As we are approaching the end of this whole story, we're approaching the reason why I wrote this in the first place. When I originally finished reading the Scorpio Races, I was...dissatisfied...with the ending. For a few reasons. One, obviously, it was disappointing that Corr was injured and unable to race anymore. And two, because I never quite understood why Puck goes to work for Malvern after all that's happened. So, these next few chapters hold the biggest tweaks I made to the original story and my alternate ending for Scorpio Races
Bay
It's Mutt who decides for me. I see the flash of light even from here and I know he's got that knife again.
I look back at the black and the chestnut. My opening's gone. But there's another option. A crazy option.
I've never jumped Tempest before. I have no idea what he's capable of. But he's a capall uisce. So I imagine he can jump twice as high as any horse.
I watch the black get closer to the fence, the chestnut pulling away, the momentary gap in the other riders.
I turn Tempest so sharp I have to stand on one side of the saddle to keep my balance. He sprays sand, but it's as if he knows what I'm thinking and he manages to keep most of his speed. We're nearly perpendicular to the fence now. The black is right in front of us. I see his rider look up at me with fear in his eyes as Tempest and I barrel toward him. I look over his head. At the empty patch of sand beside him.
The fence is right in front of us.
The sand is soft underneath us.
"Now, Tempest!" I shout.
I lower my center of gravity and lean forward as Tempest bunches his front legs beneath him and jumps. We take a flying leap straight over the poles and the black capall. We crash into the sand on the other side of the black and for a heart-stopping moment, I think Tempest is going to fall. He folds, the landing bone-jarring and graceless, but then he finds his feet in the sand and we're running again.
I taste blood and realize I bit my tongue.
Tempest barrels through the other racers, pushing for the reach for me. Riders shout at me. Blood flies and horses scream. For a moment I am suffocating in the crush of capaill uisce and men. Something jars my elbow and scrapes my arm. Tempest shudders under the bite of another grey capall. And then we are out and away, sliding through the race as if we are made of water.
We push toward the fight between a blood red stallion and a black and white spattered mare
Sean
There's no time to breathe. There's blood and salt and pain and chaos. There's a shattering clash and I lose my grip. There's nothing for me to hold onto. I grasp at Corr's mane. I see his face and my saddle and then the surf rushes up to meet me.
My father was killed on a race day like this.
I can't die like my father.
I can't die like this.
I can't die.
I have to get away from those deadly hooves. I hit cold water and hard sand and lose my breath. Salt coats my mouth. I swallow water and scrabble to my knees.
I get my feet under me but something strikes me in the back and I'm face first in the water again.
I try to take a breath and all I breathe is water. Water and salt and blood.
There are stars. And somewhere there is red. I don't know if it's blood or if it's Corr.
I rise up again to a grey blur crashing into the piebald.
A black and white knee meets my forehead with a crack loud enough to wake the dead.
I'm underwater again and all I see is black.
Bay
I make it to the fight as Sean topples. He crashes into the water and struggles to his knees. The piebald strikes out with a back leg. I don't know if it's luck or if Sean's just unsteady, but he sways to the side and the piebald only grazes his back. But it's enough to put him underwater again.
"Matthew Malvern!" I scream. "Bastard!"
I let Tempest have his head. He slams himself broadside into the piebald.
Mutt's face is a rictus of anger and fear. This situation is far, far out of his control. Out of my control. Out of Sean's control. I wonder if Mutt meant for it to get this far.
There's a bloody cut on the piebald's neck. She's in a rage of pain.
I search the water below us for Sean. He staggers upright just as Skata lifts her knees to rear. Her knee strikes Sean's forehead and he goes down again. Tempest rears to meet Skata and I vault off his back. I hit the water on my feet and stagger to where I saw Sean go under. Corr lashes out at the piebald from her other side, his legs spread over something in the water. I dart in under Corr and thrust a hand into the sea and feel Sean's shirt. I drag him up out of the water and out from under Corr. He takes a shuddering breath and looks at me for a second, eyes unfocused, then he goes limp in my grasp. But I feel a pulse when I put my fingers against his neck. He's alive.
Above us, the horses fight. Tempest and Skata are locked onto each other's shoulders and blood stains the water. Mutt is still on the piebald's back, but I can't fathom why. Corr imposes himself between us and the piebald. More capaill uisce thunder by on the beach. I drag Sean farther into the water until I'm thigh deep in the freezing sea.
The piebald turns her head and catches sight of Corr. She bites at him. He jerks out of reach, but he doesn't move. Skata gets in his face. He bites back. Tempest harries her from the other side.
Mutt is trapped in a snapping mass of teeth and hooves. Blood drips down his arm. From Tempest or Corr, I'm not sure.
