The Chariot
Haze. Sunlight. Tumultuous roar. And speed, speed like I've never felt before wind tearing against my face squinting my eyes against whipping grit those stallions surge across the sandpit faster and faster under my urging until the stands and spectators blur behind us-
BUTCHER. BUTCHER. BUTCHER.
I jerk the reigns. The stallions wheel. Sand showers us, sticks to hot blood and wind-whipped tears pours with sweat into my eyes as faster, faster, faster we race and frothy foam falls freely from the horses' mouths. The whip cracks again, draws bright red blood-
BUTCHER! BUTCHER! BUTCHER!
Game Enforcers try to bar us but we are unstoppable. Invincible. The horses bear down their necks and tear up turf as we charge that line of feeble men. They flee. Again we turn, arms burning hot, palms chafing we fly down the line and I laugh to feel such raw power unleashed. The whip cracks, the stallions jump as salty spray and bloody flecks pour down heaving flanks and churning legs-
BUTCHER! BUTCHER! BUTCHER—!
Onwards they charge, straining against their harness, fearing the wrath of bit and the raw crack of leather I saw the reigns and sand spews into the stadium, the wheels twist and for one glorious second we are flying—
BUTCHERBUTCHERBUTCHERBUTCHER—!
Their wind is breaking, great hearts dying. The Gamemakers' stand looms out over the Arena and with our last strength we charge headlong towards the silk pavilion—
They never swerve. Unquestioning, unhesitant, unfailingly they soar until with their last gasp of agony they rear, shredding silk and bone, harness and axel and the chariot explodes around us in splintering shards of shrapnel and sand.
The soft bundle in my arms stirs. My face is on fire. I spit sand and raise my head, blind and deaf, then the burst of white fades to black fades to grey, dim shapes moving slowly, drunkenly-
Beneath me, Malcovitch rolls and coughs, naked skin scoured and bleeding.
A dull roar. Sound booms back, the crowd inflamed shouting, chanting, shrieking, the Gamemakers fleeing as the pavilion collapses around us in tiers of silk and stone.
Far above me, a man is shouting. Even injured I know the face, in my madness am incensed. I shift shakily to my raw knees over Malcovitch's cowering, crawl hand over hand through splintered wood, and tarnished metal, snake between the horses bloodied corpses until the butt of the whip closes tightly in the heel of my hand.
I stand. Reel. Scream. The last thing I see as the Enforcers take me is the surprise on Seneca Crane's face before the lash hits home.
