Race the Sands

by Sarah Beth Durst

  Gently, Raia guided him out of the stall and shut and locked the door. Only then did she let her muscles unknot and her breathing return to normal. “He’s special.” He shouldn’t be able to feel loyalty to her or to understand the need to win the races, and yet he clearly did. Maybe it was because a part of him did remember who he’d been.

  “I’m going to find who did this to him,” Prince Dar promised. Laying his hand on the stall door, he said, “I’ll make this right, Zarin. I swear I will, by the Lady, by the River, by the souls of our parents . . . I swear I will.”

  The lion did not respond.

  Maybe he remembers only sometimes? she wondered. Like a dream? Or he remembers pieces? She took a step backward, not wanting to interfere. It felt like such a private moment, and she was intruding. But she also didn’t dare leave.

  “Your parents,” Prince Dar began, facing Raia.

  Raia tensed. She wondered if he was about to blame her.

  “I am sorry for how they treated you.”

  She blinked. That was unexpectedly kind. He was wrapped up in his own grief and misery, yet still managed to think of her. “Thank you, Your Excellence. I am glad they can’t do any more harm.” That was as much as she could say without her voice breaking. She knew it was wrong to be happy her parents would be jailed, and she wasn’t happy precisely. . . . Relieved, maybe. Vindicated? Always, they’d blamed her for everything that happened, but it was their own choices that caused this, their own shortsighted selfishness that warped their view of reality.

  “Mine died a long time ago,” Prince Dar said. “It was just Zarin and me. And an entire empire’s worth of people, I suppose, but it felt like just Zarin and me.”

  “Your Excellence . . .”

  “Dar.”

  She hesitated.

  He gave her a lopsided smile. “You’ve seen me bare my heart. I think that puts us on a first-name basis. You call me Dar, and I’ll call you Raia, if that’s all right with you.”

  “Dar,” she repeated.

  “You may be the bravest person I’ve ever met.”

  She felt herself blush. “Trainer Verlas has been teaching me. . . .”

  “Not only on the racetrack. Here. Every day. You could have run, after the attack this afternoon. I’m told you escaped into the desert, but then you came back. Why did you come back?”

  “Because . . .” There were at least a half-dozen reasons. Because of her future. Because of the lion. Because of Trainer Verlas and her daughter, Shalla. Because she didn’t want to run away anymore. Because if she stayed, if she raced, if she won, then she was doing something extraordinary with her life, saving a dead emperor and helping crown a living one. “I wanted to.”

  He smiled. “That’s a good enough reason.” Stepping toward her, he took her hand and raised it to his heart. He held it there for a moment. “Thank you, brave Raia.” Then the emperor-to-be of the great Becaran Empire bowed to her.

  Chapter 27

  Shortly before dawn on the day of the championship race, Ambassador Usan prepared a messenger wight. He’d been sending dozens of them over the past week, all with innocuous complaints about the sand or the food or the heat or the atrocious manners of the Becarans. All true, he thought. But all of them were designed to conceal the important updates. Namely, that Becar was on the brink.

  He was confident that there would be riots after the final race, when people went to collect their winnings. Emotions were running high, and it would take only the slightest spark to ignite the fire. He’d bribed enough people to start that spark one way or another, and he’d bribed others to spread it once it started. There were always those who wanted to take advantage of chaos, even in a country as uptight as Becar.

  Everything is in place, he thought.

  Years of planning. Months of careful maneuvering, judicious bribes, and outright lawbreaking—and soon it would all pay off.

  Carefully, he spoke the name of the recipient: his lover, Captain Sarna of the Third Battalion. She would see his message was relayed to the appropriate people, in particular the general himself. While the kehoks raced and the Becarans cheered, the Raniran army would be on the move. They’d cross the desert while the riots raged, and they’d surround the capital, a noose around the Heart of Becar. Meanwhile, the Becarans would be so involved in their own race-and-riot combo, they wouldn’t even be aware—and those who were aware would be unable to act without an emperor to issue the proper orders. By dawn, while the Becarans stood in the wreckage of a nightlong riot, the Ranirans would be ready.

