The Scorpio Races: Chapters 12–24

by Maggie Stiefvater
Each year, residents of Thisby race the violent water horses that live in the sea around their island. Sean hopes that winning will enable him to buy the horse he loves; Puck hopes that winning will allow her to save her home and keep her family together. But surviving the brutal competition will prove more challenging than either of them expected.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Prologue–Chapter 11, Chapters 12–24, Chapters 25–36, Chapters 37–48, Chapters 49–66
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. unperturbed
    free from emotional agitation or nervous tension
    He seems unperturbed by the cold.
  2. amok
    wildly; without self-control
    No one wants water horses running amok over the island as it gets close to November.
  3. kerfuffle
    a disorderly outburst or tumult
    If I went to the officials and made a kerfuffle over Dove, they might disqualify me anyway.
  4. ramification
    a consequence, especially one that causes complications
    “It’s for personal reasons,” I say stiffly. Which is what my mother had always told me to say about things that had to do with fighting with your brothers, getting any sort of illness that had intestinal ramifications, starting your period, and money.
  5. reverent
    feeling or showing profound respect or veneration
    The American is enthusiastic but reverent, more awed by me, I think, than by Corr.
  6. gait
    an animal's manner of moving
    Any horse has four natural gaits—walk, trot, canter, gallop—and there’s no reason for one to be preferable over another.
  7. understatement
    something said in a restrained way for ironic contrast
    Holly’s the American equivalent of Malvern, the owner of a massive breeding farm known for show jumpers and hunters, wealthy and eccentric enough to come all the way to Thisby for a chance to improve his stock. “Horse lover” is a stark understatement, albeit one that makes me like him better.
  8. conciliatory
    making or willing to make concessions
    Holly flicks the stick again, this time hard enough to audibly snap the leather, and Corr twists his head, more conciliatory than ill-tempered, before trotting back out to the wall.
  9. emaciated
    very thin, especially from disease or hunger or cold
    I get a momentary image of my brother trudging out of Skarmouth with a pony cart behind him, an emaciated troll in a giant sweater, and I wish that I, too, could disappear to the mainland where no one knew my name.
  10. extravagant
    recklessly wasteful
    As a child, the chief thing I noticed about Dory was that she was always wearing a different pair of shoes, a strange and extravagant thing on the island.
  11. lineage
    inherited properties shared with others of your bloodline
    Elizabeth is the pretty sister, with long straw-colored hair and a nose turned up by lineage and habit.
  12. advert
    a public promotion of some product or service
    I page through the catalog. I know that I’m being stalled but I discover that I’m rather happy to be stalled. “Are our teapots in here? Who will see this?”
    “Oh, the three people who read the adverts at the very end of the Post,” Elizabeth says.
  13. utilitarian
    valuing or chosen for usefulness above all else
    I’ve found our teapots—there is a very precise line drawing of one of the stout pots with my utilitarian thistles on the side of it, and now I can see that the illustrations are in the same hand that draws the adverts in the back of our own little Skarmouth newspaper that comes out each Wednesday.
  14. grouse
    complain
    “That makes them more valuable. It won’t take you but a moment to sign and number them. Come in and have tea. Elizabeth will stop grousing. Where is your brother?”
  15. haunch
    the upper part of the leg of an animal, often used for food
    The worse of the two mares wears a black netted cloth over her haunches.
  16. eyelet
    small hole in cloth or leather for passage of a cord or hook
    The cloth, passed down from my father, is made of thread and hundreds of narrow iron eyelets: part mourning cloth, part chain mail.
  17. crevasse
    a deep fissure
    I find a crevasse in the cliffs, a giant’s axe mark, and lead the mares and Corr into it.
  18. sheer
    very steep; having a prominent and almost vertical front
    Danger sings on the breeze, throws echoes off the sheer white cliffs.
  19. deft
    skillful in physical movements; especially of the hands
    He’s older, defter. He’s survived a half-dozen Scorpio Races.
