drop the convosation.
"Oh well, I can still go to the beach to practise on my own."
"Good idea, love." her mum smiled.
The dogs needed to run of their energy. The cold air made them rather active, and so it was more than they could ever dream to be led out into the open beach. But it was hard to keep them under control. Luckily, they tired themselves out quite quickly and Rosie was able to direct them easily. They were running inbetween some sand banks, when Jai suddenly stopped and sniffed around.
"Come
on Jai!" Rosie shouted. She had had enough of this stopping continuously. She grabbed Jai and accedently un clipped him. He didn't run off, but sniffed all the way up one of the sand banks and stood on top. He barked. Rosie stumbled up to catch him, and she saw something that pulled on her heart.
It was Donny. He wasn't with aother girl, he was with a group of several dogs and he sat on a sled. He was trying to train for the race and beat her. Rosie sank back down the slope and ran over in her mind what was going on.
"Well, he is aloud to race if he wants. It doesn't mean we're not friends any more."
"Don't be so stupid! If he
was still your friend he wouldn't have minded training with you, even if you were competing with each other."
"Yes. I know. But what if it was a supprise for me or something like that?"
"But how can trying to beat you in a competition be a nice supprise? It might have been a supprise, but a nasty meaning one!"
All these thoughts whirled around and around in her head until she suddenly burst out crying. Ilena knew that humans cried when something was wrong or they were upset. She paddd over to her musher and licked her. Rosie looked up. She saw her friend and hugged her. Then, once she had gathered her emotions together, she clipped Jai back up and turned back to Nome. She avoided the clearing where she saw Donny. She was still thinking.
He might just be taking care of them or even just playing with the dogs. It's probably just a misunderstanding. Then again, it might not be...
Rosie's sadness turned into anger. But she didn't let it get to her. First she'd tell her mum. Why did life have to be so complicated?! Ilena also had something to tell
her parents. The lead dog on that team was Steele.
"That's impossable!" shouted Balto. How could Steele be aloud to race again?
Plus the fact that there would be children everywhere.
"And what's worse, Steele knows that you're related to me and will do anything to provent you from winning. And your musher is
Rosie! So what will happen to her if he tries to savatage the team?"
"Balto! Stop shouting at Ilena! It's not her fault." Jenna yapped. Ilena hated it when Balto shouted, even when it wasn't anything to do with her.
"I'm
NOT shouting" Balto yelled. It went quiet. He sighed. He knew he shouldn't be taking it out on them. He calmed down and mutterd "I'm sorry. I'm just worried that something will happen to you and Rosie." Balto sat down and thought about the race, that was only in a weeks time. He was no doubt nervous, but he knew that Ilena would keep Rosie safe. In his heart he was more worried about Ilena. He had expirenced what Steele could do, and didn't want it happening to her. Ilena left the house and went to sleep in the boiler room. Mifa and Marsha were there.
"Oh hi, sugar!" twittered Marsha. But Mifa had a more concerned look on her face.
"What's wrong?" she asked. Ilena seemed glum. Usually she was energetic and bright, but she looked, heavy. Ilean made an effort to smile but couldn't hide away the truth. She was scared. She hadn't told anyone in her life how frightened Steele made her feel whan he was around. Now dogs can't cry, but they whine. Ilena whined and sniffed.
"I don't even like standing across the road from Steele, let alone next to him in a race. He scares me, he's got this madness in his eyes. He's
evil!" She started whining again. Marsha was always cheery, no-one had ever seen her without a smile on her face since she was born. But now, all that changed. She was concerned for her friend and so dropped her smile, and nuzzled her.
The three dogs lay there until they were tired and went to sleep. However, in the night, the door swung open, leaving the wind and snow to whip around the room. Steele walked in. He put his mouth close to Ilena's ear and whispered:
"If you beat me, I'll kill you."
Thousands of him were around her. She ran in every direction but he just closed her off from the rest of the world. Suddenly she tripped, and fell, she fell a million miles down a hole she had never known.
"You beat me, Ilena. You beat me so I've killed you."
These words echoed around her body. Ilena stopped falling and began to float. She didn't go anywhere, but sat in thin air. The voice started again.
"I don't care what I do. I will win!"
She was more scared than ever in her life. She suddenly realised that she wasn't breathing. She tried to take a huge gasp of air but choked. She spluttered and coughed. But she couldn't breath. Her air grew short. The voice filled her body again.
"Don't ever try to defeat me."
The hole disappeared and she was in a box. The box was made of glass and the top was sealed. Below her, the world lay, many hundreds of feet down. Then water started to fill the box. Ilena cried for help, but no sound came out of her mouth. The voice spoke a final time.
"You won't win, you won't live, you won't see your family again."
Ilena had one more go at getting air. She tossed her head forwards and,
Ilena shot up from her sleep, gasping for air. The other dogs had left and she was alone and cold. She felt exhausted, worse than when they nearly died in the cave. Ilena sank back to the floor. Steele strolled in. But Ilena was too tired to care. Even now she was still trying to breath. Steele walked around her, looking down on her."Feeling okay?" he chuckled. He turned around towards the door suddenly. Ilena tried to get up, but her legs wouldn't help her. She heard a familiar voice. At first she thought it was Balto, but it was Jai.
"Steele," he growled "Get out of here. Now." He kept his ears pressed back and his shoulders high, like a cat ready to pounce on a rat. He held his tail errect, though, to show that he was the alpha. Steele strolled over to him. He pretened to leave, but without any warning, he shot around and bit Jai on the leg. Jai yowled. The marks left by Steele's teeth bled. He turned and jumped on him. The two dogs rolled over and over in the snow. Ilena ran to them. The snow had turned from white to red in a matter of seconds.
"Steele! Leave him! Jai, get up! Let him go, Jai! He's not worth it!" she cried in dispare. Suddenly Steele ran off and whined. Jai stood there, claws still stuck out, his mouth foaming. Jai fell to the floor. Ilena had no idea what to do. Should she go and get help, or stay with him? Jai had a scratch or two on his face, and the bite on his leg wasn't much trouble, but his sides had been clawed quite badly. Ilena had noticed that Steele's tail had been ripped of the fur at the end and his white chest had been scratched rather ferociously and the hair had been turned to pink. What had Jai got himself into?
"I will not own a dangerous dog!" The father of Jai's owner had decided. Jai was thrown out of the house to live on the streets. Steele, however, was cleaned up and fed a high-energy food to help him recover. Life wasn't fair. Ilena refused to leave Jai on the streets alone, though, and so they walked around town together. She was still very worried about the race. Jai was a fully grown, strong, male dog. If Steele could reduce
him to shreds, then what would happen to
her?
Balto was walking down the road when he saw Ilena and her friend. "What happened?" he exclaimed. Ilena explained everything that had happened. Balto led them to Rosie's house. Rosie immeadiatly saw them and was horrified at the state of Jai. She called out her dad and grabbed a lead and a blanket.
The vet ran his fingers over the cuts and Jai winced with pain. But the man spoke softly to him and was very gentle. He asked Rosie's dad who the owners were.
"The Cane family." he replied. The vet walked over to a filing cabinet and looked in A,B,C and pulled out Cane. He rang up the number and waited for and answer. Rosie lightly cleaned the cuts with a warm, wet towel. The vet came back into the room and told the news.
"They refuse to have anything to do with him. They now see him as a dangerous animal and they don't want to be dragged in."
"But they
can't!" Rosie shouted. She was very upset at the thought of someone abandoning a dog for something that couldn't helped. But her father pointed out that they couldn't possibly take in another dog, but they could feed him sometimes and keep an eye out.
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