Gambit of the Gods

by Ashley, Angela

  “You should wake now, Kella,” she says briskly. “Maren is fast asleep, and the rest of House Klia with him. Hide your bag of clothes and food behind a gravestone in the family burial grounds so you can retrieve it later if need be. No one ever goes there.

  “And about tomorrow—I know better than to tell you to leave before the match, but please, flee on horseback immediately afterward. Kisto will find you and keep you safe until Jaereth can join you both.”

  I start in surprise.

  “How do you know that? Have you visited them in their dreams too?”

  “No, ah…the man I love, Wilde, has Jaereth as his Chosen, and he overheard their plans.”

  “His name is ‘Wilde’?” I marvel, scandalized. “But men can’t have an ‘L’ in their name. The Goddesses forbid it.”

  “Where I come from, men and women can do whatever they want, with no restrictions on what name someone can have. We also just worship one God, not many Goddesses, like the people of Civitas Dei.”

  “And men and women are free to love one another,” I breathe, in awe of such a lawless place. “Do women love other women, if they prefer?”

  “Sometimes, but some find the idea almost as repugnant as the people of your queendom do when men and women love each other. Anyway, we’re getting off topic. As I said before, Kisto and Jaereth will keep you safe, but you must leave the Field without being noticed as soon as the match is over.”

  “I’m bringing Karyl with me,” I insist, expecting her to argue with me. “I’ll explain what really happened yesterday—I know she’ll believe me. I’ll tell her I ordered a pair of slaves to protect us and she won’t question it.”

  Sera nods again, looking resigned.

  “Just wait to tell her until after the match when you’re alone with her. I love that girl, but she never could keep a juicy piece of gossip to herself.”

  “True. And thank you for the good advice, Sera. I know I have a tendency to act first and think later,” I admit sheepishly.

  She just smiles. I feel her love surround me briefly like a comforting blanket that has been warming by the fire.

  “I was the same way when I was your age,” she confides, her smile widening to show her dimples. I sense her amusement, no doubt thinking of examples from her past.

  “Now go,” she scolds, making a shooing motion. “Good luck tomorrow, and please be careful, Kella.” Her smile dies with these last words; again, I feel her fear.

  “I will,” I promise, and open my eyes. Sitting up in bed, I listen for Maren’s soft snores and hear them, sounding regular and deep. If he wakes, I’ll tell him I’m going to relieve myself, knowing he would never dare ask why I’m carrying a bag.

  Pushing the blankets aside, I walk over to my closet. The moon is young, but there’s just enough light coming through my window to give a vague outline to things. Maren always hangs my shifts on one side and my dresses on the other, making it easy to tell them apart even in the dark, so before long, I’m suitably dressed to go outside. Retrieving the bag I’d hidden under my bed, I ghost toward the door. My boots are waiting beside it, so I carry them out with me, close the door, and draw them on while sitting on the stairs.

  The stairs creak slightly as I descend, but no one stirs, and soon I’m outside, closing the door quietly behind me. Our burial grounds lie some distance behind our manse, beyond the orchards, so I walk around back and strike out into the tall grass.

  The sound of someone clearing their throat behind me spins me around before I’ve gone far. Even though the moonlight is weak, I know immediately who it is.

  “Jaereth?” I whisper, and he comes closer. I stand there, feeling awkward, but he reaches out for my hand and squeezes it gently. I squeeze back, my heart beating faster at even that slight contact.

  “I hoped you would venture out tonight,” he whispers back, his mouth close to my ear. “I’m glad to see you took my warning seriously,” he adds, indicating the bag in my hand.

  “Sera told me more creatures are coming tomorrow,” I explain, then catch myself. “Oh, you don’t know who Sera is. She visits me in my dreams.”

  I sense his disbelief, and giggle.

  “I know it sounds crazy, but she told me about my sister Kliara’s pregnancy before Kliara told anyone but Mother. She also told me that Kisto will be leading me to safety after the match tomorrow.”

  I feel his disbelief fade into surprise, then fear.

  “Who is she, and how does she know these things?” he demands.

