Our next race was being held in Coltington, a three day travel on dragon wing and right in the middle of the desert. We arrived hot, sweaty, in need of a serious shower, and what do we find waiting for us? Turned out the track was nothing more than a grounded circuit that looped all the way around the outside of the city. The start and finish were situated on either side of the main road, with a crossing that could be closed off during races. From what I had seen in the past, the second race of the season always proved to be the most challenging, given this was the first Handicap Trial.

Handicap Trials were special races where specific rules were added to make the competition even more difficult than normal. Most of the time Handicap Trials were picked at random, but the second race of the season was always the first. It was a ploy used by race officials to help weed out the less experienced riders, and to force upcoming talent to show their best skills. It worked every time, and for years the first Handicap Trial was known as the Second Storm. The first race of the season was the first true test for rookie racers, but the Second Storm proved without a doubt who belonged and who did not. The handicaps were chosen at random, so nopony had a clue what to expect before the race, making it all the more difficult to prepare in advance.

The race meeting hall was a stout little building made of sandstone, just off the main road. That was where the racers met in order to discuss the race’s Handicap. Given dragons weren’t supposed to be smart enough to listen to complex ideas, Nilak and the others had to stay at the stables until the race was about to start. None of them were happy about it, but there was nothing we could do.

The announcer stood in front of us with a pedestal in front of his rather large frame. His salt and pepper mane was beginning to show more salt than pepper, though his voice was still clear as crystal as he spoke. His dark blue coat was also beginning to show bits of grey, though nopony minded much because the old unicorn had been doing this for longer than most of the racers had been in the Circuit. “Welcome racers, to the first Handicap Trial of the season! Now I know all of you are itching to find out what the Handicap is for tomorrow’s race, so I won’t keep you waiting any longer.”

He reached into a plastic ball on his left with dozens of paper slips folded in half. He grabbed one after riffling about with his hoof, and pulled it out as the lid closed with a clank.

“The Handicap for this year’s first Handicap Trial shall be…” He unfolded the slip and raised his eyes to look at all of us, “Traps.”
Some of the other rookies murmured amongst themselves in confusion, but I knew exactly what it meant for this to be a trap race. I had seen them in the past. Obstacles were placed on the track and were meant to slow down or throw a rider from his dragon. None of the traps were ever deadly, but there was a reason medic crews lined the side of the course during every race. I knew that some of us weren’t getting out of here without a broken bone or two. I also knew that all of us were going to have dozens of bumps and scrapes by the end of the day.

“The rules for a Trap race are simple,” the announcer said as he placed the slip back in the ball, “no dragon is allowed to fly or leave the perimeter of the track during any portion of the race. To do so would mean automatic disqualification and prohibited entry into the next race of the season. Cheating will not be tolerated in the Dragon Circuit, so I suggest you stay between the lines.”

With that we were dismissed, with Lucky and Ivy mumbling to one another as I led them out of the tent.

“Wonder what kinds of traps we’ll run into?” Ivy wondered as we made our way back to the stables, “Ooh! Maybe a trap that sucks the dragon into a hole and holds them there until the end of the race!”

Lucky and I laughed at the ridiculous idea, “Really? And how do you expect them to keep such things hidden from the racers?” I asked, “It would be nearly impossible to hide such a nasty trick on a racetrack.”

She pouted with fake tears in her eyes. “Lucky,” she whined as she hung on her friend’s neck with both hooves as she displayed her best puppy eyes, “Silver’s being mean to me again.”

Lucky rolled her eyes before dumping the melodramatic mare on the dusty ground, “Grow up and take care of your own problems. Geez.”

Ivy stood up and dusted off her chest with a glare in Lucky’s direction, “Well you don’t have to be so blunt about it.”

“So what’s the plan Silver?” Lucky asked me as we walked into the stables.

“I don’t know,” I replied, “they don’t call them traps for nothing. I’m certain that any plans we make now won’t do a thing for us once we get onto the track, so I’m going to tell you the same thing I’m telling the dragons, be ready for literally everything.”

The dragon stalls were not unlike farm stalls, only much larger and with better security. Nilak and the others were at the very end, so we had to walk the length of the stables to reach them, although it wasn’t without reason. We had chosen this spot on purpose so that we could speak with the lowest chance of being overheard. Given we spoke mostly in thoughts, the concern was little to none, but you never could be too careful.