  He released the messenger wight from the window and watched it soar smoothly over the Aur River, buoyed by the ever-present wind. It receded to a dot of white on the horizon. In it, he’d mentioned the exact time of the final race, all the while complaining about the barbarism of the vicious event.

  What kind of people harnessed monsters for gambling?

  In Ranir, you killed kehoks. You rounded them up and slaughtered them, for the safety of all. Certainly you didn’t bring them in close proximity to your capital city and surround them with your wives, husbands, children, and elders. You didn’t gather them in a single location within a few mere miles of your palace and temples. Idiocy, he thought. Any sensible Raniran knew that you kept kehoks away from your cities. You built towering walls and fortresses. You watched your borders. You didn’t play with them, any more than you’d play with fire, and you certainly didn’t bring hundreds of them together for sport; you hunted them down and destroyed them.

  Fools, he thought.

  But he had no choice but to attend. It was important that he be visible and therefore above reproach. He allowed his servants to dress him, and then he, with an escort, joined the thousands of spectators flowing toward the racetrack in the predawn light.

  When my king comes, all of this will end.

  Ignoring the flood of spectators, Raia slipped behind the stands, toward the healer’s tent. She wore her old tunic, the one she’d run away in, in hopes it would keep the crowd from recognizing her as one of the finalists, and was able to reach the tent without anyone stopping her.

  Tucked away, the healer’s tent was one of the few places within the racetrack grounds that qualified as quiet. There were no campsites nearby, no bleachers, no food stands. It was on the opposite side of the tracks as the holding area, yet close enough that emergencies could be funneled to it as quickly as possible.

  Like Silar had been.

  Raia gave her name to the gray-clad man at the door, as well as the name of the patient. He consulted his notes and waved her inside. She was grateful he didn’t ask about the upcoming championship race or wish her luck—it was the last thing she wanted to talk about right now.

  The tent was divided into rooms, with tarps separating them, and she heard murmurs from behind the heavy fabric. Sometimes she caught glimpses of patients: one covered in bandages from their waist down, one with burns over half his face, one missing an arm. Raia had been so focused on her own races, she hadn’t realized how many riders got hurt each season. And these weren’t even all of them. Plenty had been hurt earlier, in the qualifiers. It also didn’t include the dead, like Fetran.

  “Silar?” she called softly.

  “Down here,” a boy’s voice called back. Jalimo stuck his head out from between tarps. “Hey, you should be preparing for your race.”

  “Don’t stop her from being nice,” Silar scolded from inside the room.

  Her voice sounded fine. Raia slowed, bracing herself for what she’d find on the other side of the tarp. Silar had been injured a few days ago. For her to still be in the healer’s tent meant that it hadn’t been a minor injury.

  With Jalimo holding the tarp door open, Raia ducked inside.

  Silar lay on a cot, propped up by pillows. “He does have a point. These other losers don’t have anything better to do, but you . . .” She pumped her fist into the air. “Go, champion-to-be!”

  Beside her, seated on a stool, Algana said, “We’re pla
nning on cheering for you. As soon as the doctors find her a chair she can travel in.”

  Raia took a deep breath, trying to find the right words to ask how she was, what her prognosis was, and whether—

  “Broken back,” Silar said lightly, as if she were reporting on the weather. “It’s permanent. I won’t race again.”

  “Will you—”

  “Or walk. It’s all connected, you see.”

  “I’m so sorry.” If she had been paying more attention to the racers behind her . . . if she hadn’t been so focused on her own race . . . there might have been something she could have done. As it was, she hadn’t even known until it was all over. “I should have—”

  “Not won? Don’t think that.” Silar struggled to sit up higher. Algana leaned over to help her, and Silar batted her away. “You didn’t cause this. I lost control of my kehok when some idiot lost control of his. It happens.” Her face twisted, belying her nonchalance, but she kept her voice even. “Your job now is to make sure it doesn’t happen to you.”

