Chapter 260: A Game Of Sticks, Part
With a blare of a trumpet, and the booming of drums, both contenders saddled atop their trusty steed slowly made their way down the ramp and into the right to the thunderous, almost deafening cheers and applause of the crowd encircling the arena.
Man, talk about stage fright. No doubt if that were me pulling on the reins and holding up that gargantuan spiny lance in hand, I’d probably just end skewering both myself and my horse just from the peer pressure alone.
Not Ash though. I knew behind that unsteady wobble of the helm lies an expression as hard as stone, unbreakable, unswayable.
“So... Elf-Knight, eh?” spoke a hooded hunter across from me far right. “What are you guys thinking?”
“As usual, it’s only eight passes around the field,” said a witch, her staff on her lap sitting just right beside him. “If she’s lucky, she’ll get to ten points by the end of it.”
“More like five,” sniggered the pale vampire to my left, twirling the end-curls of a well-groomed mustache. “Had it been Kevin on the horse, then that’s twenty. Seriously, the flu of all days. Shame.”
“Either way, we all know who wins this in the end,” calmly stated a robed wizard to the farthest left. “She might look like Eshwlyn, but unless she’s actually the real thing... I’m not holding my breath here.”
.....
Finally, it was down to the clown in the middle, opinion unsaid... the quartet sat silent, sneaking glances at me, until suddenly the witch with her staff prodded my knee with a light tap.
“And you, Sir Jester?” She said, her words polite. “What’s your say?”
Don’t think the staring and the badgering would stop if I kept quiet. No choice then, when in Rome...
“New to these things,” I said, shrugging my shoulders, being as off-handed as possible. “I say Elf, but... it seems like everybody is saying otherwise.”
The hunter leaned out, a smirk beneath the hood, “And you don’t think there might have been a good reason for that?”
“Well – ”
I felt another tap to my left, and when I turned, I found the pointed nails of the vampire beckoning my gaze front and center.
“Maybe you need a demonstration,” He said, overbearingly smug. “Watch.”
Another blast of the trumpet and the contenders were off to the ear-shattering roar of the crowd, first to a walk, and then to a canter, before finally the hooves of either horse were practically but whizzing blurs stirring dirt into the air.
Within seconds, contact was imminent. Ash dropped her lance. Leon did the same. Her lance was blue, his was red. I watched close, my fingernails digging into the seat, wide-eyed.
Closer every second, every moment, until they finally met, the blue crossing with the red – there was a clangor of metal ringing aloud, then a sharp snap. Silence fell. A moment later, they sped past each other... a blue lance still held up high, and Leon slowing to a trot, tossed away a shattered red handle to the cheers of the crowd.
“Five points to Leon The Valiant!” proclaimed the announcer on the podium. “A promising start once more to the undefeated champion of the ring! Now, will he be able to keep this up? Or will the newcomer surprise us all? Let’s find out!”
Lucky shot...
As both contenders got back into position for the second pass, I couldn’t help but notice the smug stares from all sides of me.
A staff lightly tapped my knee again. “Convinced yet?”
I kept unfazed. “I’m a stubborn guy.”
“For now, but not for long,” Wizard-Man murmured, leaning into his seat, his fist buried into his cheek. “Undefeated, didn’t you hear? That means he’s won before.”
“That’s last year,” I rebutted.
“No, that’s every year,” corrected the hunter, that smirk of his wider than ever. “You weren’t lying, you are new here. Do you at least know the rules, man?”
Come to think of it, I didn’t. Jousting was one of those novelty things you hear about and go ‘Oh cool, that’s cool’ and never delve any deeper than that ever again.
If you were to ask me to describe the process to you, I’d probably just take a twig, poke it once at your chest, and shrug away clueless proclaiming that’s all there is to it, bye-bye.
To be fair though, what the hell are you doing asking random strangers that in the first place? You have a phone. You get shitty descriptions from people that’s your fault, should have just asked Siri, dummy.
“I’m... I’m kinda eyeballing it,” I told him, earning him a little amuse chuckle at my expense.
“One point if the lance touches the guard, five if the lance breaks while doing so, and if the tip of the lances ends up touching each other then that’s a rerun,” The witch kindly explained. “Oh, and it’s ten points for a dismount. The one who has the most points after eight passes wins.”
“Yep, and right now your Elf is running five points short,” said the vampire, stroking his mustache once again in that evil villain pose. “And it’ll just get even worse from there.”
I nodded along with him, but I didn’t one bit agree with what he said. “We’ll see about that...”
