The Winged Horse Race

by Kallie George

  ‘She doesn’t want any of that food, Lachesis,’ snapped the Fate with the scissors. ‘Just look at it. Mouldy again. What is the point of making food if we never eat it? What is the purpose of our garden if the things we grow aren’t consumed?’ She snipped at the air as she spoke, and Pippa didn’t know if she was snipping threads or her words. If Lachesis was old, this Fate looked much older, so wizened even her hair was wrinkled. If the gods and goddesses, and even the demigods, could choose their ages, couldn’t the Fates? Why would they choose to be ancient?

  Lachesis looked at the bread as though seeing it for the first time. ‘We have food for guests, Atropos,’ she said, but didn’t seem convinced of her own words.

  ‘Our guests are never looking for food,’ sniffed Atropos. ‘They want advice and predictions.’ Atropos narrowed her eyes at Pippa and brandished her shears. ‘I hope that’s not why you’re here.’

  Pippa hadn’t thought about it, but now suddenly she did. Did she and Zeph have a chance in the race?

  ‘We won’t tell you a word about the race,’ continued Atropos. ‘I know what you riders want. Not to mention those gods and goddesses.’ She clucked her tongue. ‘“Who will win the race?” they ask. “Who will win? Who will win?” They should know by now that we can’t tell such things.’

  ‘So much is undetermined, you see,’ came the deep, soft voice from the corner. ‘We only know so much.’ Pippa looked over at the spinner, who glanced up for a moment from her spindle and smiled. Her skin looked paper-thin.

  Atropos clucked her tongue again. ‘We know what we know, Clotho. And you’d think by now everyone would stop pestering us.’

  ‘Don’t be bothered by her,’ said Lachesis to Pippa. ‘She’s just grouchy because she prefers our rooms in the palace. But it is much more peaceful down here during the race. We really can’t say anything about the outcome, you know.’

  ‘That’s not why I’m here. I didn’t know this was where you lived,’ Pippa replied. ‘I’m lost. That’s all. My horse and I just want to go back to the stables.’

  ‘Ah, that Bellerophon forgets some of the simplest things. Didn’t he give you a whistle? Some way to call for aid?’

  Pippa shook her head.

  ‘Hmm.’ Atropos tapped her shears on the wooden table.

  ‘Oh, come,’ said Lachesis. ‘Surely we can give her some help, a map, perhaps? Show a little love.’

  ‘Love!’ scoffed Atropos.

  ‘Do you really want another taraxippos troubling us? Disturbing our work?’ Lachesis went on.

  Atropos scoffed again. ‘I suppose a map is something we can share with her. Clotho!’

  Clotho set down her spindle and nodded. She turned to the small loom beside her, her fingers twirling across the air between the wooden planks, like she was playing a lyre with no strings. Then she gestured to Atropos, who hobbled over and snipped the invisible threads. And when she had, a small weaving appeared. Atropos plucked it from the air before it fell, then hobbled back and handed it to Pippa.

  Pippa gazed at it, dumbfounded. The tiny square of fabric was alive with detail, and movement too. The threads seemed to quiver. The map showed the stables and the training course, the sleeping quarters and even the palace at the very top corner, as well as the hut where Pippa was now. ‘Oh, thank you!’ she exclaimed. As she tucked the map into her chiton, her fingers grazed her coin. Surely the Fates would know what happened to her parents – and that wasn’t asking about the future, it was asking about the past. But before Pippa could say anything, Atropos waved her gnarled hand.

  ‘Take it and be off. But mind you leave it behind when you return to the mortal realm.’

  ‘Atropos! Hush!’ said Clotho, looking horrified.

  But it was too late. The words hung ominously in the air. Pippa would be returning to Athens. She wouldn’t win the race. She wouldn’t get to stay with Zeph. Tears pricked at her eyes. The Fates might as well have snipped her thread right then and there.

  ‘Now you’ve done it,’ said Lachesis, shaking her head. ‘And after that lecture on not saying anything about outcomes too.’

  Atropos crossed her arms unapologetically. ‘Well, she can’t very well take an item of ours down to the mortals, can she? Magic threads have no place there. I won’t have any breaking of our rules.’

