“The hotblooded horse is a beautiful machine. They are impossibly anxious and deprived creatures, with the servitude of an ant. You would think this would make them unfit for murder, but paradoxically, it is their livelihood.” - On Hotbloods, Cirrus.

  Laci watched the city wall from the woods intently. Sultan danced in place beside her, eager to go in. Two stoic Clydesdale horses stood guard at the east gate, guns across their chests. They looked so alike, she thought they might be sisters. She waited for the guard closest to her to lose focus. It didn’t take long for her to droop her head and cock a hind leg lazily. Laci snaked closer behind the cover of brush, expertly weaving around every dry twig and stone that could give her away. In one swift motion, she jumped forward and rushed the officer.

  The Clydesdale saw her coming too late, and she pummeled her into the ground, cuing a sharp squeal. In her struggle, she rolled over on top of Laci and pinned her down. The other guard fired her gun, but the flames leaping out from Laci’s mane ate up the bullet and scorched the draft’s skin, making her rear up and lay her ears back. Just before the guard above her struck her with a branding iron, Laci kicked backwards and nailed her in the cheek, giving her just enough time to jump the gate. She scrambled for balance on the other side, and took off into the city at full speed. Her feet struck against the pavement like lightning.

  She charged into the busier part of the city, where the streets were full of civilians. They ran for their lives as soon as they saw her coming, except for a little golden foal on her way home from school. She was too small to know any better, and none of the adult horses around had the sense to help her. She stood alone in the middle of the road, clacking her teeth helplessly. Laci came to a square halt in front of the filly, and approached her curiously. She smelled her through nostrils dripping with blood. The palomino walked around her and looked at her flaming tail with amazement. Laci let it swish gently, entrancing the foal, until she heard commotion up ahead. She snapped her head up, remembering her mission was yet to be complete.

  She trotted through Norfolk’s center, following the road to Glacier’s house, until he spotted her right in front of the Crystalline North Arena. Crowds of horses were struggling to escape, thousands of them smashed into the edge of the street in a wide circle around her. Young horses panicked and threw their riders to the ground, jumping fences to escape. The performance in the arena was in disarray, horses and rabbits alike rushing out of the exits like swarms of bees. Those who lived in the apartment buildings nearby stared in awe as Laci and Glacier faced each other, standing ten yards apart in the square.

  Glacier took off his cloak and threw it on the ground, even though it was subzero outside. Laci was already bare, and she was sweating bullets as if she were in a sauna.

  Sultan purred beside her. “Make him regret this.”

  She snarled like a wild animal and galloped to him, but he held his ground. When she dove to attack him, he shoved her off and hit her across the face with a copper brand, not moving his hind feet even an inch.

  “Don’t let her win,” Apollo whispered in his ear. “She’s a hotblood, for Epona’s sake. She’ll submit if you break her.”

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  She tried to fight, but every time he struck her with the stick, she jumped back and hissed like flames being stomped out. The wall he had created for himself seemed impassable. With every hit, she became less aggressive and more afraid.

  “Push his buttons, Laci! You have to get to him,” Sultan shouted.

  She let her fire flare up, and he dodged it artfully at first, but one of her strikes came too close and singed him. She could smell his annoyance, and heard his tail switching like it was next to a microphone. She kept up the game, until finally he lashed out with a massive pillar of ice. Onlookers gasped at the sight, and Apollo held his hoof regretfully. Sultan seemed pleased.

  “It doesn’t matter, Glacier. Get her back for that,” Apollo barked.

  Glacier lost his mind and hit her in the face with the heavy brand, making her vision blacken for a moment. She was crushed into the concrete, and gravel dug into her shoulder and hip. Blood streamed down her head like a red river. He iced her hooves to the ground, and she tried pulling her legs free, but they wouldn’t budge. He stood over her, panting and delirious, with a gun aimed at her neck.

  “Good night, Laci of Lebanon. I hope you never see the sky again,” he cackled.

  She closed her eyes and curled her neck pitifully, waiting for the sting of a tranquilizer dart. It never came.

  She felt a horse flying over the top of her, and heard the tortured screaming of Glacier several feet away. She opened her eyes to Sultan mercilessly slaughtering him as he writhed on the ground desperately. She again tried to lift herself up, but she couldn’t, her feet pinned to the ground and her body aching painfully. Blood pooled around her from the gash on her forehead, and her vision swayed dramatically. Her head was pounding from the strike and the drain on her magic.

  Glacier was completely still for a moment, and Sultan paused his shredding. Laci thought Glacier might be dead, but Sultan’s ears were still tightly fixed to him. The red stallion wasn’t done. He was waiting for something.

  The ground trembled when Apollo appeared. He was smaller than Sultan, but that didn’t take away from his power. Sultan shrunk back and gave a sharp squeal at the sight. The king looked down at Glacier’s copper brand with disdain, and summoned himself an icy sword so sharp it might cut your eyes if you looked at it. He tapped it underneath Sultan’s chin, and the docile hotblood lifted his head.

  “Remember who you belong to, fleet horse.”

  Without hesitation, Sultan jumped out of place and grappled the top of Apollo’s poll in his jaws. Apollo stabbed him in the side of the neck, but this did not deter him from ripping the flesh away. He dashed around Apollo, seemingly ignorant of the blood waterfalling down his neck, and bit him again, this time slashing him with his forefeet. Apollo kept tormenting him with the sword, but no matter how injured he was, Sultan could not stop. He didn’t finish until Apollo was on the ground, bones broken, heart cut out of his chest. Standing on three legs, soaked in sweat and blood from head to toe, he lit the grey stallion’s body on fire. The hotblood stumbled to the ground, having taken too much, and his spirit faded back to the realm of the dead.

  Laci locked eyes with Glacier, neither of them able to escape, and his expression was purely of dread. Services officers began cautiously wandering closer from the alleyways, and the nearby gawkers were scared speechless. Laci looked up at the setting sun, remembering Glacier’s words when he thought he’d won. A little golden foal looked at her curiously from above, and her vision was so fuzzy she thought she might’ve joined Sultan, wherever he was.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  Laci coughed blood, and she tried to stay with the poor filly, but the world went black too soon.