Silence fell between us all as we sat and watched as both contenders held firm onto their lances once more, their grips on the horses’ reins just as steady.
Come on Ash, you got this, you more than got this, you own this, go on and show ’em all that you absolutely do...
The trumpet sounded, and with a spurt of speed, they were hurtling towards each other beset on all sides by the cheers of the masses, all just as wide-eyed, all with breaths bated, as the horses’ gallop reached their peak.
Her blue plummeted, his red followed along, they crossed – something hit, something clattered – something ruptured. In the split second after, they were slowing down again.
Ash’s lance fell to her side, unbroken. On Leon’s side, fragmented pieces of bright red littered the dirt by his horses’ hooves. In his hand, raised up to the excited shrieks of the crowd, was the handle.
Another lucky shot...
“That’s another five to Leon The Valiant!” shouted the announcer, barely even perceivable against the fervent chaos sounding from all around. “What a show, what a run, and it’s only just begun! But alas, let’s not count out the Elf just yet! Third times the charm after all, as they say!”
He says that but I doubt he even believes what the hell he was shouting himself hoarse for.
As far as I could hear and see, support for the Elf-Knight had narrowed down to a measly one.
It’s fortunate that the single one was still a stubborn one... even when faced with the gloats and jeers from all around.
“Ten points short now,” muttered the mustache-twirler, his fangs protruding out from his curved lips.
“And six passes left,” I reminded him, not turning my eyes away as they both repositioned themselves back to their starting points.
“Huh, well,” The hunter snorted. “I do hope you didn’t bet anything big beforehand.”
“Stupid to even bet anything in the first place,” mumbled the wizard again, shaking his head. “Winner’s always the same anyway. It’s getting a bit boring to see, honestly speaking...”
To my right, the witch sighed along with him. “No doubt about that. Sometimes I wished he’d just lose for once... get some excitement going, you know?”
They both had their lances tight in their hands again.
Leon was waving his to and fro, basking in the revelry of victory guaranteed.
Ash was still. Very still. Unwavering, unbreaking, always was, always is...
“Keep watching, then,” I muttered.
Everybody just smiled at that, everybody save for the hunter to the right, a breathy snickering sounding from under his hood.
“You still going on about that, seriously?” He said, evidently deaf to the horn that just blared. “Dude, just face it, she’s never going to win, man!”
A slow trod at first, always just for a second, then the pace picked up.
“She’s going up against a medieval freak, you know? Leon’s whole life is just one big fantasy affair. He lives and breathes these types of things.”
There’s the gallop, there’s the speed rapidly increasing, the blast of dirt spewing onto everywhere.
“He’s been fencing since he was a boy, riding horses since he was a baby!”
Halfway down the middle. The red dropped, the blue did too. Both colors but a whizzing smear in their clutches.
Reaching, crossing...
“Just watch, you just watch, this match will be over before you know it, and you’ll be changing your tune by the end of the – !”
An echo shot across onto everywhere, more than a rupture, more than a clang...
A silence in the crowd, a quiet on the stage... in the ring, Ash pulled her horse to a sudden stop with one hand, and in the other... snapped cleanly down the hilt, was her lance.
On the other side, the other horse didn’t slow, nobody pulled on the reins, nobody was even there sitting on the saddle. A few meters away, Leon was struggling up to his feet from the dirt, the wind taken right off of his sails.
He fell.
And he didn’t do that gracefully. A flip backwards, landing his feet facing to the skies, and his helmet sunk into the dirt. With help from a member of staff, he was upright again... his lance still in his hands, still in one piece.
The silence persisted for a moment, then for two, before, like a drop of a curtain on stage, a loud blast of applause fell upon the arena.
Whistles, claps, cheers, and none more prominent, nor more vocal, than the one coming from the one middle seat on stage.
“I don’t believe what just happened!” squealed the announcer in a high-pitch voice. “A dismount! Leon the Valiant just got dismounted for the first time ever! Ten points to Eshwlyn the Elf-Knight for that – for that – I still can’t believe it – ten for ten! Both contenders tied in one fell swoop! Ladies and gentlemen, this is turning out to be a match for the ages, and we’re still far from done!”
Speechless wide-eyed faces breezed by the faces of the fantasy quartet I found myself wedged in-between.
But none more so than the hunter, his lips agape, still wrought in disbelief.
Unable to help myself, I stuck my neck out and formed a smile of my own towards the far right. “So you were saying?”
He snapped out of it, glancing at me once not as conceited anymore, before crossing his arms and slumping into his seat.
“Lucky shot,” He muttered.
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