Gallop Swiftmane's Arc

Chapter 5 of 5

Gallop left the dreamcatcher turn at dawn with a short list and a shorter purse. His partner rode south. Four backers were gone. The circuit would not build itself, and waiting had become its own kind of failure. He folded the map into his belt and went to find what he could carry home. Mervin found him first, of course. The goblin trotted up the packed-earth straight with pockets clanking. "Heard you need a race. Obviously. I know flags. I know crowds. I move things." Gallop looked at him a long moment. "Then move posts. Six of them. Tall as me. By tomorrow." Mervin blinked once, then grinned. "Done. Just logic." At the old tavern, Bramblewick was painting a fresh sign for a school that had no walls. Gallop set the map on a barrel. "I need a starting line. Two posts, checkered cloth, a bell. I can't pay yet." Bramblewick snorted. "Clearly the season for unpaid favors." He wiped his hands. "Fine. But my card goes on the post. Small. Just the corner." Gallop almost smiled. "Corner only." Mirelda was on her porch with a pie cooling beside her. She watched him climb the path without rising. "You look like a man short a prize, dear." Gallop nodded. "Riders won't come for a handshake." She reached behind her chair and set a heavy golden disk on the rail. Engraved. Real. "My husband won it for something. He's been dead twelve years. It's bored." She slid it across. "Bring it back if no one earns it." By the next dusk, Mervin had the posts up crooked and Bramblewick straightened them, swearing. The checkered cloth snapped above the packed-earth straight. The medal hung from a nail on the left post, catching the last light. Gallop walked the twelve furlongs alone, then back. Six riders had answered the call he'd nailed to three trees. Six was enough. He stood at the line as the sun dropped. The circuit existed now, crooked and borrowed and small. His partner was not here to see it. Tomorrow centaurs would run on ground he had mapped and someone else had nailed together. The first race would happen. That was the only thing that had ever been the point.