  “She won’t lose control,” Algana said. “She’s got some kind of freakish connection with her monster.” She made wiggling motions with her fingers.

  Raia didn’t deny it. Instead, a question burst out of her: “Was it worth it?” As soon as she asked it, she winced. She hadn’t meant it the way it sounded. “Sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  “Obviously it wasn’t. For me. But you—”

  Algana was studying Raia with narrowed eyes. She interrupted Silar. “You’re not here to check on Silar. Or not just to check on her. You could have done that after the race. What is it? Nerves? Second thoughts? Completely understandable, since this is the championship. Endless luxury and fame if you win, and all that.”

  “What happened?” Silar asked.

  “I’m fine. The lion’s fine.”

  Silar pressed her lips into a line. “Raia. What. Happened.”

  She couldn’t look at them as she said, “My parents tried to murder my kehok.” Fixing her eyes on a tray of bandages, she tried not to see the flames roaring through her memory.

  “So?” Jalimo said. “You already knew they were shit people.”

  And with that, he so easily dismissed the central pain of her entire life. She stared at him for a moment, and then she laughed. She didn’t know why she was laughing—it wasn’t funny, either what her parents had done or what had happened to Silar—but she couldn’t seem to stop. Her friends laughed with her.

  She spent the next precious few minutes with them, as long as she could spare, talking and laughing, and by the time she left, she knew she was going to win this race. She held tight to that confidence as she strode through the camps, past the holding areas, and through the crowds that were shouting and pointing at her, calling out to her to wish her luck, either good or bad.

  She’d nearly reached her campsite when Gette caught up to her.

  “Told you we’d race together again,” the prior grand champion said. “I know a competitor when I see one.”

  “You told me to quit racing,” Raia reminded him.

  He flashed a smile that he must have thought was charming. “It was a test. You passed!”

  “You didn’t. Highly likely you’ll be reborn as a hyena.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Are you trying again to get in my head? Because it won’t work. I’m ready to race, and I’m ready to win.” She smiled as she said it. “And do you know why?”

  “Because you’re arrogant after all your wins and have forgotten what it feels like to confront a proven champion? From one rider to another, I only came to tell you that you should feel proud of what you’ve accomplished and not let today’s inevitable loss diminish that pride.”

  Raia quit walking. He could be right. He was last year’s champion, and like her, he was undefeated in all his races so far this season. Worse, he’d already beaten her once. Easily. “I have so many reasons to win. Important reasons. But the real reason I’ll win isn’t any of them. Actually, they’re all too terrifying to even think about.” She looked him straight in the eye. “The real reason is because it will be fun to beat you. So thanks for that. And thanks on behalf of my kehok. He’ll enjoy his rebirth.”

  Without waiting for him to respond, she pivoted and marched toward her camp, where her kehok and trainer waited for her. In the distance, on the stands, the spectators continued to fill in every bit of available space, all of them eager for the final race to begin.

  At last, she was eager too.

  And for a brief instant, the excitement outweighed the terror.

  By midmorning, the racing grounds were packed tighter than ever before. The stench of kehoks permeated the air, and the sound of several hundred kehoks screaming, bellowing, and screeching at one another was phenomenal.

  Tamra loved it.

  They’d done it: the championship race!

  Or we almost did it. One more race. Just one, and then we’ll have everything we want and need. She thought of Shalla and what this win would mean to their lives, and what it would mean to Raia and her life.

  Tamra shooed Raia into the tent to dress in her riding uniform. She checked over the kehok—he looked healthy, strong, and fast. She hummed to herself. Today is going to be a great day. And Shalla will be by my side to see it!

  Augur Yorbel promised to bring her when he came from the temple. Lots of augurs came to watch the championship race, and the high augurs would of course be here to drape the victory charm around the winning kehok’s neck. At sundown, they’d bring the kehok back to the temple to be reborn into his or her second chance at life.

  It will be better than great, she thought. It will be glorious!

