The Scorpio Races

by Maggie Stiefvater

Our dead drink the sea.

I trust Corr more than any of them. I should not trust him at all.

But he’s got one foot on the land and one foot in the sea.

“The sky and the sand and the sea and Corr.”

“There are no others. You’re the only one.”

“They’re saying that you and Sean Kendrick were burning up the cliffs.”

I’m quite happy for the smile, because Dad told me once you should be grateful for the gifts that are the rarest.

“Where will you and Corr be?” I ask. Sean presses two fingers along the edge of the counter, sweeping crumbs into a pile. I notice that his fingers are permanently dirt-stained like mine. He says, “Right next to you and Dove.”

I say, “I will not be your weakness, Sean Kendrick.” Now he looks at me. He says, very softly, “It’s late for that, Puck.”

“You swallow her with your eyes. I’m surprised there’s any of her left for the rest of us to see.”

What it’s like is a battle. A mess of horses and men and blood. The fastest and strongest of what is left from two weeks of preparation on the sand. It’s the surf in your face, the deadly magic of November on your skin, the Scorpio drums in the place of your heartbeat. It’s speed, if you’re lucky. It’s life and it’s death or it’s both and there’s nothing like it.

“Tell me what to wish for,” I say. “Tell me what to ask the sea for.” “To be happy. Happiness.”

“That tomorrow we’ll rule the Scorpio Races as king and queen of Skarmouth and I’ll save the house and you’ll have your stallion. Dove will eat golden oats for the rest of her days and you will terrorize the races each year and people will come from every island in the world to find out how it is you get horses to listen to you. The piebald will carry Mutt Malvern into the sea and Gabriel will decide to stay on the island.

I will have a farm and you will bring me bread for dinner.”

It is the first day of November and so, today, someone will die.

“You didn’t have to. I’ll come back next year and you’ll have a nest of horses outside your window and Puck Connolly in your bed and I’ll buy from you instead of Malvern. That’s your future for you.”

Sean reaches between us and slides a thin bracelet of red ribbons over my free hand. Lifting my arm, he presses his lips against the inside of my wrist. I’m utterly still; I feel my pulse tap several times against his lips, and then he releases my hand. “For luck,” he says. He takes Dove’s lead from me. “Sean,” I say, and he turns. I take his chin and kiss his lips, hard. I’m reminded, all of a sudden, of that first day on the beach, when I pulled his head from the water. “For luck,” I say to his startled face.

It is time for the Scorpio Races. I am so, so alive.

He is slow, and the sea sings to us both, but he returns to me.