Page 100 of Hijack the Seas: Seismic

Okay.

I couldn’t tell if the guy was dead or not, but he was definitely out of the race, with his body going limp and he and his seahorse getting all but mowed down by several more riders. He vanished into the darkness, and Enid steered us into the center of the course, which, yeah. Good job, Enid!

Or it would have been, only Galygos had finished his shrimp and had it register that there were freaking seahorses in the water ahead of him.

And how very dare they?

He shot ahead, and I mean that literally. I now know what a bullet feels like, I thought, trying to scream but not being able to as hitting the back of Enid’s shield forced all of the air out of my lungs. And then I hit it again and again as we dodged this competitor and that one, trying to get ahead, where Galygos clearly believed he belonged.

“Do up the straps!” Enid was yelling, and for a moment, I didn’t know what she meant—and then I realized that I hadn’t strapped my legs into the thigh-high stirrups. And sure, I was going to be able to manage that now!

But I tried anyway because this was unsustainable, and she couldn’t help me. She looked how I felt, with her face white, her eyes huge, and her glamourie glitzing, showing glimpses of the ruined flesh beneath the perfect veneer. Maybe because it was taking every ounce of concentration she had to steer with Galygos not caring if he ran over the competition.

In fact, he seemed to prefer it.

And then, so did I when we started getting attacked on all sides. Some guards had noticed that we’d joined the race and reined in to allow us to catch up, only to start trying to force us into the walls as soon as we did so. Only, yeah, I thought dizzily.

Have you met our ride?

Apparently not.

The next moment, one guard and the pretty gray-green seahorse it was riding were flung into electric hell, courtesy of Galygos’ mighty tail, and another mount disappeared in a sea of red after getting a sizeable piece torn out of its neck by those vicious teeth. And then Galygos demonstrated another way in which Faerie’s children differed from their Earthly counterparts, by opening some bony plates covering his stomach.

And launching a bunch of knife-like spikes into the guard right in front of us, who had been attempting to slow us down.

They popped his shield like it wasn’t there and then tore apart what was inside. And that was enough for the remaining guards’ mounts, who scattered in a storm of panicked fins and churning bubbles while we tore through the bloody remains. Just in time to see Pritkin up ahead, battling with the remaining guards, who were also targeting—

“What the hell?” I asked Enid breathlessly. “What is she doing here?”

She didn’t bother asking who I meant. “Bodil can’t compete!” she yelled back, to be heard over the water rushing on all sides.

“I know!”

“So, she must have a champion—”

“I know!”

“—who she doesn’t trust to take this! She must have joined his entourage to win it for him!” A lot of weird fey curses followed this pronouncement because Bodil ran the stables and had for basically ever.

What chance did we have against her?

Maybe better than I’d thought. Because the purple-haired guards seemed to be splitting their time between trying to kill Pritkin and trying to knock Bodil out of the race. Probably to help Feltin’s champion get ahead, whoever that was.

But while the beautiful black and silver seahorse she rode had the delicate features of a female, it fought like a male—and a vicious one at that—matching its rider’s skill and aggression. As a result, the two of them were holding their own, even though there had to be a dozen guards boiling around her and Pritkin, like vultures around a carcass. Until he broke open a hole in the line by expanding his shield and scraping a guard along the wards of death until there was nothing left but a smear of red, even though the fey in question had been warded and clad in dragonscale.

I stared at the wards and vowed to stay very far away from them, which was what everyone else was doing. Except for Pritkin, who skimmed along the surface of one, what must have been a millimeter away, enough that the deadly thing started sending little tendrils of lightning outward, trying to rope him in. Until he’d bypassed the remaining guards, then he broke for open water, with Bodil right behind him, along with the guards, peeling off from their formation and shooting spells through their shields.

One of the curses set another champion on fire, and even though we were all submerged, he kept right on burning. The guards seemed to have forgotten that Feltin had said to capture Pritkin, not to kill him! But it looked like he’d really managed to piss them off.

The man had a talent.

And right then, they wanted payback for all the people they’d lost in the kitchen fight more than they wanted rewards. He needed additional power, but he’d removed Lover’s Knot as soon as we’d escaped Bodil’s trap, so I couldn’t send him any. And that was assuming I had any to spare, which I didn’t!

But they did, I thought, noticing a couple of royal guards who were lagging behind slightly to allow them to lob spells from a safe distance. And just like Enid on the merpeople’s unfinished track, they’d released a cloud of magic around their heads to speed that process up. A cloud that looked like every meal I’d been missing for the last week.

“Get me closer,” I urged her, pointing at them, and got a wild look over her shoulder in return, but it didn’t matter. Because it appeared that there was something Galygos liked better than shrimp, and she was straight ahead and being attacked.

And, okay, forget the bullet; now I knew what a missile felt like. I hit the back of the ward again, and this time, I didn’t climb back up against Enid. Because she’d just slammed into me after our sudden surge broke the straps on her stirrups.

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