  Raia dressed quickly and emerged to coax her racer out of his cage. All around, the other finalists were doing the same. Tamra checked both Raia and the lion over once, twice, three times, and then they made their way to the holding area.

  As one of the top twenty, she had well-wishers all around her, shouting at her to run fast, as well as those who were rooting against her, calling out insults. Tamra cheerfully made rude gestures at all of them. “Block it all out,” Tamra told Raia. “Or drink it all in. Whatever will fill you the most. Isn’t this amazing?”

  “I think it’s making him nervous,” Raia said.

  “Is it making you nervous? That’s what matters most.”

  Tamra saw Raia glance at the other competitors, each with his or her own racer. Nearby was Gette with his silver spider. He gave Raia a mocking salute.

  “I’m not nervous,” Raia said.

  It was, Tamra thought, a lie. But it was a good one. Raia was getting better at telling them.

  At last, a few hours past dawn, the last of the undercard heats were completed, and the horn was blown for the top twenty to get into position for the final championship race. Tamra felt as if her body was humming with excitement.

  Her ears were buzzing with the cheers and screams as Raia rode the lion to the starting gate, where Tamra was allowed to give her rider one last piece of advice. She thought of what she’d told last year’s rider, before things went so disastrously wrong: to own the track, to swallow every moment and make it his, to use his hunger for victory to propel him faster. That was why the race commission had fined her, because of that advice. With difficulty, Tamra pushed that memory out of her mind. Raia was different. She ran for her own reasons. She wouldn’t suffer the same fate.

  Tamra chose different advice for her: “Run with joy.”

  Raia smiled—all the hours, days, even years of worry and fear disappearing as her whole face brightened. “Yes. I can do that.”

  At the race official’s signal, Tamra retreated from the track with the other trainers. Other officials herded up into the stands, on the opposite side of the psychic shield. She craned her neck to see over the throngs of people—There! Shalla! She waved at Augur Yorbel. He was standing with a woman augur, with Shalla between them. Shalla was wearing her training robes, one of her braids had slip
ped out of its ribbon, and she was dancing from foot to foot.

  Pushing through the crowd, Tamra reached them. She scooped Shalla up against her, helping her stand on a bench for a better view. “Isn’t this exciting?”

  Shalla laughed. “I’m so excited I think I’ll burst!”

  “Thank you for bringing her,” Tamra said to Yorbel. She then greeted the other augur, an elegant woman with silver braids and a welcoming smile. “I’m Trainer Tamra Verlas.”

  “Tamra, this is one of my oldest and dearest friends, High Augur Gissa,” Yorbel said.

  A high augur! Tamra tried to think of what to say, and words failed her. She hadn’t been close to such a luminary in years, not since she’d been a champion racer, and she’d never met one in the stands.

  “Pleasure to meet you,” High Augur Gissa said. She clasped Tamra’s hand warmly, and Tamra was surprised to feel callouses on her palms. Yorbel’s hands were as soft as cotton. She wondered what work High Augur Gissa did in the temple, aside from continuously being good and holy. She couldn’t imagine a high augur doing common chores.

  “Yorbel has spoken highly of you,” High Augur Gissa continued. “And I am told your daughter is a gift to our temple. We are pleased to have her as a student.”

  “Thank you, Your Grace.” Tamra told herself not to be awed by the fact that they were standing with a high augur. After all, Tamra had talked with an emperor-to-be, and Yorbel himself was an augur. She shouldn’t be so starstruck. But a high augur, the holiest of holies! “Honored to meet you.”

  Then there was no more time to be impressed with the lofty company she and Shalla were keeping.

  The race announcer shouted, “Ready!”

  Her heart felt as if it was pounding so fast that it would drown out the cheers.

  “Prepare!”

  She joined the cheering, yelling so loud that her voice scraped her throat. Shalla cheered with her, and Tamra braced her so she could stand on the bench and see better.

  “RACE!”

  The starting gates exploded open, and the kehoks shot out like blurs.