  “She and some others had something terrible happen to them many years ago that made their bodies disappear. Now, they can only experience life through others. Sera Chose me, and her love, Wilde, Chose you. They follow us around, so they heard you and Kisto making your plans.”

  His hand tightens in mine.

  “An invisible man is following me?” He stifles a laugh, coughing quietly instead. “Can they fly, too?”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised, but she hasn’t mentioned it.”

  “So that’s all she told you? That more creatures are coming tomorrow and that Kisto would lead you to safety?”

  “She told me not to tell my family because they wouldn’t believe me. She’s been watching the Ladies of my House since my grandmother’s time, so she would know. I sensed that maybe she knew more than she was telling, but she wants me to be safe.” I hesitate. “She also told me that romantic relationships between men and women are the norm in her society, so I shouldn’t be ashamed of how I feel about you.”

  His joy washes over me, and I offer him a shy smile. He looks around, then runs his other hand nervously through his hair.

  “Is she here now?”

  “Maybe. They’re invisible. I can only see them in my dreams, silly.”

  He addresses the air to one side of me.

  “If you’re real, visit me in my dreams. I’d like to know more about your intentions.”

  I grin. “So you believe me?”

  He looks down at me seriously.

  “I would believe you even if you told me the sky is red.” Humor twinkles in his eyes. Pulling me to him, he holds me close for a moment out of time. When at last he pulls back, I feel stronger, somehow.

  “I came to tell you that I’m sending Kisto tomorrow after the match to take you to safety, but I guess I’ll just admire your beauty instead,” he says, smiling. He leans in to steal a kiss.

  Something clicks in my mind while he’s speaking.

  “Wait, though—I can see how Sera might know danger is coming my way. But how could you have known about those horrible creatures and the fact that they would attack me, and how do you know they’ll do it again tomorrow? You didn’t know about Wilde or Sera, so they didn’t tell you.”

  Now Jaereth looks uncomfortable. “I just know. I can’t explain it.”

  “Is it part of your ability to control people somehow?”

  “You could say that,” he says evasively. “It’s complicated.”

  “What are you not telling me?” My suspicions are fully roused, and I hate the feeling. We had been so close only a moment before.

  He looks sad. His lips move, but his words don’t register. I feel dizzy, the sky beginning to spin around me, and lose my balance. He catches me as I struggle to catch my breath.

  “You need sleep,” he whispers in my ear. “I’ll take the bag and put it wherever you want it. Go back inside and rest. You’ll need all your strength for the match tomorrow.”

  I nod weakly, feeling strange, and let him take my bag.

  “Put it behind one of the gravestones,” I whisper back.

  He gives me a last, tight embrace and then steers me gently back toward the manse. Thinking is difficult somehow, so I focus on putting one foot in front of the other. I don’t remember how I got there, but when morning dawns, I’m in my bed, still wearing my dress from last night.

  Maren comes in with the breakfast tray, frowning slightly when I sit up and he sees what I’m wearing. But he says not
hing.

    

  The morning of the match dawns clear, warm, and still, with that strange, charged feeling one sometimes senses in the air just before a summer storm. I woke just before dawn. Sitting at the window of the carriage I share with Karyl and our other teammates, I watch the sun’s golden rays spill over the horizon. Mother and the rest of House Klia will follow us to the Field of Honor later.

  Adjusting the quiver on my back, I scan the fields we pass for any sign of those horrible, nightmarish creatures, seeing nothing out of the ordinary. Mother’s mouth had tightened when I warned her about the large pack of dogs I claimed to see the day before. I thought she might scoff, but instead, she ordered the servants to retrieve her crossbow and bolts, sending my sisters and cousins back to their rooms to get their weapons, as well. She even asked me while we waited for them to return if I had fully recovered from the fall from my horse. I lied again and said I had, even though my head still aches quite painfully.

  When the creatures attack, I muse, our weapons won’t be enough. I need to use my ability to defend us without letting them know I’m doing it.