  20. cavalier
    showing a lack of concern or seriousness
    It’s just a petty disagreement between two savage horses, but they’re all teeth and hooves. One of the men tries to tear them apart, but he’s too cavalier. There’s a snap of blunt teeth and just like that, his fingers are gone.
  21. throes
    violent pangs of suffering
    I can’t see if she stays above water, though, because now the stallion is snorting, seaweed and jelly and bits of coral all spewing from his nostrils around the red berries, and in his drowning and his death throes, it’s taking all my energy to keep from going underwater with him.
  22. solicit
    request urgently or persistently
    They are still calling my name on the beach, though I can’t tell if it’s to solicit my help or to solicit help for me.
  23. discomfit
    cause to lose one's composure
    The idea of throwing in the towel is simultaneously relieving and discomfiting.
  24. cheeky
    offensively bold
    “I would have thought that you have people to do your unpleasant business for you,” I say, and feel cheeky.
  25. poised
    marked by balance or equilibrium and readiness for action
    Behind it swims Fundamental, a bay colt full of promise and promises, a sport-horse colt poised to sell for hundreds on the mainland.
  26. disquiet
    make uneasy or cause to be worried or alarmed
    I feel disquieted. I’m not certain why. If it’s because of the girl, interrupting the routine I’ve followed for years.
  27. billow
    rise and move, as in waves
    I’m not swimming through water. I’m swimming through blood. It billows around me in great underwater thunderheads as one of my hands finds Fundamental’s spine.
  28. illicit
    contrary to accepted morality or convention
    I remember the story we’re all told as soon as we become teens, of the two teen lovers who met illicitly on the beach, only to be dragged into the waves by a waiting water horse.
  29. bulbous
    rounded and bulging
    Malvern, who has been moneyed for his whole life, has that air about him of well-cared-for ugliness, like an expensive racehorse with a coarse head. The glossy coat, the bright eye, the bulbous nose over too-fleshy lips.
  30. derisive
    expressing contempt or ridicule
    One of the laughs in particular is a low, derisive chuckle, the sort that elicits a frown from those not in on the joke.
  31. mogul
    a very wealthy or powerful businessperson
    There are many paths that Mutt Malvern might be on, but I think we both know that none of them ends as the mogul of an internationally famous breeding yard.
  32. flighty
    unpredictably excitable (especially of horses)
    She’s flighty and sea-wild; she is not fast because she takes no pleasure in what the rider wants.
  33. formidable
    inspiring fear or dread
    Ahead of me, the road winds to avoid the more formidable outcroppings.
  34. outcropping
    part of a rock formation that juts above surrounding land
    Ahead of me, the road winds to avoid the more formidable outcroppings.
  35. anemone
    a marine polyp that resembles a flower
    We are shoulder to shoulder due to the size of the cab, and if Gratton is made of flour and potatoes, Sean is made of stone and driftwood and possibly those prickly anemones that sometimes wash up on shore.
  36. intermittent
    stopping and starting at irregular intervals
    From the back of the truck, the border collie whines. The vibration of the truck makes it a broken, intermittent whistle.
  37. rend
    tear or be torn violently
    Finn eyes me as he slowly uses his fingers to rend a biscuit into a pile of crumbs.
  38. flourish
    an ornamental embellishment in writing
    I sign my name on the bottom of a pot. Kate Connolly. It looks like I’m signing a school paper. What I need is more flourish. I add a curl to the bottom of the y.
  39. culminate
    end, especially to reach a final or climactic stage
    Every year the Scorpio Festival is held a week after the horses emerge. I’ve only been once, and even then, we didn’t stay long enough for the parade of riders, which is the culminating event of the night, when the riders declare their official mounts and betting goes crazy.
  40. wistful
    showing pensive sadness
    Finn’s expression is wistful.
Created on Mon Aug 19 15:40:07 EDT 2019 (updated Thu Sep 05 09:55:37 EDT 2019)

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