  ‘My dear, please try to forget what you have heard,’ said Lachesis, turning to Pippa.

  Her throat felt tight, but Pippa managed to say, ‘Thank you again. I’ll leave the map behind, I promise.’

  ‘Who knows if we are right in our predictions anyway?’ added Lachesis. ‘We are only three old ladies, after all …’

  ‘With lots of work to do,’ grumped Atropos. ‘And I’ve wasted most of the afternoon arguing.’

  Pippa nodded and headed to the doorway.

  ‘That’s not my fault, you know,’ said Lachesis. ‘You started it.’

  ‘Starting is not what is important; finishing is,’ grouched Atropos.

  ‘No, it is the journey that is the most important,’ said Lachesis.

  ‘Oh dear, here we go again,’ sighed Clotho. ‘Goodbye, child. And good luck.’

  ‘Oooh, and please take some of the carrots in the garden for your horse,’ called out Lachesis as Pippa left.

  ELEVEN

  Pippa had never been the sort to cry, not even when a horse stepped on her foot. So when the rain began to fall during her ride back to the stables, she couldn’t tell if it was raindrops or tears wetting her cheeks. Now she knew she wouldn’t win. She would have to say goodbye to Zeph.

  It wasn’t fair. As long as Bas could hang on, he and Kerauno were practically guaranteed to finish first. But Pippa had so hoped that there was a chance. Now there was none.

  When they reached the stables, they were both drenched. Steam rose from Zeph’s back. The other horses were all in their stalls and the other riders were nowhere to be seen. Visiting Day was over. She should probably check in with Bellerophon and face her punishment, but she didn’t want to.

  Instead, she rubbed Zeph dry, then she sat in the hay in his stall and fed him the carrots she’d picked from the Fates’ garden.

  Bellerophon blew the whistle for supper, but Pippa didn’t go. She wasn’t hungry. When Zeph was done with his treat, he lay down beside her and nosed her inquisitively.

  ‘I’m OK,’ said Pippa. ‘It’s just that I don’t want to leave you.’

  She stroked his mane and his feathers and slowly felt better. She fell asleep there, in Zeph’s stall, with the map from the Fates tucked under her head like a pillow.

  ‘There you are!’ Bellerophon bellowed.

  Pippa woke with a start. The great groom filled the stall doorway. His eyebrows scrunched together across his forehead like a dark trough.

  Pippa scrambled to her feet, hay stuck to her sweaty face. Zeph was already up. The sun streamed in, giving the little horse’s coat and wings a golden sheen.

  What time was it? Pippa’s mind was foggy with dreams of stars and spindles, mist and maps. Maps! Below her feet was the map, peeking from the hay. Not dreams. She really had met the Fates. Her shoulders slumped, remembering what she’d learned.

  ‘You certainly are here to stir up trouble – for me! You left during the visiting. You missed supper and breakfast – I was willing to overlook all that. But not morning training. There is a schedule we keep,’ Bellerophon barked.

  Pippa didn’t know what to say. What was the point to training now she knew it wouldn’t make a difference?

  As though the groom could read her mind, he said, ‘If you don’t care to train, you have no place on the mountain. I will send you home at once.’

  ‘No!’ The word burst from her mouth. Even if she was fated to lose, she didn’t want to leave Zeph yet. ‘You … you said we could explore.’

  ‘But not miss meals or a whole morning!’ Bellerophon pounded his cane on the floor. ‘Do you think you are better than my rules? Better than the other riders?’

  ‘No! No
t at all! I’m only …’ She trailed off.

  ‘Only what?’ A curious light came into Bellerophon’s eyes. ‘My father might have been a king, but I was an exile before I was a hero, and a hero before I was a demigod. A little humility is appreciated by the gods. But it was my pride and perseverance more than my might that brought me here.’ He pounded his cane again. The ground shook, and the hay shifted, revealing more of the map. Bellerophon noticed it. ‘Where did you get that? From Aphrodite?’

  ‘The Fates,’ Pippa said. The truth seemed best.

  ‘The Fates?’ Bellerophon exclaimed in surprise. ‘Just what I need! Them meddling!’

  ‘They told me—’ started Pippa.