  Curious to see if I can still call the winds on a windless day, I focus on a bird winging its way across the field next to the road. Letting my eyelids flutter closed, I reach within for that feeling of knowing something without knowing how. It’s like a prayer, though now I know the Goddess didn’t give me this gift, but it’s also the act of connecting with the earth and sky, letting their power flow through me. I feel the answering surge of energy, sense it rushing toward me, and direct it toward the bird. When I open my eyes, the bird has turned to ride the wind and is soaring swiftly away in the other direction.

  The grooms stabled our horses in the stalls to either side of the grandstands last night. Darkstar whinnies when she sees me, kicking the door of her stall as if to say, “Let me out of this unfamiliar place!” Sweetpea and Raindrop look restless too, though they settle after I give them each a piece of apple and talk to them for a while.

  I lead Darkstar out and tie her lead rope to the ring in the wall. She scents the air, looking longingly across at the green grass of the Field, no doubt wanting to roll in it and find some sweet clover to nibble, but she’s too well-trained to fight me. A groom begins to braid and tie up her tail while I wrap her legs, still murmuring to her under my breath.

  Behind us, another groom leads Sweetpea out of her stall and begins braiding her tail as well, with Raindrop soon to follow. I’ll alternate between Darkstar and Sweetpea for the four scoring periods my trio and I will play, with Raindrop, my youngest, least-experienced mare, held in reserve in case one of the other two is injured, Goddess forbid.

  I felt nervous last night, but now, thinking about what I need to do, I feel calm and focused, as I always do just before a match. Even my headache feels muted, I realize, pushed back by the adrenaline rising within me. Karyl often complains of nerves just before we ride out onto the Field, but not me. My brain goes into a kind of ‘war mode’, ready to anticipate and react quickly, my hands steady and sure. ‘Battle brain’, as I call it, ultimately drains me emotionally and physically, but not until the match is well over. I imagine my ancestors felt something similar when they rode into battle, and thank the Goddess for the clarity and decisiveness it gives me.

  Soon, all three horses are ready to ride. I hear music start up behind and above me, the low thunder of the drums and the dull roar of my people as they file into the stands beginning to fuel the steady infusion of adrenaline to my system. Some of my teammates lead their horses onto the Field and mount, waving to acknowledge the cheers of the crowd. Darkstar begins to paw the ground, impatient to join them. With a chuckle, I unclip the tether from her bridle and lead her after the others.

  Jogging after the others around the Field, Darkstar and I find our rhythm. The way she immediately responds to the slightest pressure of thigh, weight shift, or rein fills me with fierce pride. She champs at her light bit excitedly, her focus on me and mine on her. The drums and the sounds of the crowd fade away. The only things that exist for us now are on this Field with us.

  The main enforcer blows her whistle twice, signaling the end of warm-ups. Karyl and Krisyl ride over to tap netsticks with me. Together, we canter to the starting “T” to the side of the field facing the stands for the first throw-in. The arena goes silent.

  The other horses bunch around us, waiting. When the ball sails over our heads, six netsticks dart for it, but it’s Karyl who pulls it down. Darkstar starts for the scoring line but the Arrowtails’ #3, a tall girl in the blood-red divided riding skirts of Amalria named Adaleyn, presses us hard, steering us inexorably away from the goal. Darkstar spins neatly at last and breaks free, but their #2 manages to pop the ball out of Karyl’s net and scoop it up. Karyl tries to return the favor, but the girl, a stocky brunette named Akayla, pivots her horse and whips it into a gallop toward the goal.

  Krisyl is waiting for her over the scoring line and manages with a beautiful bit of riding to get alongside and turn them away. Her mare fights to match the other horse for every turn and pivot while Krisyl reaches over to try to knock the ball free. Her horse suddenly half-rears, ears flattened, allowing Akayla’s horse to dart past; Akayla throws the ball through the goal posts. The enforcer blows her whistle to signal the score, and the crowd cheers.

  Krisyl rides toward me, looking troubled. Her horse, a trim blood bay named Ruby, touches noses with Darkstar before they turn and canter upfield.

  “She deliberately struck Ruby on the nose with her netstick when she knew the enforcer and the crowd wouldn’t see it,” Krisyl growls, gesturing toward Akayla. The girl turns our way and grins before loping away. I can feel her contempt for us like a slap to the face.

