Page 59 of The Mirror and the Curse

Steadily, and more quickly than Eddi would have believed, he gained on the two leaders, flying a good thirty feet above their heads. When Eddi could no longer see her rivals, she knew they must be able to see White ahead of them. Sooner than she’d expected, White passed over the playing fields a second time. One lap to go.

The big colt’s breathing was deep and steady. At this altitude, his lungs functioned at peak capacity, and any sweat his body formed evaporated almost instantly. Eddi marveled at the power in his shoulders and wings, and her sincere admiration flowed into him. She sensed his pleasure, and if anything, he flew even faster. Eddi had no idea where Arush and Tirador were now. They could be directly below or even pulling ahead, yet she knew they weren’t. Neither of them could match White’s current pace for any length of time.

“You’re amazing,” she told her horse, speaking aloud inside her helmet. Happiness flowed from him. Message received.

But an instant later, his body jolted in midair as if he’d been struck. If Eddi hadn’t been flattened on his back and neck, she might have lost her seat. As it was, she clutched his barrel with her legs and gripped his mane with all her strength.

What happened? Had he been shot?

White spiraled downward so quickly that Eddi’s short legs could no longer grip his sides, and her body lifted away from his, connected only by the safety strap and her hands wrapped in his mane and the saddle band’s leather straps. “White!” she tried to call, but when she briefly caught a mental glimpse of his mind, there was only chaos. No reason, no thought, only fear.

A stone ridge seemed to rush up at them. White had just sense enough to swoop upward before colliding with it head on—which pancaked Eddi on his back—then leveled out, flying faster and faster as if he raced to escape the maw of doom. Peaks, valleys, and ridges flashed past below. “Stop, White!” Eddi shouted aloud, and her mind echoed the command again and again.

When he did slow, and a patch of somewhat level ground at the base of a stone column grew rapidly larger, Eddi realized White was making directly for it. He landed, running up the slope, and Eddi discerned one clear thought amid his hopeless maelstrom of dread. “Band. Off!”

The saddle band. Her hands were unwrapped before he slowed to a stop, and she unhooked her safety snap and slid to the ground on his uphill side, her legs shaking and rubbery. Her nerveless gloved hands scrabbled at the leather band, and only constant practice at the task enabled her to loosen the buckle and pull the strap free. As it fell, the buckle touched bare skin between her glove and her sleeve—

Terror filled her mind like a sucking void. Then the saddle band dropped to the ground, and White leaped into the air. The downdraft from his wings sent Eddi tumbling down the slope, unbalanced by the clumsy weight of her parachute pack.

Once her body skidded to a halt, her eyes focused on two blades of grass while her spinning brain recovered. At last she gasped a shuddering breath, rose to one elbow, and tipped her head back to look up the slope. She saw rocks and scree, with a few bushes and patches of grass. To her left rose a pock-marked formation of granite. Higher and to her right, she glimpsed trees.

Slowly she sat upright and looked down the slope. Her heart nearly stopped.

Not ten feet below her position, the ground seemed to end. Deliberately she focused back on those trees, gathered her feet beneath her, and scaled the slope, using her shaking hands to find rocks stable enough to hold her weight. In this manner she reached a flat area, and there she dropped and lay still, waiting for her heart rate to normalize and her breathing to steady.

First things first. She was alive and uninjured. A good starting place. The magic in her helmet prevented her visor from fogging and allowed her sufficient oxygen.

She sipped water from the tube leading to a bottle inside her pack. Must stay hydrated. Send for help? She pressed the button on her wristband. It didn’t buzz. Was it dead?

In all her years of flying, she had never once needed any of the emergency gear stuffed into the pocket below her parachute, the things Kai had made her practice using during one of her lessons last month, such as a pocketknife and a lighter. Digging deeper, she found the flare gun and carefully followed the directions printed on its stock. Pointing the gun at the sky, she hunched her shoulders, scrunched up her face, and pulled the trigger.Pow!

High above, the glowing signal made an arc through the sky.

Eddi watched it until even the smoke dispersed.

And now what? She could sit here waiting for quite a while before help arrived, and then she had to find White, who had probably flown several miles off the racecourse . . . and she couldn’t clearly recall in which direction. Was she even on resort grounds?

Now that was a concern. Remembering Kai’s frequent warnings about venturing into the wilds of these mountains without the resort’s magical protections, she shivered in her flight suit.

Here she sat on an open mountainside. Everything within miles must have seen that flare, and anything sentient could easily locate her position.

Hunkering down beside a boulder, she shifted to a crouched position and peered around, squinting in the afternoon glare. She should be safe enough. After all, it was broad daylight. Didn’t evil magical creatures prowl at night? But a creepy sensation of being watched kept her shifting position, turning in circles. That cliff face was riddled with holes. Dark holes. Where nasty things might be hiding.

Even as that thought crossed her mind, something touched her leg and whistled. With a shriek, Eddi leaped to her feet and spun to face the enemy, brandishing her little utility knife. Only then did she identify the whistler.

A cinder sprite.

Not just one, but three large cinder sprites regarded her with startled disapproval, their horns high, whiskers quivering.

Her arms dropped to her sides. “Oh, I’m so sorry! I thought—I was—I don’t know what I was thinking!”

“Wow, girl, are you ever jumpy!”

The gravelly voice sent her heart back into panicked spasms as she spun to face the speaker, and the sight of a round gray face with huge yellowish eyes, a flattish nose, and protruding teeth did not help matters. Silvery hair sprouted from the top of the creature’s head, and its complexion appeared to have the texture of mud. “The cinder sprites told me a human girl was up here, and I figured I’d better claim you before my brothers show up. Since you interrupted my tea party, I think you should join us. You know, as an unexpected guest. Will you?”

Eddi’s frazzled brain processed only part of this invitation, fixing on the bit about a tea party. Was she to be the main course? “I must return to the castle. I’m a guest at the resort, and I—”

“I know that. I’m guessing you were riding a fterotó, judging by your clothes. Do you know Kai?”

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