Skata crashes into Corr again. Corr still doesn't move. He takes the brunt of the hit with his shoulder and suddenly I realize what this crazy horse is doing. He's trying to protect Sean. But if he stays still like this, he's in danger of being hurt by Skata or the other horses racing by. I need to make him move. I'm suddenly struck with a wild idea.
If a capall uisce ever goes back to the sea, owner forfeits.
"Get out of here, Corr!" I scream at that fierce, blood-red horse and there are tears on my cheeks as I do it because I know Sean would kill me for it. "Go!" I don't know if I'm angry or sad or afraid, but my voice is raw and there's blood and salt everywhere. I reach into my pocket and pull out the packet that I'd stashed there this morning just in case. The dark, dark holly. I shove it toward Corr. He shies back.
On his other side Skata screams as Tempest bites down on her haunches. She bucks and Mutt is a dark shadow sliding over her head into the water. Skata twists and kicks at Corr again, her hooves missing him by mere inches. Tempest loses his grip on her, his teeth ripping flesh as Skata tears herself out of his bite. But Corr is still here.
"Get!" I shout at him again. "You stupid horse!" Corr looks at me and I hear that warning thrum in his chest. I do the only thing I can. I slap him on the rump with the packet of holly. "Go!" I yell. He screams in surprise and bursts away from me. "That's right, go," I say. He looks back. "I've got your rider." I clutch Sean closer to my chest and wave the holly at Corr again.
Skata screams and this time Corr screams back and jumps into the sea. Skata watches him go and there's a murderous light in her dark eyes, as if she wants to follow. Mutt surfaces, gasping, underneath Skata. Tempest backs up. There's blood on his shoulder and his chest and I can see his sides heave with his breath.
"Tempest!" I shout. He looks at me.
Skata realizes there's something beneath her feet.
"Matthew!" I yell. But there's nothing I can do. He realizes it too late.
Those awful hooves come down and I close my eyes as the sea turns red.
I hear Corr scream again, farther away this time.
Skata answers and dives into the sea.
Then a shadow falls over us and I open my eyes to see Tempest shuffling toward us. He keeps a wary eye on the riders who flash past on the beach like nothing happened here. I reach up with one hand to grab his reins, partly to steady myself and partly to keep Tempest from following Skata and Corr. There is no sign of Matthew Malvern anymore.
I kneel in the surf and shift Sean into a better position in my arms. I cradle his fierce, dark, matted head to my chest, as the water laps at us beneath Tempest's broad shadow.
Puck
Dove runs straight and true. Today she's an angel. I keep her in the edge of the surf, the water and sand stinging my eyes but I don't dare blink. And then I'm right beside Privett and Penda and I see the surprise in Ian's eyes as I pass him.
Then Dove crosses the finish line in front of Penda and the race is over.
I can't believe it.
I hear cheers from the cliff tops.
Penda thunders over the finish line a moment later and then the other racers start coming through. I see Dr. Halsal and Ake Palsson, but I don't see a blood-red capall and his dark-haired rider. I stand in my stirrups, but I can't see the beach behind the riders coming through the finish line.
Someone walks up and grabs Dove's rein. It's a race official. I think he's congratulating me on winning the race. His mouth moves, but I can't hear what he's saying over the rush of blood in my ears.
"Where's Sean?" I ask him.
"What?" he says.
"Kendrick," I say. "Sean Kendrick."
The official shrugs. He's holding a trophy in one hand, like he's going to hand it to me, but I don't reach down for it.
I tug Dove's reins out of his hands.
"I've got to find Sean Kendrick," I say, as if that explains everything.
I turn Dove around and we trot back down the beach, my eyes scanning the sand for one thing.
Bay
I can see her even from where I wait in the surf. Dove flies up the beach, running all out, Puck stretched across her back.
I see them pull ahead of Penda.
I see them cross the finish line and then they are lost in the tangle of capaill usice that pound over the finish line a second later.
"She did it," I say. Tempest whinnies beside me, putting his head down to look me in the eye. "Puck Connolly just won the Scorpio Races on her island horse," I tell him. Tempest snorts as if to say, She had help.
Just then I feel Sean stir. I look down as he opens his eyes.
"Puck?" He blinks up at me.
"No, it's Bay." I brush wet hair out of his eyes. There's that old familiar curl of jealousy in my chest for a moment, but it fades away like the blood washing out on the tide. He was in this race for Puck, not me. I knew that before we started.
"I know it's you," he says. "But Puck...did she make it?"
"Oh," I say, realizing what he's asking. "Yes, she made it." And a smile stretches itself across my face despite myself.
"Then what a couple of fools we are."
I laugh. "Maybe we are. But it was worth it. You should have seen her, Sean. She was glorious."
