Tamra had visited the Heart of Becar, the glorious capital of the Becaran Empire, countless times over the years. Still takes my breath away, she thought as they sailed beneath an archway made of two stone figures crossing swords. Ahead was the city: white spires with gold domes, palm trees along the streets, and colorful markets near the docks. And of course the statues.
The statues of the emperor’s city lined the river and dominated the city squares. Made of stone, bronze, wood, clay, and glass, they’d been carved by artisans over many generations. Many were hundreds of years old, and a few were reputed to be a thousand. They depicted every creature that had ever walked, swum, crawled, or flown in Becar—every type of vessel that a human soul could be reborn as. Except kehoks, Tamra thought.
Beside her, Raia was gawking at everything.
Tamra grinned at her. “Wait until you see the palace.”
“The Heart of Becar is a marvel,” Augur Yorbel agreed. “It is said that three hundred years ago—”
Lady Evara interrupted. “Yes, lovely. Spare us the history lesson, and tell me: Are the royal stables and training ground ready? I know Trainer Verlas will want to start immediately.”
Augur Yorbel looked uncomfortable, as he usually did whenever Lady Evara issued one of her demands. So far on this trip, she’d insisted on private sleeping quarters on the riverboat, as well as ripe mangoes at every meal and buckets of fresh flowers to cover the scent of kehok. She’d also brought a glass bowl with three koi fish in it that she insisted one of her three servants carry near her at all times, because she said she found it soothing when traveling.
Rich people are strange, Tamra thought.
In this case, though, Lady Evara was correct. Tamra did want to resume training with Raia and the black lion as quickly as possible. It was mere days until the next round of races.
“I’ve sent messenger wights, and we will be met at the royal dock with a transport,” Augur Yorbel said. “But you will understand if the facilities require more time to be restored to their former glory.”
“Sadly, I am not a particularly understanding person,” Lady Evara said. “If you wish the emperor-to-be’s return to the Becaran Races to be triumphant, we must be supplied with all we need to make our debut on the national stage a success.”
“Um, yes, well, of course.” He looked rattled, and Tamra almost felt sorry for him. She wondered if he was underselling the royal training ground, or overselling it. Exactly how neglected was it? She’d been on plenty of less-than-luxurious tracks. Odd that the emperor wouldn’t prepare the stables before recruiting a racer. She wondered if all this was some spur-of-the-moment whim, like Lady Evara’s fishbowl.
He turned to Tamra and asked, “What do you need?”
“Supply of raw meat and fresh water for the kehok, a stall he can’t break, and a track. And no audience until we’re ready.” She felt Lady Evara glaring at her for not asking for more, but that was truly all she needed. They’d be at the royal stables for only a couple weeks, just until the major and minor races started and all racers converged on the Heart of Becar. They’d be required to stay at the official race campsite then, a few miles beyond the city. “We can sleep in the stables.”
Lady Evara sniffed. “You cannot. Quiet quarters are a must for a well-rested rider, as well as private baths, funds for new racing clothes, and a chef dedicated to our needs. I will draw up a list.” She flounced away from them, into the silken tent that had been erected for her at the back of the boat. Her three servants followed, one still carrying the fishbowl.
Augur Yorbel was watching her leave as if she was more alarming than a kehok, and Tamra decided she did indeed feel sorry for him. “Raia, can you check on the kehok? The new sights might be alarming him.” She waited until Raia scurried across the deck to the cage before saying in a low voice, “You have no idea what you’re doing, do you?”
He jumped as if startled, then looked sheepish. “It’s obvious?”
“Frankly, yes.”
“I am out of my depth. Ask me to read a soul, ask me to save a soul, and I can do it! I have trained for that. But ask me to restart a racing program at the highest level on the most public stage . . . Well, I am wondering what I’ve gotten myself into.”
She laughed, liking that he was so honest about it. “How did you get stuck with this?”
He hesitated. “I volunteered.”
“That was your first mistake.”
“I’ve made a few.” He sighed mournfully, as if he were cataloguing every single mistake he’d ever made.
“You’re the first augur I’ve ever met to admit he’s ever made any,” Tamra said. Certainly you’d never catch Augur Clari saying anything as vulnerable as that. She guarded her infallibility as if it were a precious jewel. “Us ordinary people are in over our heads on a daily basis. You get used to it.”
