Closer to the Heart (25 page)

“I shall, your Highness,” she replied, with a sketch of a bow. Then she turned and walked as fast as she could, heading for the Heralds' Wing. Already she was behind on what the others were discussing . . . and it looked as if it was going to be a very long night, if she didn't get there soon.

:I'll catch you up,:
Rolan promised.
:We'll start with Herald Tarlin.:

• • •

Morning came far too soon, after a long night of being treated to a rapid education on the Heralds in the South and their pertinent Gifts and abilities. Amily woke to the sound of the first bells with a groan. After fighting free of the covers and clambering out of the bed, she gave herself a good dousing with cold water, and felt, if not better, at least more awake. The one benefit of being overtired was that once she finished with the King, if she could justify a nap, she'd have no trouble drifting off to sleep.

It wasn't her day to visit Linden and Tuck, nor was it her day to get lessons in roof-running from Renn, so once the morning's work was done, she opted to snatch a bite or two of food in her rooms as she flung herself down on the bed, instead of having a “proper” lunch at the Dining Hall. The little page who regularly brought fresh rolls, butter, and other things that would not spoil had brought some fresh mixed greens and watercress. That on a buttered roll with thin slices of ham was a perfectly good lunch for someone who was so tired that her stomach felt a bit upset.

The bed felt wonderful. Someone had come in and made it up for her with fresh sheets scented with lavender, and her head felt better as soon as it touched the pillow and she closed her eyes. As she normally did during the process of falling asleep, she let her mind drift around to some of the animals
she knew were in targeted homes “of interest”—mostly because these highborn or wealthy folk had kin in the south near or even across the border with Menmellith.

But all she got, as her concentration flitted from cat, to lapdog, to guard dog, to cat again, was general worry and unease. Unease from those who had kin on the Valdemar side of the border, and worry from those who had kin on the other side. No one knew, yet, about the threat of war between Menmellith and Valdemar, but it was obvious to folk who were used to getting regular letters from their Menmellith kin that something was wrong. Letters weren't coming. And letters were
expected,
given the situation with the rebellion going on. At least three families were anticipating that they might have to find a place to put displaced relatives. They hadn't been pleased by that, but what could one do? Family was family, and blood was blood, and you had obligations that went far past a little inconvenience and perhaps some crowding.

But now that communication had completely stopped, that was even more worrisome than the threat of having relations to house.

It was not at all a productive session, and she rather regretted the time she had wasted trying it. But at least she knew that none of these folk had any information on the smuggled weapons. Not that those relatives across the border were innocent—there was no way of telling that—but the ones here in Haven had no inkling of any smuggling going on, past the normal sort that every merchant family seemed to engage in.

She finally drifted off to an uneasy sleep, wishing her Gift was something more useful than this.

• • •

The sun beat down on what had been a nice stretch of pasture; pasture that had been carefully groomed of any “presents” left
behind by the horses that had been here. The horses themselves had cropped the new grass nicely short, which was one reason why it had been chosen in the first place. It was a pretty stretch of field. It wasn't going to stay pretty for very long.

“Well, gemmun. Reckon we're ready?” Mags looked around at the members of his new Kirball team; although he was not nominally the team captain, that young man had surrendered the title within moments of the start of their first practice. Willingly, even eagerly.

Kirball for non-Heralds required a much abbreviated team; four riders, and eight footsmen, at least as this group played it. It was also played on a perfectly flat field, hemmed in on all four sides by fences of some sort. In this case, two of the sides were painstakingly erected wooden fences, and two were hedges, long in place, since hedges were far more forgiving for horses that ran into them than wooden fences could be. The hedge ends were where the goals were, in case the horsemen overran the goals. It was much more likely that any hits against the fence would be at an angle rather than straight on; these were all excellent horsemen, and they would do whatever they could to save their beasts any injury.

The goals were nothing like the miniature fortifications that the Collegium teams used. It was much, much too dangerous to have something like that in a version of the game where there was no team of Healers on the sidelines, and there were no Heralds who could carefully coordinate every move of the entire team. These goals were canvas stretched over a wooden frame; one hole had been cut about window-sized and window-height, and another cut next to it, down to the ground, to represent a door. The flag was behind the blank canvas of the goal, out of sight, the better to enable the footmen to sneak up and steal it. If these goals got overrun, the worst anyone would have to fear would be the splintered uprights. That
could be dangerous, but the wood was willow, and unlikely to splinter into lethal shards the way a hardwood could.

The eleven young men (eight footsmen, and the other three riders) around Mags nodded solemnly. The three horses—and Mags' pony—stood easily, showing no sign of stress, reins slack in the riders' hands. The other team was all on horses, for all four quarters. Mags' team was divided half and half, although initially the other three riders were on the taller beasts, while he was sticking to ponies for the entire game.

“All right. Fer th' first quarter, I reckon the best plan is t'run 'em up an' down th' field, an' see what they learnt from me,” Mags told them. Just to be fair, Mags had taken an afternoon and taught the other side all the drills that the Collegium teams used, until he thought they had the basic notions down solidly. But that didn't mean he wasn't savvy enough to do a good deal more than just drill his team. He and his ponies had demonstrated how to
really
scrum, and gotten their horses used to getting shoved against the fence or into the hedge. With Dallen's help soothing some of their panic, he'd gotten them conditioned over the course of a couple of days.

But he wasn't blind to the fact that the other side probably had people watching those practices, and bringing back the information on what he was doing. They'd probably conditioned their mounts in the same way. He couldn't use his Mindspeaking ability to coach and direct every member of the team the way he could if he was Herald Mags. The best he could do would be to skim off the intentions of their opponents from surface thoughts. So this was very likely going to be a real battle.

