stirrups as Chavi had told him, and giving the ball another good, solid crack. It sailed into the audience once more.
'That's twice,' the Bardic trainee said as he ducked again.
Just then, Efrem lost control of the potato he had been peeling, and it slipped out of his hands. With a mixture of shame and curiosity he watched its arc as it left his hands and knocked the trainee in the back of the head, where he knelt in 'safety' behind a bush.
'Herald, thy days are numbered,' the Bardic trainee thundered as he turned to face his assailant-from-behind. 'Thy lack of skill with a blade shall henceforth go down in the annals of history in the 'Ballad of How Efrem Lost the Battle of Potato Picnic.' Let thy infamy precede thee wherever thou go.' He sat down with his back to a nearby tree and began composing verses as he watched the rest of the game.
'You know, he's right,' Eladi told Efrem after they had all laughed heartily. She handed him some of her carrots to peel, hoping he would have more luck with them. 'I mean, if Alberich had seen you—' She shuddered, the thought too unpleasant to contemplate.
'What do you mean
The game was as exhilarating as Chavi imagined it would be, once everyone had mastered the rudiments of play and the actual game was underway. It moved at a remarkably fast clip, the entire thrust shifting to the other side of the field as a backhand swing sent the ball arcing toward the other goal.
Gildi served as a highly efficient captain for her team, masterminding a myriad of strategies which Chavi took careful note of. She was less concerned with scoring the most points herself than in helping her team to the most points. Her favorite tactic was to ride up alongside someone as he was about to take a shot and block his mallet with her own. Then, one of her team mates, who had been instructed to follow her, took the ball back toward the other goal. Through Mindspeech, team members were only a thought away as strategy decisions were relayed to them by their Companions.
Fiz proved to be an excellent backhand, although he still had difficulties with his forward shot. Grav was the powerhouse hitter, often sending the ball arcing out of bounds (usually toward the audience). Kem and Some were both adequate players, but they never really excelled at anything in particular. Chavi kept worrying that they weren't enjoying themselves.
Chavi relinquished his musings to the game. He focused on the ball, stood up in his stirrups, and swung. He connected, and a moment later whooped with delight as the ball rolled into the unprotected yellow goal.
Chavi held one of his creations aloft and decided that, yes, he was more than just pleased with them. He was elated. The game was seen as a general success by one and all. The Bardic trainee had begun a second ballad about the day's events, featuring Chavi as its hero. Chavi was grateful that he had changed his mind before asking the man to 'Move along.' As the game progressed and she was not called upon in her official function, the Healer let herself relax enough to enjoy the sport. Word had spread quickly once the game was underway, and the audience had swelled to five times its original size. Even the Queen herself showed up to watch. Aside from thinking it looked like fun, Heralds were interested in the game for the combat training and equitation skills it provided.
Everyone wanted a mallet of their own. Chavi was beside himself with pleasure.
As his tired but happy year-mates dismounted and relinquished their mallets to other Heralds who wished to try them, Chavi began congratulating himself. 'Yes, yet another successful experiment brought to you by the one and only Chavi the magnificent, inventor of innumerable wondrous inventions, including the—'
Gildi Mindspoke to Fedele, who passed the message on to Tecla, who dumped Chavi into the river.
'All right, all right,' Chavi said, as he dragged himself, soaking wet, onto the shore, where his year-mates waited, ready to toss him back in depending on his attitude. 'So I had a little help from my friends.'
When Kelsey saw the white horse enter the pasture runs, she stopped breathing for a moment and squinted into the distance. Then she saw the Herald Whites of the man who walked just beside it, and with a pang of disappointment she continued across the green toward the inn. Shaking her head, she grimaced just before she took a deep breath and walked through the wide, serviceable doors.
'Kelsey, you're late. Again.'
'How can you tell?' She pulled her dark hair back from her square face, twisted it into a makeshift coil, and wrapped it up with a small swathe of black silk—a parting gift from a friend who'd left the town to join a merchant caravan. It was the finest thing she owned, and the fact that she used it in day-to-day wear said a lot about her. Not, of course, that she had very many other places to wear it.
'Don't get smart with me,' Torvan Peterson snapped, ; more for show than in anger. He had very little hair left, and professed a great resentment for anyone who managed to retain theirs, he was obviously a man who liked food and ale a little overmuch, and he owned the very practically named Torvan's Tavern. Children made games with that name, but not often in his presence. 'Not,' he added, 'that I would disparage an improvement in your intellect.' He stared at her expectantly, and she grimaced. 'Well, out with it, girl. If you're going to be late, you can at least amuse me with a colorful excuse.'
She rolled her eyes, donned her apron, and picked up a bar rag. 'We've got a Herald as a guest.'
'Chatting her up?'
'He, and no.'
'Hardly much of an excuse, then. All right. The tables need cleaning. The lunchtime crowd was rather messy.'
She could see that quite clearly.
On normal days, it wasn't so hard to come and work; work was a routine that added necessary punctuation to her life. She saw her friends here—the few that still remained within reach of the inn—and met strangers who traveled the trade routes with gossip, tales of outland adventures, and true news.
But when a Herald rode through, it made her whole life seem trivial and almost meaningless. She worked quickly, cleaning up crumbs and spills as she thought about her childhood dreams, and the woman who had— while she lived—encouraged them.
Kelsey snorted and blew a strand of hair out of her eyes. I can be whatever I choose, but I'll never be Chosen. In her youth she'd believed that to be Chosen by one of the Companions was a reward for merit. She'd done everything she could think of to be the perfect, good little girl, the perfect lady, the little hero. She had forsworn the usual childhood greed and the usual childhood rumbles for her studies with her grandmother; she had learned, in a fashion, to wield a weapon, and to think her way clear of troublesome situations without panicking much. Well, except for the small stampede of the cattle back at Pherson's, but anyone could be expected to be a little bit off their color in the midst of their first stampede.
She had done her best never to cheat or lie—excepting those lies that courtesy required; she shared every bounty she was given; in short, she had struggled to lead an exemplary life.
And for her pains, she had drifted into work at Tor-van's Tavern, listening to her friends, encouraging and supporting their dreams, no matter how wild, and watching them, one by one, drift out of her life, either by marriage, by childbirth, or by jobs that had taken them out of the village.