“Then will you be my guide?” He sounded so innocent, with a hint of pathetic, that it was charming, and Tamra couldn’t help smiling. She wondered if he’d ever spent much time out of the temple. Poor sheltered augur, she thought, and found herself actually believing it. “Tell me what’s needed, and I will see you get it.”
“Just the basics for me. And whatever will placate Lady Evara. You don’t want her making your life miserable.”
He shot a look at the silken tent.
“She’s testing you right now, to see how far she can push her demands. Like a toddler. My advice? Listen to everything she says, and then do what you think is best, regardless of whatever she demands. Really, that’s the only way to handle the wealthy.”
He smiled, and it transformed his whole face, changing him from an unapproachable augur to a man with warmth and humor. “You’re the first ‘ordinary person’ I’ve met to ever give life advice to an augur, instead of the other way around.” Then, more seriously: “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I—”
From the tent, Lady Evara called, “Augur Yorbel? We have matters to discuss!”
He sighed; then his face smoothed back into a pleasant, professional demeanor. Bowing slightly to Tamra, he crossed the deck. She watched him.
As soon as he’d left, Raia returned. “That was so sweet.”
Tamra frowned at her. “What?”
“He admires you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Tamra said. “He was asking for advice.”
Raia was grinning. “I think it’s romantic.”
Tamra wavered between annoyance and amusement. She certainly hoped that Augur Yorbel wasn’t having romantic thoughts about her. She had no time in her life for such foolishness, especially in race season. “I don’t need romance in my life right now. I have something more important: a purpose. And so do you.” She pointed at the statue of a crocodile on the side of the river. It was carved of pink stone, polished so it shone. “Concentrate on that statue. Learn its curves, its shadows. Your mind must be strong and focused if you’re to win the next race. For the rest of the journey, I want you to pick objects we pass and let them fill your thoughts. See if you can ignore the wonders of the Heart.”
“Fine, but you shouldn’t ignore your own heart.”
“Focus!”
“Okay, okay.” Quietly, Raia said, “But love is important too.” Then, with more determination, “And I won’t lose again.”
Tamra shook her head. “Just when I think you almost understand, you say something ridiculous. It can’t be about winning or losing. It’s always just about the moment. What you want in that moment can silence the failures of the past and the pressures of the future.” She paused before adding, “And yes, love is of course important, but love isn’t only giddy new romance. My life is full of love. Now, focus on that crocodile.”
“You’ll see, Trainer Verlas—this is a fresh start. The augur choosing us . . . We have a second chance!” Raia sounded so certain.
Tamra pointed firmly at the statue, and Raia finally studied the crocodile.
As she did, Tamra kept thinking about this unlikely hope. I’ve had so many chances. A lifetime of them. She’d been given a way out of her childhood with kehok races. After she’d been injured too badly to continue racing, she’d been given a way out of despair and a new future with the birth of her daughter. And now this new chance to secure a future for herself and her daughter . . . and possibly a second daughter.
I don’t know that I deserve yet another chance.
She’d failed her rider last year. She’d failed her students last month. And in doing so, she’d failed both herself and Shalla. But Raia does deserve this. Tamra watched as her rider began to breathe slower and more evenly as she narrowed her focus on a single, stationary object. As they sailed past the crocodile statue, Tamra directed her toward the next target: a colossal tiger, sheathed in gold.
She continued to lead Raia through the exercise until they reached the royal docks, which were a sight in and of themselves: every post carved into the shape of a man or woman, dancers and soldiers and farmers and fishermen. “Good job,” she said.
Raia beamed.
Stepping off the boat first, Augur Yorbel took the lead, presenting documentation and talking in a low voice to the dockmaster, who bowed and then welcomed them to the Heart of Becar.
Lady Evara and her entourage disembarked next, as soon as a plank was laid between the boat and the dock. They boarded waiting chariots. Following, Tamra, with Raia, helped load the kehok in his cage onto a cart. An expensive-looking red sheet was draped over the cage. So the citizens won’t have to see such a hideous creature in their beautiful city, Tamra thought. Or so they won’t see a reminder of what could happen to them if they aren’t careful with their souls. Either way, she didn’t object.
She climbed into the seat of the cart, next to Raia, who’d already hopped up beside the driver—a silent woman in a royal city guard uniform. Raia was bouncing in her seat like an overexcited puppy. As they drove toward the palace, Tamra tried to absorb some of Raia’s enthusiasm. Maybe I don’t deserve this second chance, but I am going to make the most of it.