"Glorious…" he murmurs. "You've never called me glorious." It's the first time I've ever heard a tinge of jealousy in Sean's voice and I wonder if he's serious.
"Sean Kendrick, you're about the farthest thing from glorious I've ever seen."
Sean laughs quietly. "Good thing I have you to keep me grounded." He tries to sit up. I stand up and haul my best friend to his feet. We're both soaking wet and look like a couple of drowned cats. Sean stands there, shivering in the cold November air, blue-black jacket gone, looking as little and as lost as I've ever seen him. His eyes scan the water, looking for that blood red stallion. I see the shock in his eyes when he doesn't see Corr. He went under with Corr standing guard over him and now...nothing. I think I see tears mix with the sea water running down Sean's face.
I pray I didn't make the biggest mistake in my life by chasing Corr out to sea. I pray that his tie to Sean is stronger than the water. Stronger than the piebald. Because even though I tried to keep Corr out of it, I know he lured the piebald out to sea to get her away from us. I only hope that once they were out in the water, Corr outsmarted her.
"Sean." I take a deep breath, because I need to explain.
He runs his sopping sleeve over his face to try and get water out of his eyes. He blinks but he's not focused on me. His eyes frantically search the water.
"I…" I start, but the words stick in my throat and I gasp like I'm going underwater and can't get a breath.
I watch Sean's gaze pass over my bloody capall standing in the water beside us. I see the anger in his eyes when he looks at Tempest. It's not fair. Not fair that Tempest stayed and Corr ran. Not fair that Tempest's loyalty seems stronger than Corr's. His gaze flits over everything faster and faster, more dazed, more erratic.
"Sean, I'm so sorry," I whisper.
"The sea." He stares out to sea like he's going to throw himself in it. I put a hand on his arm. "He went back." It's almost a question. Because the alternative is that Corr is dead, washed out in the waves. But there's no body.
"Yes," I say. "Yes, he went back."
Sean looks like he can't get a breath.
"Which means Malvern doesn't own him anymore, right?" I say because it's the only thing I can think of to say that might make this situation any better. Because I don't know if Corr will come back. Because I feel like I'm holding Sean's heart in my hands and it's raw and it's beating, but it won't be if I don't find a way to put it back in his chest.
Sean puts out a hand and steadies himself against my shoulder.
I look anywhere but at his face.
"I don't own him either if he doesn't come back," he says.
I shattered Sean Kendrick's world. He could have given Corr the chance to go back to the ocean a million times over. But he never has. Because he was afraid of what the answer might be. Keeping Corr on land was safe. Controllable. Letting Corr go always carried a chance of loss. A loss Sean couldn't bear. A loss I forced him to take.
"Sean, that horse…" I choke up. He looks at me this time. As if he knows I have more to say than what I'm saying. I swallow the lump in my throat and keep talking. I have to keep talking. Because if I don't keep talking, I'm going to lose Sean to the sea and I don't know if he'll come back. "Corr didn't run because he wanted to, Sean. He ran because he lured Skata away." Because I forced him to. I can't bring myself to say it. "Because he was protecting you," I say instead.
Sean weighs my words when I finish, deciding if they sound like Corr or not. He looks out to the horizon. He watches the sea. He takes a breath as if he's about to speak and I think he's going to call my lie. But he doesn't. He just stares at a point over my shoulder.
That's when Puck rides up on Dove, smiling and jubilant. I see the relief in her eyes as she takes in Sean's figure. She jumps off Dove and splashes toward us.
"Sean!" she calls, breathless and elated. But her mood changes instantly as she sees his devastated face. She looks around. Looks at me and Tempest and the blood in the water. She swallows. "Where's Corr?"
"He ran," Sean says.
"Oh, Sean." Puck puts a hand on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry."
"It...doesn't matter," Sean says. It's the most blatant lie Sean Kendrick has ever told. "What matters is you're safe. You made it." He summons a smile for Puck. It's equal parts relieved and empty. A painful smile. "You won." He brushes a stray strand of Puck's hair behind her ear.
"I did," she says. "Thanks to you."
I step back until my shoulder bumps against Tempest's neck. Like the night of Tommy's funeral, I feel like I'm not supposed to be in this scene. Tempest snorts, his warm breath ruffling my hair.
Puck continues, "Thanks to Corr."
No thanks to me, but right now I don't deserve it.
"You won," Sean repeats, as if he can't believe it.
Puck shifts uncertainly in the water in front of him. Then she reaches out and draws him into a hug. He doesn't stop her. But he doesn't return it either. He drops his head onto her shoulder like even that weight is too much for him. Puck holds him tighter.
I look away. I don't see what I so desperately need to. I don't see a familiar red stallion swimming back to shore. Back to us. Back to Sean Kendrick.
