The thumping of shoes against turf.

  The whistling of the wind being cut.

  The roar of the crowd in the stands.

  Western Woodland, like all horse girls, was born to run. In this moment, she was in her element. Her heart pounded as she turned the final corner, the goal coming into view, just a few hundred meters away at the top of the hill. Less than half a length in front of her and a few steps to the right ran the race’s favorite, Crystal Spark, her white hair streaked with red flying behind her, unbound as it always was.

  The same situation.

  Four times they had been in this position. The final stretch, Woodland on Spark’s heels, close enough to hear her panting over all the other noises of the race. They ran, side by side but not quite shoulder to shoulder, each putting their all into every step, trying to gain any tiny amount of ground over the other.

  The first time, Crystal Spark held on to her lead and won by the same half length. The second time, Western Woodland overtook her just before the finish line. The third time, she came out of the corner with enough speed to overtake and swap their positions earlier. The last time, Crystal Spark accelerated away, opening the distance and winning by two lengths.

  They ran the last spurt for the fifth time, in their own world. Flicking her ears back, Western Woodland leaned forward, launching herself forward. She’d paced herself this time, and wouldn’t let her rival open the distance. We was going to win here, show she was superior, show that-

  She stumbled.

  In that moment, her heart stopped. Her body moved automatically. She twisted, flailing, trying to maintain balance as she lost speed, staggering to the side. Her brain screamed to push onward, to run, to win, but her body just tried to survive. Fear drove her to avoid falling at top speed. Instead, she slowed and fell sideways, rolling in the grass.

  As she came to a stop, she heard the crowd roaring. She’d messed up, and Crystal Spark had won. Her body was sore from the fall, but the knowledge of that hurt more. She looked to her rival, laying in the grass beside her, equally brui-

  Crystal Spark hadn’t won.

  The crowd was cheering for someone else.

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  They had both fallen.

  “You! You’d do that to win? Does it mean that much to you?”

  Thundering Silence stopped, turning to look at Western Woodland. The short, black-haired horse girl shrugged. “I just kept running. Accidents happen.”

  Stomping her way across the pavement of the lot outside the racecourse, Western Woodland pointed at the race’s winner. “That was no accident. You only won because both of us happened to fall at the same time. You-“

  “Hey.” Thundering’s eyebrows dropped as she glared up at Woodland. “I didn’t touch either of you. Watch the recordings. I just ran my race, like-“

  “Frost Breeze always falters at sixteen hundred meters. She’s also a good friend of yours. She wasn’t going to win today, but if she ran well she’d be in a perfect position to do something to me and Spark. Did you put her up to it? Or did she do it on her own?”

  She saw it. A tiny movement in Thundering’s eyes - she looked away, for just a second.

  Guilt.

  That was all it took for Western Woodland to make the worst decision of her life.

  “Disqualified? For how long?”

  “Forever.” Tamura said, refusing to even look at her. She stared at her trainer as he dispassionately scrolled through something on his laptop. The other members of her team weren’t in their training room now - he had called her here to speak with her alone.

  “Why? What did I do?”

  He turned on her, exasperated. “You punched another horse girl! In public, in front of people! This isn’t something that can be explained away as a training accident. People saw you call her out and then hit her. What were you thinking?”

  “She rigged a race! She cheated!”

  Tamura’s expression didn’t soften. “There’s an investigation into that, but there’s no investigation for you. The racing association has a no tolerance policy.”

  Woodland clenched her jaw and dropped her ears. “You’re my trainer! Can’t you argue in my favor at all?”

  He let out a sigh. “Zero tolerance is zero tolerance. I’m not your trainer anymore.”

  It took a moment to process, but when she did, the anger left her. “It’s over. I’ll never get scouted to central. I’ll never go to Tracen.”

  “You won’t race.”

  “What?” She knew she heard it right, but didn’t want to. That couldn’t be true.

  “No trainer will take you. No trainer means no races. You’re done. Entirely. You threw away all of your dreams because you got mad. Live with the consequences.”

  She couldn’t move. She wanted to do something, say something, but she just stood still, frozen in place.

  “Get out, Woodland. I don’t want you here either. Hanging around will only worsen my reputation, and that of your former teammates. At least try not to ruin them as well.”

  Slowly, she turned and walked out, leaving Tamura alone. No racing? That’s all she ever did. All she had ever done.

  Horse girls were born to run. If she couldn’t race, what was the point in running?