The Scorpio Races - Maggie Stiefvater [108]
My heart is already galloping. I cannot believe that I’m really about to get onto a capall uisce. And not just any capall uisce, but the one whose name is on the top of the board at the butcher’s. The one who has won the Scorpio Races four times. The one who tore out David Prince’s throat yesterday morning. I grab a fistful of his mane and struggle to keep from being tugged off the rock as he dances. Finally, I pull myself on his back, clutching his mane with both hands like a little kid.
Sean says, “I’m going to give you the reins now. I’ll need you to hold him while I get on or you’ll be on your own. Can I trust you to hold him?”
The way he says it makes me realize just how much he’s risking right now, putting me on his horse, giving me the reins.
“Could others hold him?”
His face remains the same. “There are no others. You’re the only one.”
I swallow. “I can hold him.”
Sean drags his foot in a semicircle before Corr and spits in it. Then he quickly loops the reins over Corr’s head and hands them to me. If I had never seen or touched Corr, this would be the moment when I realize just how large he is, how unlike Dove. Through the reins, I can somehow feel how powerful he is. They’re spiderwebs anchoring a ship. He tries my hold and I try him back. I don’t want him to try harder.
Sean settles swiftly behind me, and I’m startled by the sudden closeness of him, my back suddenly warm against his chest, the press of his hips against me.
I turn to ask him a question, and he jerks his face away from the proximity to mine. I say, “Oh. Sorry.”
“Are you all right with the reins?” He’s all black and white in this light, his eyes hidden in shadow beneath his eyebrows.
I nod. But Corr won’t go forward; he only backs, shaking his head. When pushed, he lifts his front feet a little off the ground. Not rearing, but warning me. Sean says something that’s lost to the wind.
“What?”
“My circle,” Sean says, right into my ear, his breath warm. I shiver, hard, although the wind is no colder than before. “He won’t want to cross it. Go around.”
As soon as we’re free of the circle, Corr is like a bird in a gale. I can’t tell if he’s walking or trotting, only that we’re moving, and that all directions feel possible. When Corr jerks to the side, I press my legs into his sides to straighten him and Sean’s arms go around me to grab his mane.
I know that Sean only did it to steady himself, not me, but suddenly, I feel more grounded. I turn my face, and again, he moves his head to give me room. But I don’t know what I was going to say.
“What?” His mouth makes the shape of the word although I don’t properly hear it. “Is it —?” He starts to withdraw his arms, and I shake my head. My hair whips across my forehead, and he winces as it lashes him, too. He says something again, and once more, the wind steals his voice.
When Sean sees that I didn’t hear him, he leans forward to my ear again. I can’t think of the last time I was so close to another person. I can feel the rise and fall of his chest when he breathes. His words are warm in my ear: “Are you afraid?”
I don’t know what I am right now, but it’s not afraid.
I shake my head.
Sean takes my ponytail in his hand, his fingers touching my neck, and then he tucks my hair into my collar, out of the reach of the wind. He avoids my gaze. Then he links his arms back around me and pushes his calf into Corr’s side.
Corr springs into the air.
When Dove moves up from a canter to a gallop, sometimes the only way I can tell the difference is because her hooves pound a four-time rhythm instead of a three.
But when Corr moves into a gallop, it’s as if it’s a gait that’s just been invented, something so much faster than all the others that it should be called something else. The wind roars savagely across my ears. There are uneven stones standing watch in the field, but they’re nothing to Corr. He barely lifts his knees