Raia twisted around, trying to see everything, so many times that Tamra thought she was going to topple out of the cart. Certainly, there were glorious sights in every direction: a tower sheathed in gold, a statue of a heron sculpted out of glass, a mosaic detailing an ancient emperor’s victory repelling an invasion . . . but Tamra noticed the people. Namely, that there were too many of them, mostly workers who should have been off at construction sites or quarries. She expected the farmers—historically, the Becaran Races began as a way to distract farmers who couldn’t work while their fields were saturated during flood season—but this many workers loitering in the streets was unusual.
All these men and women out of work, purposeless and some of them penniless, had to be causing more trouble than usual. She thought she spotted some soldiers from the Becaran army patrolling with the guards. It was a good thing they’d have the races to distract them.
That was, according to legend, the reason the Becaran Races began. After the great warrior Aur split the desert and created his mighty river, the people flocked to its banks. Discovering the land was fertile, they rejoiced. But the great crocodile Ferlar, who inhabits all the rivers of the world—a description Tamra had questioned the first time she’d heard the tale and been told he was “so large he needed all the rivers”—heard their celebration and hated it. In response, he flicked his massive tail, causing the fields to flood. Despondent, the early Becarans began to squabble and then war among themselves. To cheer up his people, the warrior Aur plucked a couple kehoks out of the desert and forced them to run as fast as they could. And thus, every year when Ferlar flicks his tail and floods the farmlands, the Becaran people hold their races to distract themselves from the tragedies they can’t control.
Except for the part with the enormous crocodile, Tamra thought that was a plausible explanation. For at least a thousand years, the races had been giving people something to cheer for, and Tamra had the feeling that this year Becarans needed to cheer more than ever. Turnout is going to be massive, she thought.
She hoped Raia wouldn’t be distracted by the size of the audience. She was glad Raia had done the extra focusing exercises on the trip here—that would help. As they drove through the city, Tamra silently crafted her training schedule.
Soon, they saw the palace, and Raia gasped so loudly that Tamra laughed. Composed of several sprawling buildings, the palace was painted every color imaginable: vast murals of river scenes, beside massive thirty-foot-tall portraits of every emperor and empress who had ever ruled.
They circled around it, driving behind and beyond. Still on the palace grounds, the royal kehok stables were through three archways and beyond a high-walled garden, tucked out of sight. After a surprised-looking set of guards yanked open a black gate, they rode inside, and Tamra saw that Yorbel had not exaggerated. She climbed off the cart, wincing as her leg ached, and joined Lady Evara in surveying their new home.
As Yorbel had said, the royal kehok stables had not been maintained.
That’s the polite way to put it, Tamra thought.
Lady Evara, however, had no interest in putting it politely. “I have housed rats in better accommodations than these.” She had her hands on her hips, her voluminous hat was askew, and her cheeks were flushed.
“Technically, kehoks are lower than rats,” Tamra said. She supposed there were some people who could even want to be reborn as rats, especially given a worse alternative.
Lady Evara fixed Tamra with a glare and then pivoted to face Augur Yorbel, who was inching backward as if he wanted to be elsewhere. “This does not begin to fit the requirements I detailed to you. I question whether the emperor-to-be is serious about this endeavor.”
“He’s more serious than you know,” Augur Yorbel said. “If you will excuse me, I will see what can be done to rectify this situation.” He bowed twice before exiting quickly, out through the black gate, toward the palace.
Lady Evara glowered at his retreating back, at the weed-choked practice track, and at the dilapidated stables. “I don’t even comprehend how anything so close to the palace was allowed to fall into such a state of disrepair. This is absolutely unacceptable.”
Raia, who had gone inside the stable to explore, poked her head out. “It’s not so bad.”
“Your rider is too cheerful,” Lady Evara informed Tamra.
“She’s young,” Tamra said. “It’ll fade.”
“True.” Then Lady Evara lowered her voice, so only Tamra could hear. “Tell me the truth: Can you do this? Can you shape that girl and her monster into champions? Because this is an opportunity for all of us. Yes, for me as well. You needn’t look so surprised.”
Tamra knew why she needed this, but Lady Evara? She hadn’t questioned it when Lady Evara had insisted on coming, but now that they were here, she thought it was an odd choice. Lady Evara could have bargained for more gold from the emperor-to-be’s bottomless coffers, rather than tying herself to the risk of the races. She could have stayed in the comfort of her own palace, with all her luxuries around her. “Why do you want a champion so badly?”