So what’s the word Silver? Nilak asked as he leaned around the edge of his stall.

Yeah, what’s the trick going to be for this race? Winx added as she placed her front paws on top of the stall door. Given she was so small compared to most other racing dragons, she had to stand on her hind paws in order to see.

The race is going to be a trap race, I said to all of them. The track is going to be littered with nasty surprises and we aren’t going to know what they are until we run right into them. Also, flying isn’t allowed, so we’re going to be running the whole thing.

That’s crazy! Winx yelled as her frills rose to full mast, what do we do if one of us gets hurt? We can’t carry someone while running through the track!

That’s why the race is scored by total distance for the racers that don’t finish, I explained, anypony who can’t finish is awarded points for how much of the race they complete. Given that most of the rookies won’t finish at all, I’m guessing that the leaderboard is going to be thinner than usual.

That may be all well and good, Mel said calmly as she shared a look with Nilak and Winx, but what about if the Blood Claw try and pull something with a trap of their own? We won’t know the difference until it’s too late to pull back.

That forced all of us to pause as the image of being crushed or squired by a Blood Claw trap played through all of our minds.

We’ll just have to fly out of it. I don’t care if we get in trouble. I’m not going to let something happen to any of you guys just because of a stupid rule. I shared a look with Lucky and Ivy, feeling slightly relieved when they nodded agreement, then it’s settled. If the Blood Claw pull a trap of their own, we’ll break any rules we need to in order to stay alive. Other than that, we stay on the ground and do our best to finish the race. I looked around and met the gaze of everypony and everydragon there, are we clear?

They nodded. Clear, they chorused.

Given that the city didn’t have space for quarters like the ones back home, riders and dragons had to be housed separately. So, while Nilak and the others got to hang out at the stables, Lucky, Ivy and I got to sleep in a fancy hotel. It wasn’t the same as the living quarters we were used to, but it was more than we ever had at our old homes.

“Goodnight girls,” I called over my shoulder as I entered my room.

“Goodnight,” the chorused as they closed the door to their own suite.

And boy where we going to need our sleep tonight. Because tomorrow was going to be one Tartarus of a ride.

We were at the starting line, waiting for the horn to sound. The main road had been closed so that the track could loop fully around the city without interruptions. We were currently waiting just off one side, with the finish line directly behind us. Due to the short length of the course, there were going to be three laps in this race before the final placing was recorded. Winx and Mel were on either side of Nilak and I, and we tensed as the warning lights flashed from red to yellow.

In a split second, the lights changed to green and the horn sounded, causing the racers to blast out of the starting gates in a thick cloud of dust. Nilak tried his best not to bump me around too much, but I could see other riders having trouble staying on their mounts because of the bouncing lope dragons normally used. Black Beauty and Whiteout were just ahead of us and on the inside edge of the track as we came around the first turn, though we weren’t able to see her for long.

Machines lifted out of the sand on either side of the track, roaring to life as the fans kicked up swirling lines of dust and sand that crossed from one side of the track to the other. Nilak and I shut our eyes tight as we barreled into the blustery mess, though I could feel the pelting fragments across my entire body as we charged ahead blindly.

As soon as the pelting stopped, I forced my eyes open to see what was ahead, only to close them again as a second dust tornado came at us from the other side. This repeated for three more times before the machines stopped popping out of the ground. Nilak and I slowed down to catch our breath for a moment, but we had to pick up the pace again as other racers began to catch up. Winx and Mel were jockeying for position with some of the other racers, though Winx was having a bit of trouble making her way through the larger dragons.

Worry about them later, Nilak said to me as we came around the second corner of the track, they’ll do the best they can just as we are. If we can’t finish because we were distracted by the girls, then we won’t be doing them any good.

I nodded, turning my body around to face front again as we thundered into the next section of track. Just like before, there wasn’t any warning before the traps began popping out of the ground. This time there were metal trees that popped out of the track in a thick maze, swinging bulbous branches around in every direction as they spun on a central axis.

I yelped as a blunt end nearly took my head off, “What are they trying to do, kill us?”

Nilak grunted as a lower branch impacted his left flank, I think it’s meant to slow us down by making the way harder to traverse. He jumped over another low branch, only to get blindsided by another branch swinging at head level.

“Nilak!” I cried as his head snapped back with a dull thump.

