“Okay,” I say.
“So, terrible,” she says. “Gabe told me they wouldn’t give you any colors.”
I shake my head. I won’t let my face show anything.
Peg says, “Right, then. Off with the saddle.”
Mystified but trusting, I pull off the saddle and watch Peg carefully unfold the costume in her arms. I see now that the great, terrifying bird head is no longer attached; it’s just the back of the feather-covered cape. Peg lays it down on Dove’s back where the colors would have gone, and then she takes the saddle and looks to make certain that it won’t chafe.
“Now you wear Thisby’s colors,” she says.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me.” Peg’s already walking away. “Show them who you are.”
I swallow. Who I am is crouched down inside this girl named Puck Connolly, praying that I’ll make it through the next few minutes.
“Riders, line up!”
How can it be time to line up? We’ve only just gotten down here and I haven’t seen Sean before the race. I swing onto Dove and stare over the capaill uisce, looking for him. If I can just see -
On the other side of the line, I see him lifting his chin and looking at me as well. Corr, wearing dark blue colors, is slicked with sweat already. Sean’s still looking at my face so I lift up my wrist for him to see his ribbon on it.
“Riders, line up!”
I wish I were next to Sean and Corr, but there’s no time. Three race officials are pressing us back into lines behind great wooden poles. The lines ring and shrill with hundreds of bells on dozens of hooves. The capaill uisce snap and snort, paw and shudder. I keep Dove as far from her neighbors as I can. Her ears are flattened back to her head. She’s surrounded by predators.
Beside me, the capall uisce shakes its head and foam cascades down its neck and chest.
They’re counting down.
The ocean says shhhhhhhh, shhhhhhhh.
They lift the poles.
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
We explode into action. There’s no rhyme or reason; the only thing I can remember is to pull Dove to the inside. No one wants to be near that November sea unless they have to be. Dove’s hooves touch the edge of the surf, and salt water mists my face. Somehow there is salt between my fingers and the reins, and the crystals burn and grate.
Something crushes my leg, hard, the buckle of my stirrup leather grinding into the bone, and I turn in time to see a great bay capall uisce pressed against me. I jerk Dove farther into the surf just as the bay twists and snaps at her. Her ears flatten all the way back into her mane just as I see that it’s Gerald Finney. His fists are white-knuckled around his reins and he doesn’t glance at me. I can tell by the shiver working through the saddle that Dove recognizes his capall. I clamp my legs on either side of her. Don’t be afraid yet, Dove. We have a long way to go.
I remember, too late, that I’m supposed to be conserving Dove’s energy and I check her speed. Horses charge by us; the green of Ian Privett’s colors, the light blue of Blackwell’s, the gold of the piebald mare. No red stallion under dark blue, though. I have no idea if he is so far ahead that I can’t see him or if he is behind me.
I look for Puck or Dove, but I can’t see anything in this crush of bodies. Corr’s strong in my hands; my exhausted shoulders already ache from the weight of him. My calves burn with the friction of the stirrup leathers. I’m not sure how long I should hold Corr back behind the pack to look for her. The back is the worst place to be; the capaill back here lag not because they’re slow but because they’re fighting with each other or fighting with the sea. The hooves in front of me kick sand into my face. My eyes sting, but I can’t spare a hand to swipe at them.
To my left are a gray and a chestnut tearing at each other. They try to incorporate Corr into the skirmish. I hold him true and press him forward: not too far, because if Puck is behind me, I don’t want to leave her behind. My hands are buried in the sweaty mane at his withers, and I feel his muscles shaking at the touch of the November sea. I whisper at him to be steady.
I look under my arm to the right for Puck; there’s nothing but the gray halfway into the surf. He’s already mostly a creature of the sea. His eyes are slits in his lengthening head. The gray twists and scrabbles, more anxious for the rider on his back than the race before him. Seawater sprays from somewhere, the cold of it like claws on my cheek.
Another capall pushes on my left side; she snaps out and grazes my leg before her rider jerks her away. I can’t stay back here. I’ll get out in the open and find Puck. If she’s not out of this rabble by now, she might already be dead.
I lean over Corr’s neck to whisper to him, but for once, I can’t think of what to whisper.
But it doesn’t matter. Corr knows what I want without me having to speak, and he surges out of the bunched capaill in the rear.
There is a narrow corridor open right to the very front where the three front-runners are fighting it out. Last year I would’ve been through that hole with Corr and they would have been counting the lengths between the rest of the pack and Corr for the remainder of the race.
But I don’t take that move.
I wait.
It only takes a minute for Dove to be bitten and another few seconds for me to be cut by some razor-sharp edge that I don’t think can be horse teeth. I don’t have time to look at the wound or guess what has cut me. We’re trapped in a crush of bodies. Even over the rush of the wind in my ears, I hear their squeals and roars, the clucks and growls as they fight.
From the slice in my thigh, I feel the disconcerting heat of blood running down my leg but no pain, yet. Whatever cut me was sharp enough that the wound was clean.
Dove is beginning to panic. Movement to her right makes her jerk her head sharply enough that the rein rips open one of the searing blisters on my palm. I see white all the way around Dove’s eyes.
I need to get out of here. Sand stings my cheeks and the corners of my eyes, but I can’t spare a hand to swipe my skin. I don’t see how we can move forward until the capall uisce to my right charges into the ocean, tripping over the waves, twisting in the air before throwing its rider.
It’s Finney. I see his eyes meet mine for a bare second, his hands pedaling through the water, and then his bay capall’s dull teeth snap shut on his cheekbone.
Then I’m past them and they’re gone and it’s only seething water that sprays a dark pattern on Dove’s shoulder. And I’m sick, sick, sick.
Suddenly, there is a narrow path where before there was a capall uisce. If I pull through the right, using some of Dove’s precious strength, we might get clear.
It won’t do any good to save her speed if we die in this fight. I press my calves into her hot sides and suddenly, it clicks. Dove finds her stride and we pull free of the little tempestuous pack that we were trapped in. And there, hanging behind the leaders, I see a red stallion under blue colors, and Sean Kendrick folded neatly on top of him.
I sweep blood off the bite on Dove’s shoulder. It’s not deep, but guilt pricks me anyway. I say sorry to her and she flicks a trembling ear back. I let out a barest length of rein. She’s still terrified, but for a moment, I have her attention.