Maggie Stiefvater: The Scorpio Races

“This is nice,” Gabe tells me as he pulls out his chair, and I’m relieved, because nothing is wrong, everything will be fine. “Mint smells good after today.”

I try to think of what Mum or Dad would’ve said to him then; for some reason, our age difference feels like a massive void just now. “I thought they had you getting the hotel ready today?”

“They were shorthanded at the pier,” Gabe says. “And Beringer knows I’m quicker than Joseph.”

Joseph is Beringer’s son, too lazy to be quick at anything. Gabe told me once that we should be grateful for Joseph’s inability to think of anything but himself, because it is why Gabe has a job. I’m not grateful at the moment, though, because Gabe smells like fish since Joseph is a feck.

Gabe holds his tea but doesn’t drink it. Finn is still washing. I sit down at my place. Gabe waits a few more beats and then says, “Finn, enough, okay?”

Finn still takes another minute to rinse, but then he shuts off the tap and comes and sits across from me. “Do we still say grace if it’s only apple cake?”

“And a chain saw,” I say.

“God, thank you for this cake and Finn’s chain saw,” Gabe says. “Are you happy?”

“God, or me?” I ask.

“God’s always happy,” Finn says. “You’re the one who needs pleasing.”

This strikes me as incredibly untrue, but I refuse to rise to the bait. I look at Gabe, who’s looking at his plate. I ask him, “So, what?”

Outside, I hear Dove whickering where the pasture meets the yard; she wants her handful of grain. Finn looks at Gabe, who’s still looking at his plate, pressing his fingers into the top of the apple cake as if he’s checking the texture. I am suddenly aware of how tomorrow, the anniversary of our parents’ deaths, has been looming inside me, and how it never occurred to me to think that it might be the same for quiet, solid Gabe.

He doesn’t lift his eyes. He simply says, “I’m leaving the island.”

Finn keeps his gaze on Gabe. “What?”

I can’t speak; it’s like he’s said it in a different language, and my brain has to translate it before I can understand it.

“I’m leaving the island,” Gabe tells us, and this time the statement is firmer, more real, though he still doesn’t look at either of us.

Finn manages a whole sentence first. “What will we do with all of our things?”

I add, “What about Dove?”

Gabe says, “I’m leaving the island.”

Finn looks like Gabe has slapped him. I jut my chin out and try to get Gabe to meet my eyes. “You’re going to go without us?” Then, my mind provides an answer, a logical one, one that gives him an excuse, and I give it to him. “So you aren’t going long. You’re just going for -” I shake my head. I can’t think of what he would be going for.

Gabe finally lifts his face. “I’m moving away.”

Across from me, Finn is clinging to the edge of the table, his fingertips pressed into the wood so that they’re white on the very ends but bright red toward the joints; I don’t think he’s aware of it.

“When?” I say.

“Two weeks.” Puffin is mewling around his feet, rubbing her chin against his leg and chair, but Gabe doesn’t look down or acknowledge her. “I promised Beringer I’d stay that long.”

“Beringer?” I say. “You promised Beringer you’d stay that long? What about us ? What’s going to happen to us?”

He won’t look at me. I’m trying to imagine how we can survive with one less earning Connolly and one more empty bed.

“You can’t go,” I say. “You can’t go so soon.” My pulse is clubbing inside my chest and I have to press my jaw shut to keep my teeth from chattering.

Gabe’s face is utterly unchanged, and I know that I’m going to regret what I say, but it’s the only thing I can think of, so I say it.

“I’m riding in the races,” I tell him. Just like that.

Now I have both my brothers’ full attention, and my cheeks feel like I’ve been leaning over a hot stove.

“Oh, come on, Kate,” Gabe says, but his voice is not as sure as it should be. He half believes me, despite himself. Before I say anything else, I have to think about it and decide if I believe me. I think of this morning, my hair tugged in the wind, the feel of Dove stretching out into a gallop. I think of the day after the races, the red-stained sand high up on the beach where the ocean has yet to reach. I think of the last boats leaving for the winter, and Gabe on one of them.

I could do it, if it came to it.

“I am. Didn’t you hear in town? The horses are coming out. Training starts tomorrow.” I am so, so proud that my words sound firm.

Gabe’s mouth works, as if he is saying all sorts of things without parting his lips, and I know that he is going through all the counterarguments in his head. Part of me wants him to say “you can’t” so I can ask “why?” and he would have to realize that he can’t answer “because you might leave Finn by himself.” And he can’t ask “why?” because then he’d have to answer that question as well. I should be feeling very clever and pleased with myself, because it’s very hard to render Gabe speechless, but mostly my heart is just going tip-tip-tip in my chest, very shallow and fast, and I’m half hoping that he’ll say that if I don’t ride, he’ll stay.

But finally he says, “All right. I’ll stay until after the races.” He looks cross. “But no longer than that, or the boats will stop running ’til spring. This is a really stupid thing you’re doing, Kate.”

He’s mad at me, but I don’t care about that. All I care is that he’s staying, for a little while longer.

“Well, sounds like we’ll need the money, if I win,” I say, trying to sound as adult and blasé as possible, but thinking that maybe if I do win the money, he won’t have to leave. And then I get up from the table and put my plate and teacup in the sink, like it was a normal evening. Then I walk into my room, close the door, and put my pillow over my head so no one will hear.

“Selfish bastard,” I whisper, the words close under the pillowcase.

Then I burst into tears.

I am dreaming of the sea when they wake me.

Actually, I am dreaming of the night that I caught Corr, but I can hear the sea in my dream. There is an old wives’ tale that capaill uisce caught at night are faster and stronger, and so it is three in the morning and I am crouching on a boulder at the base of the cliffs, several hundred feet from the sand beach. Above me, the sea has made an arch in the chalk, the ceiling a hundred feet over my head, and the white walls hug me. It should be dark, hidden from the moon, but the ocean reflects light off the pale rock, and I can see just well enough not to stumble on the coarse, kelp-covered rocks on the floor. The stone beneath my feet has more in common with the seafloor than the shore, and I have to take care not to lose my footing on the slippery surface.

I am listening.

In the dark, in the cold, I am listening for a change in the sound of the ocean. The water is rising, quickly and silently; the tide is coming in, and in an hour, this incomplete cave will be full of seawater higher than my head. I am listening for the sound of a splash, for the rush of a hoof breaking the surface, for any hint that a capall uisce is emerging. Because by the time you hear a hoof click on the stones, you are dead.

But there is nothing but the eerie silence of the sea: no seabirds at night, no shouts of boys on the shore, no distant hum of a boat’s motor. The wind is ruthless as it finds me in the arch. Unbalanced by its sudden force, I slip and catch my balance again on the wall, my fingers splayed. I hurriedly pull my hand back – the walls of the arch are covered with blood-red jellies that wink and glisten at me by the light of the moon. My father told me they were completely harmless. I don’t believe him. Nothing is completely harmless.