Lilac's Chance

Chapter Twenty-Three

Finally it is time for the seventh race. It feels as though a month and five days has passed between my run with Prisoner and now, and I'm equally exhausted and excited.

"Ready?" Braydon doesn't look at me when he asks, but I sense his attention on me anyways as we stand in the saddling area, only a few people watching. The rest are placing bets.

Last Chance certainly is. Her nostrils extended, she snorts and paces her way across the ground. Every step she takes flashes her glistening coat against the sun. Liquid gold. Dancing fire. Her eyes are wide with excitement- it's time to run.

"Ready as we'll ever be," I say, and he legs me up.

The second my seat touches her back, Last Chance leaps forwards, still snorting. Her mane streams across her neck, her tail swishes, and every motion she takes is coiled with unreleased power. Oh, yeah. We're ready.

Braydon still doesn't look satisfied, but I can't think why he wouldn't be. "I don't think we've ever been in such good shape before. This race is going to be a walk in the park for us," I reassure him as he frowns.

His frown deepens. "That's what I'm worried about." But before I can ask him what he means, he's giving Chance a final pat and slipping away to melt into the crowd.

I push him out of my mind and focus on the filly beneath me. Wind swirls around us, catching my hair and her tail in it, and whips Chance into a fury. She's frantic to run, almost shaking with it, but her ears flick back to me. She's concentrating. She wants to run, but she'll listen to me.

Yes, this is the perfect combination for the perfect race.

All riders are called out, and we slip in line between number 13 and number 2, a gorgeous chestnut and a rather scraggly black colt. He's still young enough to fill out, but for now I don't consider him or his jockey competition. He's one of J's friends, from what I've seen, and I've never been very impressed by his performance.

The chestnut, though, could be a problem. I appraise him as Chance prances onto the track, head held high. Every step he takes is slow and regal, but his muscles ripple and I see an enormous potential for power in his hindquarters. As I watch, a plastic bag flaps by, riding the wind. The horse doesn't spook. He's solid, reliable.

Last Chance, however, is an uncertain creature of the wind. She flourishes in it, lifting herself higher, as though she wants nothing more than to throw herself into it. I breathe in deeply and don't resist the smile flickering across my face.

When she's like this, we can't lose.

"Congrats on your earlier race!"

The voice spooks me almost as badly as it spooks Last Chance. She skitters to the side, flipping her head up, snorting her astonishment. It takes me a moment to settle her, and then I shoot a pretend-glare at Josie, who's looking apologetic on her pinto horse. "Where'd you come from?"

"I just rode up. You're checking out the competition?" Josie sits on her pony as though she grew out of his back, and he's trotting steadily besides us even as the wind drags his mane and tail across his sides. If it weren't for the western saddle, he would look like an Indian pony.

Guiltily, I glance at the other horses. I'd been too busy prepping for Prisoner's race to fully consider those Chance is going against. There's J's friend, trotting on his half-grown colt, and the chestnut, but the other horses aren't really too interesting. None look spectacular. Nothing like Last Chance feels. "Sure," I finally say, amidst Josie's laughter. "Just... preparing for the race."

"Sure you are."

I'm saved having to answer by Last Chance's nervous jittering. She laces her ears back at the pinto, shaking her head menacingly. I sit quietly on her, not wanting to amp her up even more before the race, not wanting to waste precious energy. But I gently rock the bit in her mouth and sink into her back, and she does settle, though only in motion. Her back is still tense and her ears flicker nervously, though one is pinned on me, awaiting instruction.

By the time I'm satisfied with her jog, Josie and her pony are gone and it's time to load.

The gatekeepers know us now. So Last Chance gets to walk steadily into the 5th gate, before anybody else loads, and we're left to wait for the rest of the horses to load. The track is empty and inviting in front of us, just a long stretch of sand that is begging for us to pound our hoof-print shaped speed into it. My breath catches in my throat. Knuckles curl into mane. I am steady, steady, leaning over Last Chance's neck as she focuses on the track.

Time stops.

I can feel and hear everything around me. My blood, hot and thick, rushing through my veins. Every heartbeat. The steady rise and fall of Chance's breathing. The coarse hairs of her mane tangled in my hands. The smooth leather of the reins, the cut of the saddle, the cold brush of gate metal across my calf when she shifts. It's heat and the scent of already lathered horses, the dull hum of jockeys trash-talking each other and the clang of a bit against teeth, of hoof against bone.

I never feel so alive as I do in moments like these.

Brrrrnnngg.

Her head, her neck, her powerful shoulders, all pass the gate in the time it takes for me to hurl myself into position. But before the rest of Chance has pooled out of the gate, there's a flash of black.

"Foul!"

I don't know if I've spoken or merely thought the word, but the scraggly black colt is in front of us and Chance has to nearly stop to avoid a collision. It takes a mere millisecond, but then the rest of the herd is pulling away and we're in hot pursuit.

Last place.

I don't have time to be mad that J's friend cut us off so crudely, because we're flying, flying, flying to catch up. There's nothing I can do but hang on and let Chance take the reins, but there's a fleeting moment where I think that, possibly, she could pull this race back together if she keeps it up. All by herself.

The black colt as his rider have already disappeared into the pack, and I don't care to look for them. The chestnut, too, is out of sight, but there's an opening between a compact bay and a rangy sorrel. I point Last Chance towards it. We're going faster than any other horse here, covering distance in an unbelievable amount of time. I can already taste the victory in my mouth when Last Chance angles into the opening.

She doesn't pass through it.

Clods of dirt, kicked up by dozens of scattered hooves, ping against us. Sweat streaks Chance's coat. She's working hard, but she's not tiring. There's still more speed in her, and she's not giving.

I ask for more. I knead the reins up her neck, telling her, calling for her attention, asking for that power I feel unleashed in her. But she hesitates. Not slowing, but not lengthening her stride either. That black colt has got her nervous, and she doesn't want to enter the pack.

There's no time to go wide. There's no time to convince her to enter the pack anyways.

And the race is over.

What will I say to Braydon?

I stand in my stirrups, calling for Chance to slow down. She's not spent at all, and she's not upset about losing. No, dead last isn't losing. Dead last is...

I can't even think about it.

The winners are already flashing onto the board. I hope the chestnut placed. I did like him. As I'm trying to get a good look at the board, I signal to Chance to slow. She fights the bit, shaking her head in annoyance. We never ran enough, she seems to say.

And that's all there's time for.

The world flashes out of balance. I don't know what it is, but there's a sudden stop. Not the good kind. Last Chance is there, underneath me, and then she's not and I'm falling, falling, my body frozen, beneath a horse as black as shadow and onto one that's golden and light. But then there's a "crunch", and I hear it more than I feel it, and then I'm seeing it and it is dark, dark, dark.