“All right then. Let's get ready for it. Mount up, gemmun. Lads, get into the field.” Mags suited action to words as he swung into Jess's saddle and felt the pony gather himself under him. Jess snorted and tossed his head eagerly. He wanted to play. He'd enjoyed the practices, but he knew that
they weren't games. Jess had wanted to play in a real
game,
every minute they were practicing, at least according to Dallen.

The eight footsmen distributed themselves across the field; the goalsman at the goal, the other seven spaced at strategic points on their half of the field. Around the fences and behind the hedges were those folk of the Hara and Laon workers that could get leave to come, all the members of the actual families of the seven riders that had any interest at all in seeing the game, and every single person at the Rolmer mine here, for the entire lot of them had been given an afternoon off to watch the play. The gentry were sitting in nicely constructed bleachers on either side of the field; the rest found space where they could, and the more enterprising had gotten bits of log to stand on to see above the heads of the rest. It was actually a far more enthusiastic crowd than Mags had seen at the Collegium. It wasn't as colorful, however. There was no Bardic Scarlet, Healer Green, or Guard Blue in the crowd. Most of the spectators were in the slightly fancier version of their workaday clothing, but the colors were muted, all things they could get from herbal dyes. But even the gentry had opted for light colors, being as they were sitting right in the full sun.

The excitement among the spectators was palpable.

The eight riders formed a rough circle in the very center of the field. One of the judges held the ball. The crowd fell into a silence so absolute that every note of birdsong, and every insect call, echoed into the quiet and filled it up. Mags breathed, slowly and steadily, to keep Jess from tensing up so much that he jumped into the circle too soon.

Then the judge tossed the ball into the middle of them, Jess leapt for it almost before Mags had realized the ball was in play, and the game was on.

As he had expected to, Mags and Jess nipped in under the noses of the taller horses and got away with the ball, heading toward the Laon goal. But he couldn't keep the ball, not with
four larger horses thundering down on him in a virtual stampede. They were so close behind him he could almost feel the hot breath of the straining horses on the back of his neck, and the pounding hooves drowned out any other sound.

He sensed, rather than saw, that his teammate Retner was free. With a powerful
thwack
of his club, he sent the ball hurtling toward Retner, then wheeled Jess to force the pony's shoulder into the chest of the horse overtaking him. Jess responded with enthusiasm, happily charging into the taller horse and throwing him off-balance. He didn't so much
hit
the other horse, as knock him off his course and startle him, making him blunder sideways and lose his momentum—and as luck would have it, in his turn stumbling into the path of a second Laon rider. That tangled them both up as Jess scuttled away, and kept them from following the ball. Retner got it, and was down the field in a trice.

He knew there was no way Jess could outrun the taller horses, so he backed off a little until the other two Laon riders caught up with Retner, and they all came up in a knot against the fence.
:The ball is under the hocks of that scrawny bay,:
Dallen told him.
:I think it's going to stay there, they can't seem to figure out where it is.:

:Unless the bay kicks it afore we get there,:
he replied. Then he and Jess dove in, again got in under the noses of the taller horses, shouldered between two of them, and got the ball away.

Then he got a lucky break, a clear shot all the way to the goal, with only the goalkeeper standing in the way—while the rest of the Laon riders still thought the ball was in under their horses' feet, and the Hara riders were perfectly happy to let them keep that illusion. Off he and Jess scuttled, him thwacking the ball in short bursts, and heading straight for the goalkeeper while Jess kept his head down and his nose practically
on
the ball, chasing it like a hound. He'd gotten about halfway
there when the Laon team figured out they'd been jiggered, and came tearing after him, the Hara riders mixed up with them. He looked back over his shoulder and saw that two of the Laon riders had pulled a little away to the sides, intending to intercept the ball if he got it too far ahead of himself. But Mags was too wise in the ways of the game to let that happen. He kept dribbling the ball and Jess kept his head down, and no one could catch them with the head start they had to physically shove him away from it. His head was pounding as hard as the hoofbeats behind him, and the crowd was screaming. And as he suspected, the goalkeeper, unnerved at the spectacle of six animals heading straight for him, with no sign whatsoever they were going to pull up, dove to the side to avoid getting trampled. At the next to the last moment, the Laon riders lost their nerve and pulled up. At the last moment, knowing that little Jess could make a short, tight turn
much
faster than a taller horse could, Mags pulled him around and at the same time, drove the ball through the goal.

The crowd went insane. Mags took off his helmet, ran a hand through hair already soaked with sweat, patted Jess on the neck, put his helmet back on, and turned back to the center of the field for the judges to send out the ball again.

The rest of the quarter was spent running the ball up and down the field, without anyone managing to get full control of either the ball or the field. The footsmen all made some abortive attempts at the flag, but each time they were spotted by the opposite side, and prevented from making a run for it.

The next quarter, half the Laon riders switched to ponies, as did one of the Hara riders. That put things on a more even footing. The game turned from a race into scrum after scrum, while the spectators screamed encouragement until they were hoarse. By this time Mags was sweating freely under his armor and helmet, feeling runnels of sweat pouring down his back. The field didn't have any grass left over the parts most contested,
and the horses were kicking up so much dirt and grass that Mags had his mouth full of it and kept spitting out grit. The footsmen were hard at work, fielding the ball back to the riders whenever someone hit it long. Finally Mags, on the cream pony, who seemed to have a supernatural ability to interfere with the other team's stratagems, somehow shoved his way through the scrum, kicking the ball as he went, and freeing it. It dribbled down the field and one of the Laon footmen got hold of it and hurled it toward the Hara goal. But the Hara goalkeeper fended it off with a miraculous save, and sent it back toward the horsemen. Mags and the cream dove after it, but they were too late; the captain of the Laon team got hold of it, and ran it all the way to their goal despite the valiant efforts of their goalkeeper.