As his paws hit the ground again he groaned and shook his head from side to side, swaying a few times before he pushed into a standing position again.

“Are you alright?” I asked, uncertain if he could go on.

He snorted once as he glanced over his shoulder at me, don’t sell me short Silver. Mel might say I have a hard head but she isn’t just making fun of my sometimes absent-minded memory. He reached up and knocked the side of his head with a fisted paw, that tree thing might have rung my gong but I’m still kicking.

I chuckled as I kicked his flanks lightly, “Then let’s get moving. We don’t want to fall behind because you can’t see straight.”

He grunted agreement as we made our way through the rest of the metal trees, somehow avoiding getting clobbered again. I got scraped a few times by near misses, but had avoided getting hit directly by some miracle. I wasn’t looking forward to the second and third laps.

As it turned out, Winx and Mel had passed us while we had been recovering in the trees, and we managed to catch up to them as we came around the second corner. Both sets of girls seemed slightly surprised to see us coming up from behind, but otherwise didn’t comment.

We raced side by side into the next section of track, wary of what could be coming next. We weren’t disappointed when the ground around us began to change into a darker shade of brown and Winx yelped in fright as her paws began to sink into the sand.

“Quicksand!” Lucky yelled as Mel’s paws began to sink as well, “Don’t move around! You’ll only make it worse!”

Everypony froze and the sinking slowly ground to a halt. Nilak and I seemed to be in a more shallow part, as he had only sunk in to his knees. Mel and Winx, on the other hoof, were wallowing around with sand up to their bellies.

“Well this sucks!” Ivy growled as she looked around, “How do we get out of this?”

I looked around at the track, seeing that the darker sand went from one side of the track to the other. There was no way to go but forward. “I guess we have to force our way through. Winx! Mel! Get behind Nilak and we’ll find a way that has more shallow sand! We’re not going to let some sticky tricks stop us!”

The girls nodded and their dragons slowly forced their way behind Nilak. He and I shared a knowing look, and he began to slowly force his way forward. We could hear the other racers coming up behind us, but so far we retained the lead. I didn’t even need to look back to know what was going on, given that the sounds of skidding paws on sand were enough to tell be everything. Apparently the other racers couldn’t get their dragons to go into the shifting quicksand.

It took a while, but somehow we managed to pull ourselves out of the muck, shaking off about a hundred pounds of it before picking up the pace again.

Winx whined as she kicked one of her back legs in annoyance, I’ve got sand in places I didn’t even know I had. Can we stop so I can clean myself off?

Not unless you want to do that for the next three laps, Mel countered. Cheer up. After the race we can take a nice long bath to get rid of all the sand and dust.

Winx mumbled something dark but otherwise didn’t complain. We slid around the next corner, seeing that final stretch of the track was somewhat different than the last. The track was marked out in perfect squares, about five feet across and going from one side of the track to the other. At first it wasn’t that bad, but we soon figured out how wrong we were.

At first it was only one or two, but ever so slowly, the squares began to rise and fall in different patterns, making the footing completely random as we made our way forward. It was like the track had come alive and we were trying to run along the back of a giant serpent. We stumbled onto solid ground again, passing the finish line as the assembled crowd roared in approval. However, the pain and challenges had only just begun.

All through the next lap, the traps hit us again and again, except they were going faster than before. The sand tornadoes were now rotating from side to side in random patterns, while the clobbering trees were going much faster than before. Also, the shallow track through the quicksand had moved, forcing us to wallow through the deep stuff until we could reach the other side. The moving track portion was the worst of them all. Instead of moving in simple wave-like motions, the patterns had become completely random, making the ground look more like a boiling pot than a desert.

We stumbled over the finish line once more, somehow finding the strength to continue on like before. However, Lucky, Ivy and I all knew that our dragons were nearing their limit. This was going to be a race of stamina now, not speed or skill.

Just like the previous lap, the traps were going even faster than before. The fans were now moving up and down as well as side to side, while the clobbering trees were moving so fast I was shocked we made it out of their in one piece. The quicksand had gotten so deep that Winx had to lift her head to keep it above the surface, and Ivy had to jump on Mel’s back to keep from being swamped. The moving track part was even more ridiculous. Instead of moving from side to side, the waves were now coming directly at us. We had to jump them like hurdles or run up and down the faces like a hill climber. By the time we got past that, I could feel Nilak’s limbs shaking as we stumbled towards the finish.