Lady Evara waved an arm at the palace spires that rose above them. “For fame! For glory! For personal reasons that I have no intention of sharing with you.” She laughed airily, as if none of this meant anything to her and it was all a grand joke.
“Fine. Yes, we can win.”
“What do you need to make it happen? Tell me, and I will secure it for you.”
It was so similar to Augur Yorbel’s offer that Tamra thought Lady Evara must have overheard their conversation on the boat. She wondered if the lady had thought of Tamra and Yorbel’s interaction the same way Raia had, and then firmly told herself to stop it with the ridiculous thoughts. “That’s a far cry from offering only two hundred gold pieces to buy a racer.” She would have asked what changed, but she knew the answer. An invitation to the Heart of Becar. Proximity to the emperor-to-be. A chance at greater glory. An opportunity to escape the dreaded “boredom” that Lady Evara so feared. Tamra wondered if Lady Evara had ever cared about anything but her own pleasure and amusement. “I told you and Augur Yorbel what I need already.”
“Augur Yorbel . . . bears watching.”
“Excuse me?” That was not the response she expected. “Why?”
“He’s lying to us.”
Absurd, Tamra thought. He’s not the kind of person who can lie. He was exactly what he seemed—a sheltered-from-the-world, out-of-his-depth augur. A good man. She trusted her judgment on that. She’d met enough bad people in her life to feel confident in her ability to recognize liars and cheats. And yet, Lady Evara was so assured in her declaration. “About what?”
“I don’t know, which is what bothers me. Can I count on you to be my ally here? Our goals are aligned, after all. Vigilance is required.”
This was the strangest conversation she’d ever had with Lady Evara. Her sponsor had never talked to Tamra as if she were someone she trusted. The fact that she was doing so now was even more bizarre than the idea that Augur Yorbel might not be who he seemed. But Lady Evara wasn’t wrong—they did have a common purpose, and as long as that was true, it couldn’t hurt to work together.
“Sure. We’re allies.”
“Splendid!” Lady Evara beamed at her. She then began shouting at her three ever-present servants to clean up this place so that it was fit for her to see. Obeying, they dispersed, presumably to find cleaning cloths, water, and soap.
Or to find a new, less demanding employer.
Tamra joined Raia inside the stable, ducking under an array of cobwebs.
It had once been a grand stable, a few decades ago. Much of the woodwork was intact. In the dim light that filtered through the windows, Tamra could see paintings on the walls: depications of famous races with beautifully intricate sketches of kehoks and even more exquisite renderings of past emperors watching from their stands. Each stall was reinforced with metal, now bearing rust stains. She tested one door. “Still sturdy.”
“It’s like a forgotten secret,” Raia said happily.
It was odd, Tamra thought, that when the emperor-to-be sent an augur to restart his kehok racing program, he hadn’t also ordered cleaners and carpenters to fix up the stable. “Rich people don’t always think about the details it takes to do things,” she said, mostly thinking out loud. “They just expect them done.” Belatedly, she remembered that Raia came from wealth.
But Raia was nodding as if Tamra had said something wise. “I’m sure an emperor-to-be is the worst. Just make a pronouncement and don’t think about the consequences. You want a pineapple; you get a pineapple. Never mind that they aren’t in season, and it requires a dozen people to travel to where they are growing, bargain with the farmers, and then journey back.”
“Exactly. I bet it was a whim he had. He probably forgot all about it as soon as he sent Augur Yorbel off to buy some kehoks.” Or maybe Lady Evara was right, and something was truly off here. What if he didn’t know about Augur Yorbel’s plan at all? Maybe the whole idea was the augur’s. It would explain why the stable wasn’t ready for them, and why no one official had come to greet them beyond simple transport here. But that made no sense. Why would Augur Yorbel want them here? He didn’t seem to care—or even know—anything about racers and the races.
“He might have a new whim every day,” Raia said, warming to the idea. “Start a zoo. Build a university. Collect bells. Or birds. Or musical instruments.”
Maybe, Tamra thought. But did any of that matter? She had a job to do. Whatever’s going on between the augur and the emperor-to-be, it’s not my business. “Let’s get the kehok loaded into a stall, and let Augur Yorbel worry about emperors and their whims. Our concern is only the next race.”