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The golden mare was going so fast that she nearly missed it; Kasyan hauled her around and she stumbled, but recovered, long ears flat to her head, while her rider shouted her on. Vasya whispered to Solovey and he took a short stride, gathered his quarters beneath him, and sprang smoothly to the right, gaining ground. His head hung level with the mare’s hip. The mare was half-frantic and floundering with her rider’s steady whipping. Solovey ran in great leaps, and soon they were drawing ahead; now Kasyan’s stirrup was level with Solovey’s heel.
Kasyan whooped and saluted her, teeth bared, when they passed him, and Vasya, despite her fear, felt answering laughter rise in her own throat. Fear and thought were all gone; there was only the speed, the wind and cold, the perfect heave and surge of her horse beneath her. She leaned forward, whispering encouragement to Solovey. The horse’s ears tilted toward her, and then he found a speed greater still. They were nearly a horse-length in front, and Vasya had frozen tears running down her face. The wind dried her lips and cracked them. Her teeth ached with cold. To the right again, and then they were in the thick snow, running beneath the kremlin-wall. Shouts rained on them from the wall-top. Down and down, faster and faster, and with her legs and her weight and her soft voice, Vasya bade the horse keep his feet under himself, his head forward and driving. Go, she told him. Go!
They hit the ice again with the speed of a storm, ahead of their rivals, and now there was the sound of the boyars cheering. They had made the first circle.
Some of the younger men were galloping their horses along the ice, racing the speeding Solovey, but even their fresh horses could not keep up and they fell back and away. Vasya shouted laughing abuse at them, and they answered in kind; then she risked a look behind.
The golden mare had opened up when she came back onto the river, running over the ice faster than Vasya had ever seen a horse run, chased by the howls of the watchers. She was gaining on Solovey again, foam speckling her breast. Vasya leaned forward and whispered to her horse. The stallion found something in him: a breath, a swifter stride still, and when the mare caught him, he matched her. This time they hit the turn side by side, and Kasyan had learned his lesson; he checked the mare a stride before, so that she would not slide on the ice.
No possibility of speech, of thought. Like horses yoked to a wagon, the mare and the stallion circled the city side by side, galloping at full stretch but neither one gaining, until they were racing again down the twisting road of the posad, down again toward the riverbank and the end of the race.
But—there—a sledge—a heedless sledge halted too soon, fouling their path. People all around it, shouting, heaving. The riders had circled the city faster than these fools had thought possible, and so the way was blocked.
Kasyan glanced at her with joyful invitation, and Vasya couldn’t help it, she grinned back at him. Down they tore to the sledge heaped high, and Vasya was counting Solovey’s strides now, a hand on his neck. Three, two, and there was not room for another. The horse heaved himself up and over, tucking his hooves. He came down lightly on the slick snow and launched himself down the final stretch of river, toward the end of the race.
The mare leaped the sledge a stride behind; she hit the ice like a bird, then they were racing along the flat with all Moscow screaming. For the first time, Vasya cried aloud to Solovey: shouted, and she felt him answer, but the mare equaled him, tearing along, wild-eyed, and the two horses ran down the ice together, their riders’ knees jostling.
Vasya did not see the hand until it was too late.
One minute Kasyan was riding, fingers urgent on the reins. The next he had reached over and seized the ties that bound her hood, seized them and wrenched them apart, so that the sheepskin cap tumbled away. Her hair tumbled out, her plait raveled, and then the black banner of her hair was flying loose for all to see.
Solovey could not have stopped even if he had wished to. He drove on heedless of everything. Vasya, her battle-madness gone cold and dead, could only cling to him, panting.
The stallion thrust his head in front, then his shoulder, and then they stormed past the finish to a stunned silence. Vasya knew that, win or lose the race, Kasyan had beaten her at a game she had not known she was playing.
SHE SAT UP. SOLOVEY SLOWED. The stallion was heaving for breath, spent. Even if she had wanted to escape, the horse could not manage it now.
Vasya dropped to the ground, getting her weight off him, and turned back to face the crowd of boyars, of bishops, and the Grand Prince himself, who stood looking at her in horrified silence.
Her hair wrapped her body, snagged on the fur of her cloak. Kasyan had already slid off his golden mare. The horse stood still, her head low, blood and foam dripping from the tender corners of her mouth, where the bit had cut deep.
Vasya, in the midst of horror, knew a sudden fury at that golden bridle. Jerkily, she set a hand on the headstall, meaning to rip it off.
But Kasyan’s gloved hand shot out, knocked her fingers away, and hauled her back.
Solovey squealed and reared, striking out, but men with ropes—Kasyan’s men—beat the exhausted horse away. Vasya was thrust onto her knees in the snow in front of the Grand Prince, her hair hanging all about her face and all Moscow watching.
Dmitrii was salt-white above his pale beard. “Who are you?” he demanded. “What is this?” All about him his boyars were staring.
“Please,” said Vasya, yanking at the hand that held her. “Let me go to Solovey.” Behind her, the horse squealed again. Men were shouting. She twisted around to look. They had flung ropes over his neck, but the stallion was fighting them.
Kasyan solved the problem. He hauled Vasya to her feet, put a knife to her throat, and said very softly, “I’ll kill her.” He spoke so low that none heard except for the girl and the keen-eared stallion.
Solovey went deathly still.
He knew everything, Vasya thought. That she was a girl, that Solovey understood men’s speech. His hand around her arm was going to leave fingermarks.
Kasyan addressed Solovey, softly. “Let them lead you to the Grand Prince’s stable,” he said. “Go quiet, and she will live and be returned to you. You have my word.”
Solovey shrilled defiance. He kicked out and a man fell gasping into the snow. Vasya. She read the word in the stallion’s wild eye. Vasya.
Kasyan’s hand tightened on her arm until she gasped and the knife beneath her jaw dug in until she felt the skin just split…
“Run!” Vasya cried to the horse desperately. “Do not be a prisoner!”
But the horse had already dropped his head in defeat. Vasya felt Kasyan let out a satisfied breath.
“Take him,” he said.
Vasya cried out in wordless protest, but now grooms were running up to put a bridle with a twisted chain on Solovey’s head. She tasted tears of rage. The stallion let himself be led away, head low, still exhausted. Kasyan’s knife disappeared, but he did not release her arm. He spun her around to face the Grand Prince, the crowd of boyars. “You should have listened this morning,” he murmured into her ear.
Sasha was still mounted; Tuman had bulled her way onto the ice, and her brother had a sword in his hand, his hood cast back from his pale face. His eyes were on the trickle of blood running down the side of her throat.
“Let her go,” Sasha said.