“We’re almost there guys!” I called over my shoulder, “Stay strong just a little longer!”

My words were interrupted by an ominous rumbling, and I turned around slowly to see the entire track in front of the finish line rising up into the air. Our jaws dropped as it climbed to about eighty feet tall before grinding to a halt. Standing before us was a huge circular tunnel, with what looked like knobs on the entire inside surface. Nilak took a step forward, but before he could jump in the cylinder began to rotate, until the whole thing looked like a clothing dryer on high.

The dragons took one look at the swirling mess in front of them, and plopped onto the ground as one. Not that I could blame them. After all the energy they had spent getting through all the other traps, there was no way we could make it through this mess.

I looked back as I heard something closing in behind us, and my eyes widened as I spotted Whiteout and Shield Fang closing in at a steady trot.

They paused next to us as Shield Fang lowered his head to our level, having trouble there youngsters?

Nilak glared at the larger dragon, given that was all he could do, buck you.

Black Beauty chuckled as she pulled Whiteout in front of us, “You six may be the most promising rookies this year, but that doesn’t
mean you know everything. Come along Thunder,” she turned Whiteout towards the spinning trap, “we have a race to finish.”

He laughed as Shield Fang walked up to their side, “That we do.” He turned around in his saddle and gave us a salute, “Until we meet again children.”

With that they leaped into the tunnel and easily made their way through, jumping down on the other side as the crowd roared.

I groaned as I slid off of Nilak’s back, “Well, that just proves that we still have a lot to learn.” I walked up and ran my hooves behind Nilak’s ear, making him hum in appreciation as my legs rubbed the boundary between his scales and feather, “Guess they win this round.”

I heard Lucky laugh as she walked up on the other side of Nilak’s head, “Well at least we finished in the top five again.” Her face twisted into a scowl, “If only I didn’t have to give Thunder my winnings.”

Ivy giggled as she walked up by my side, “That’s what you get for thinking you’re better than one of the top ranked racers in the Circuit.” She used the edges of her hooves to rub Nilak’s face between his eyes for a moment before turning back to Winx, “We’ll get them next time, eh Winx?”

The poor dragoness was so winded she couldn’t stop panting, I’ll… try… my… best… Ivy…

“Alright guys,” I said as an official came past us with a measuring tape, “I guess the race is over.” I lifted up Nilak’s head with both of my forelegs, forcing him to his paws before he could protest, “Guess you three deserve a nice long soak in the baths after this one.”

That was enough to cause all three dragons to perk up.

I guess I could force myself to get up if that is the case, Mel grunted as she forced herself onto her paws once more.

Me… too…! Winx said between pants as she followed the rest of us on shaking legs, I… really… need… a… rest…

Join the club, Nilak said with a groan as he winced. Silver? I don’t suppose you and the girls could join us in the baths? I could really use somepony small who knows just the right spots to rub.

I smirked, “Sure buddy.” I glanced at Lucky and Ivy, “I think we all need a good soak after a day like today. What do you say girls?”

They shared a look and a smile. “Why not?” Lucky said as she turned to me, “It’ll be nice to wash the dust and sand out of my mane.”

Ivy smirked as she elbowed Lucky gently in the side, “And you’ll get to show off that skimpy new swimsuit you got a while ago.”

I rolled my eyes at her as Lucky gasped, “She doesn’t need to wear anything more than what she’s comfortable with. I have no interest in peaking at you two while we’re in the baths.”

The dragons laughed as Ivy and Lucky fixed me with a dark look, you’d better watch it Silver, Nilak said as he glanced in the girls’ direction, or you might just find yourself being drowned in the bath instead of soaking in it.

I rolled my eyes and the girls led Mel and Winx away, “It doesn’t matter to me. I just wanted to embarrass Lucky a bit before we take care of you guys.”

Nilak shook his head slowly as we followed the girls, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Author's Notes:

Three down, one to go. How are you liking your Birthday Marathon Submission so far?
I really don't know how the cast can stand getting coated in sand and dirt like that. I'd imagine having sand stuck in one's fur and under scales is ten times worse than just getting your skin rubbed raw.
Anyway, let's get on with the next one.

I'll see you next chapter,
Shadow Quill, Messenger of he Moon.