  “The enforcer won’t believe it without seeing it for herself, so we’ll just have to try to prevent her from doing it again. Go tell Karyl what happened.”

  It takes all my self-control to wall my anger away behind my mental shield. Emotion has no place out on the field—it only makes you reactive, unfocused, and sloppy. Besides, I don’t want to give them the satisfaction of upsetting me, and as the leader of this trio, I need to lead with confident strength.

  When the enforcer throws the ball this time, it lands behind us and rolls away. Whirling, we race to scoop it up, netsticks rising and falling all around us. It takes a lucky bounce away from Adaleyn’s net and I snap it up. With Karyl on my flank to guard me, we dash toward the scoring line. I bounce the ball on the ground as we cross it and catch it again as she peels off, expertly blocking Adaleyn from following me, and I score our first goal. Darkstar prances and bows her head on the way back to the throw-in ‘T’ as if graciously acknowledging the cheers from the stands. I pat her neck and murmur to her, her ears flicking back to catch every word.

  Their #1 sniffs loudly when we line up beside her in front of the enforcer at the ‘T’, her snub nose held high. Her name is Aloris. She has a reputation throughout the Queensrealm for being a bully. Last season, a girl from the Jemleyn Jackdaws complained that Aloris had cornered her and pushed her into a wall, but there were no witnesses. The season before that, Aloris and a teammate called two girls from the Damalis Doves, whose team emblem is a brown pair of wings, the “dirt-wing duo” at a party, threatening to hurt their horses if their team beat hers in the upcoming game. I’d bet a string of silver Queens that Aloris is behind what happened to Ruby.

  The enforcer throws the ball, someone stops it with a net but doesn’t catch it, and it falls to the ground under the #2s’ churning hooves. Six netsticks scramble for it, and I’m so busy making sure no one hurts my horse with a stick that I miss my chance. Aloris doesn’t. She spurs her horse with Karyl and Krisyl to either side of her. I have no choice but to hang back in case one of them get the ball, since it pays to be as near the goal as possible if that happens. Adaleyn stays with me.

  Instead of trying to avoid them, Aloris deliberately guides her horse to aggressively bump Karyl’s with
her shoulder to try to ride her off, but the enforcer blows her whistle to call the foul. Riding off is acceptable, but not aggressively while in full gallop, because the other horse and rider might careen off helplessly and get hurt. The ball goes to Karyl, who bounces it off the ground and catches it before turning her horse upfield. Aloris and Akayla are on her right, the latter trying to pop the ball out, so Karyl attempts a long pass across midfield to me.

  I throw up my net to receive it but Adaleyn interposes hers at the last moment and catches it instead. One spin in the opposite direction and she’s lobbing it back across the field. Aloris catches it and whips her horse mercilessly to get out in front of Karyl and Krisyl. The ball flies through the uprights, the whistle blows, and the crowd roars approvingly.

  The next ball goes straight to Akayla. Krisyl harries her for it and she drops it, but Aloris snatches it up and takes it in for a quick score. Soon after, Adaleyn catches the ball and throws it downfield to Aloris. Krisyl tries to pop the ball out, but Aloris rides her off without a whistle and carries it in for another point. The ball after that rolls out of bounds; when it’s thrown in again, I manage to come down with it and gallop downfield well ahead of everyone else to send it through the posts.

  Glancing at the game-clock, a large wind-up device that triggers a bell to chime when each eight-minute scoring period ends, I sigh inwardly. Less than two minutes to go. The score-keepers update the number of goals on the Kestrels side of the scoreboard to two. The Arrowtails have four. We need to tie up the score, and soon.

  At the throw-in, the ball goes to Krisyl this time, who throws it to me. Darkstar and I pound across the scoring line; I bounce the ball and regain it, with Adaleyn matching us stride for stride. We turn to draw her off, Darkstar twisting, dodging, and pirouetting back again in the dance that gives Horse-Dancing its name, while I strive to keep the ball away from Adaleyn. She and her horse dance with us, her netstick sweeping upwards to try to pop the ball out, failing once, twice, three times.