Mercedes Lackey: Changes

Mercedes Lackey

Mags shaded his eyes and peered across the uneven ground of the Kirball field at the opposing team huddled up in front of their goal and forced himself to relax. There was no point in getting tense. This was only a game, after all. He had to keep reminding himself of that, even as nervous sweat trickled down the back of his neck, and inside his gloves his palms were moist.

Only a game being played in front of hundreds of people . . .

::To most of whom you are just a red shape on a white horse. Even with Colin calling the gameplay, they still wouldn’t know who you were.:: The voice in his head was as familiar as his own now, warm and slightly amused.

“Thanks fer makin’ a lad feel special, Dallen,” he muttered under his breath, knowing the great white horse-shaped smart-aleck beneath him had very keen ears.

::Don’t mention it,:: came the cheerfully cheeky reply.

Mags was wearing red rather than Herald Trainee Grays because his Kirball team’s color was red—although to be strictly accurate, only his padding and helmet were red. But since the Kirball field was deliberately awash with dangerous obstacles, the players wore full-body protection, so very little of his Grays were showing. The same went for the rest of his teammates—unrecognizable in padded helmet in red, metal face-guard in red, neck collar, shoulder pads, upper and lower arm braces, elbow and knee cups, thigh protection, chest and backplate, and armored boots. They looked more prepared for combat than a game.

Not that most people would ever have recognized this as a game field either. Gullies corrugated the field, which also contained a major ravine, little hills with abrupt drop-offs, stone fences as well as rail fences, culverts, bridges, and even a stream that led into the river. There were no big hills, but there were bits of very steep slope, enough to make even the most sure-footed Companion pause. It most closely resembled the obstacle course, or perhaps a steeplechase racecourse. But unlike the obstacle course, there was no pattern, no obvious path you were supposed to take around the field. It was, in fact, far more random than nature would have created, a calculated randomness that ensured that there were no “easy” places anywhere except in front of the goals.

At either end were two identical little stone buildings, with ramps up to the tops of them. The ramps had been stone too when the game had first been played; now they were stone and rammed earth, and the squat towers were buried to their ramparts in the rammed earth. After the first four games, the stone ramps had been deemed a bit too narrow and dangerous, and earthen slopes made sure there were no abrupt drop-offs. Flagpoles thrust up from the tops of the towers, flying pennants in the team colors, red for South and green for West, flapping bravely from the tower-tips in a brisk breeze. They needed that breeze today; it was wicked hot. It wasn’t only nerves making Mags sweat. The bathing room was going to suffer a stampede.

Beneath him, his Companion, Dallen, was as steady as a statue, which made him feel steadier. It wasn’t nerves that bothered him so much as the ever-recurring dread that he would somehow let the team down. He wasn’t the only one who felt that way, though, so he was in good company. He knew this because he could sense it. He wasn’t just a Mindspeaker who could make himself heard by anyone whether they had the Gift or not; he had just a touch of Empathy too. Enough to be useful most of the time—enough to tell him that his teammates were fighting similar knots in their guts.

The emotional stakes were much, much higher today than they had ever been before. The Kirball game they were playing was part of this concluding day of a week of presentations, tours, and demonstrations put on by all three Collegia for the benefit of the parents and relatives of Trainees and the townsfolk of Haven. Valdemar was bigger than ever, with Trainees coming from farther afield. The Collegia were changing; some people liked the changes, while others were fighting any change at all. The King wanted to show what the results here were, and he didn’t want even a hint of elitism or a shadow of secrecy to color peoples’ perceptions of the Collegia. He reckoned the best way to nip rumors in the bud would be to throw open the doors for a general look around.

::Give us a slosh of that water then, would you?:: Dallen craned his neck around and opened his mouth; Mags obligingly poured most of the water from the half-gallon sized bucket the team runner had just brought them down Dallen’s throat. A lot of it sloshed out of Dallen’s mouth but enough of it went down to quench his thirst. Mags tossed the empty bucket to the boy, who ran it back to the sidelines to be refilled. Having a team runner was a good idea—especially as the team runners were mostly from the Healers’ Collegium. They generally knew when you needed something without needing to be asked, since the ones with Healing Gift also had Empathy.

“Huddle up!” ordered the South team captain, Herald Trainee Gennie. Swathed in her armor and helmet, only her voice betrayed who she was. The whole team converged on her, including the Foot, who moved into the center, standing at the heads of the horses and Companions.

This game wasn’t just for Herald Trainees—which was, in part, the point. Each team had been made up of four Herald Trainees, four Riders—who could be anyone with a horse or horses who had tried out for the team and won a place—and four Foot, who could also be anyone, but in practice, tended to be young Guardsmen. In a real fight, Heralds would fight alongside everyone else. In Kirball, Herald Trainees learned how to use their Gifts and skills in partnership with people who had no such advantages.

“We’ve had the first quarter, and we took it slow, by agreement between me and the West Captain,” Gennie told them. “We wanted the townies and the parents to get a good grounding in Kirball before we went all out. That was why I told you all to play easy and slow. So, now it’s time to show the game proper. Gloves are off.”

“ ’Bout time,” Pip grumbled. Trainee Pip was certainly the most keen Kirball player on the South team, and may have been in the entire Collegium. He and his Companion were never happier than when they were scrumming.

“Now here’s where we need to talk show versus strategy.” She grinned at Pip, a flash of teeth showing behind the metal faceguard. “Remember that the point of this whole match is to give the crowd a show. It’s a demonstration, and we need to think about how it will all look from out there.” She waved her hand at the crowds pressed in along the fences around the Kirball field. A steady murmur of voices came from beyond the bounds. “So don’t scrum too long, or they’ll get bored. They’ll like a bit of football, but they’ll like running better.”

“West team never lets us scrum much anyway,” Halleck pointed out.

“It’s those evil little ponies of theirs,” said one of the Guard Foot.

Jeffers, son of a wealthy tradesman, gave him a hurt look; he was mounted on his favorite Kirball horse, a scrappy little pony that looked ridiculously small under him.

“Present company excepted, of course,” Corwin amended. “Your ponies aren’t evil, Jeffers.”

“Not evil to you, anyway,” Jeffers corrected.

There were three ways to score. The first was to lob a Kirball through the windows or the door of the opposing team’s tower. That was one point. The second was to occupy the tower and hold it for a quarter candlemark. That was ten points, and so far no one had ever had the temerity to try it. Sure, you could get in there, but neither horse nor Companion would fit inside, and the enemy Foot were only too eager to mob you and drag you out, ending your occupation. Meanwhile, your own team didn’t dare abandon their goal to come to your rescue lest the opposition make goals while they did.