  ‘I don’t want to hear it!’ Bellerophon said sharply. ‘And you should not listen either. The Fates speak in riddles and have a way of getting into your head.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘But nothing. Which is exactly what you should think of your conversation with them. Did you know the Oracle said I would make nothing of my life; that I would be a great disappointment to my family, to myself? I could have listened to her. I didn’t.’

  ‘But that’s the Oracle, not the Fates.’

  ‘Pah! Close enough.’

  ‘So … you think I have a chance?’ The words slipped out, though they were meant more for herself.

  ‘Only if you think you do.’

  Her cheeks flushed with hope.

  ‘And if you train.’

  The great groom scooped the map up with the end of his cane and flung it through the air towards Pippa. She caught it awkwardly.

  ‘Perhaps the Fates gave you this map for a reason. On it, you will find a cliff shaped like a lightning bolt. It is the spot of the old training course. The old training course is more dangerous to fly, but it is truer to the actual course, which will be on the mountaintop.’

  ‘So I am not punished?’ said Pippa slowly.

  ‘Training there is punishment enough,’ Bellerophon replied. ‘And I do expect you to train.’

  The rain of the day before was long gone. The morning sky was bright, the colour of honey, as they flew across the mountain. Pippa, however, sat tensely on Zeph’s back, map in one hand and a fistful of reins in the other. At last, they reached the cliff shaped like a lightning bolt. Zeph landed at the edge, the sound of his hooves ringing out across the rocky gully below.

  Pippa peered across the chasm.

  A tattered flag waved on the clifftop opposite. To reach it, they would have to fly over rocks as piercing as the gaze of the Gorgon, the monster whose mere glance turned the living into stone. It certainly seemed like this might be where she collected her victims. Stones, sharp as knives, stretched as far as Pippa could see.

  Zeph nickered. She gave his neck a pat then slipped the map into her tunic so she could grip the reins with both hands.

  ‘Are you ready?’ she whispered. He flicked his ears. He seemed eager, even if she was less sure. At least there aren’t any other riders to distract us, she reassured herself. And so, with a whistle, she pressed her legs into Zeph’s sides.

  He jumped from the top of the cliff with a jolt.

  Instantly, a rock sprang up in front of them. Zeph reared, barely missing it. He pitched to the right. Pippa gripped the reins with all her might.

  Where did that come from?

  Before she could turn and see if the rock was still there, another seemed to appear out of nowhere, looming up and over them like a claw.

  Just in time, Pippa directed Zeph down, though one of his wingtips grazed the inside, loosening a bit of rubble.

  Pippa watched as it tumbled down, down, down … she gasped.

  There below, caught between two stones, was a bridle torn in two. It was blanched white from the sun, like a bone. And was that a real bone she saw too? There were riders here – the remains of them.

  Distracted, she didn’t see the next rock. Luckily Zeph did, and he surged around it. But not before it scraped hard against her leg. Pippa cried out in pain. Warm blood trickled down her skin.

  Pippa could barely breathe, could hardly see, as they whirled upwards. She clutched at Zeph’s reins and directed him higher still. Up, up, up, they flew, above the treacherous training grounds.

  Only when they were far away did Pippa breathe again.

  ‘Are you OK?’ she asked.

  Zeph’s wingbeats, powerful and swift, seemed to answer yes.

  But she wasn’t. Not just because of her leg, which throbbed but would heal soon enough. But because of what she now knew.

  She could never train on a course like that. The Fates were right. She really was going to lose.

  Shaking, Pippa directed Zeph back to the stables.

  That night at supper, the other riders looked at Pippa questioningly. Especially at her leg, which she’d bandaged clumsily with her old tunic.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ whispered Sophia, concerned.

  Pippa shook her head. ‘It was only a scrape.’

  Before Sophia could ask more, Perikles burst out, ‘So you’re still here. I thought you’d been sent away.’

  ‘You gave up, as you should. Good riddance,’ laughed Khrys.

  ‘No,’ replied Bas. ‘She’s been punished. Didn’t you hear Bellerophon say so?’

  Khrys looked even more pleased. ‘Punished, eh?’ He smirked.

  ‘Which you will be too, if you don’t stop prying,’ said Bellerophon, thumping past them to his own seat.

  ‘Some hero.’ Khrys glowered. ‘He can’t even walk without his cane.’

  Pippa had thought of the cane as an adornment rather than a necessity, but now that she really looked, she could see that Bellerophon’s left foot was badly mangled.

  She remembered what he had told her that morning, that pride and perseverance had brought him there. Had the injury happened when he fell off Pegasus? Had the Fates been against him too? She wasn’t sure. But she did know one thing. Khrys was wrong. If Bellerophon had fallen and got up again, he was a true hero.

  And she realized she knew another thing. She did not want to ‘give up, as she should’, as Khrys said. She wanted to spend as long as she could with Zeph, and that meant she had to train, no matter how frightening the course was.

  Pippa’s stomach growled loudly. Suddenly she was starving. She piled her plate with food – soft flatbread, mashed beans and salty sardines – as high as Bellerophon’s. And, just like Bellerophon, she ate it all.

  With new-found determination, Pippa returned to the old course early the next morning.

  She had a plan. No looking below. Instead, she focused on avoiding the jutting rocks. Although they weren’t actually magic, they rose up in such strange formations that they tricked the eye, often appearing where they seemingly weren’t before. It took all her effort and control to guide Zeph around them, sometimes even over them, as they sprang up in the sky like a surge of water.

  Once, they didn’t quite clear a rock, and Zeph’s hoof hit the tip, causing a clang that rang out across the stony wasteland. He wasn’t hurt, but it took a long time before Pippa had calmed down enough to try again. But she did try again. Round and round the course they flew, not touching down until Selene, the moon goddess, appeared, and it was time to head back.

  Pippa was exhausted but proud. This time at supper, she held her head high and sat near quiet Timon and Sophia, who asked how her training was going but didn’t pry.

  No one else bothered her. Khrys and Perikles were too busy goading Bas, who was the one wearing a bandage on his leg this time. It seemed she wasn’t the only one having trouble.

  As the days passed, Pippa became a better and better rider, though there was no one but the birds and butterflies to notice her improvement. She didn’t always put a bridle on Zeph; although she knew it was a rule, she didn’t need it. The leather of her sandals had grown soft now, but still, some days, she did not wear them, letting the winds tickle the bottoms of her feet as she flew.

  The sky was her home now: blue ceilings
, courtyards of cloud and, if she was out late, stars so close and so numerous it was like they were woven tight as linen.

  Pippa sometimes looked for the Fates’ house on the way back to the training ground, but the hut had disappeared from the map, as if they didn’t want her to find them. It was probably for the best. She knew Bellerophon had told her not to listen to them, and she tried to put their prophecy out of her head. Instead, she remembered Lachesis’s words: ‘It is the journey that is the most important.’ She wanted to enjoy her time with her little horse, for she loved him more than anything.

  As Zeph skirted the stones with increasing ease, flying smartly and swiftly, a boldness billowed in Pippa. After a day of particularly fine riding, she’d watch their shadows – hers and Zeph’s – race on the ground below, and imagine them winning.

  ‘Nikepteros,’ she whispered. ‘Victory in flight.’

  TWELVE

  Pippa never encountered another rider on the mountain. Until the day she decided to return to the stream where she had seen the nymph playing. Using the Fates’ map, she reached the spot, only to find Theodoros there, kneeling on the bank, his horse in the water and surrounded by nymphs.

  Upon seeing Zeph and Pippa, the nymphs dived underwater and Pippa could see ripples on the surface as they swam away.

  Theodoros went red, tugging at his horse, Hali. Hali seemed to be chewing something and didn’t budge. Theodoros gave Hali’s reins another yank. ‘Come on,’ he barked. This was the first time Pippa had heard him raise his voice.

  ‘I won’t say anything if you don’t,’ he said to her, finally drawing Hali out of the water and mounting his steed.

  ‘But …’ began Pippa, confused. The others knew she was being punished and had to train on the mountain. She didn’t have secrets. But clearly Theodoros did.

  ‘I have to do this, OK? It’s Poseidon’s orders. Please don’t say anything.’ He gave her a desperate look.