Trapped On Talonque: (A Sectors SF romance) (13 page)

Two days before the games, the head trainer called for Nate.

“What colors do you wish to wear? What is your team to be called?”

Nate remembered what Bithia had said about the native reptile. “We’re the Tolokon, which is her totem, done in the dark blue of the night sky mixed with the scarlet of the dawn from which she came.” He frowned, and the man retreated a few steps. “Why are you bothering me with this trivia when surely you knew the answers?”

“Only to be entirely sure all is to your liking.” The trainer was obsequious. Apparently, the man was now none too sure the outcome of the sacred game was going to fall on Huitlani’s side.

“Ensure the uniforms are ready on game day, and until then stay out of my way.” Nate was enjoying intimidating one of the people who held him prisoner.

On the day of the games, the team was awakened early by servants bearing a huge breakfast heavy on the carbohydrates. Celixia wasn’t present this morning to oversee the meal. Nate decided not to worry over her absence. Now the fateful day was actually here he needed to concentrate on the game.

“Any sign from your lady?” Thom asked in a whisper as the team was escorted to the dressing room at the back of the palace arena.

“None. I figure if something were wrong with her, Sarbordon would have come to gloat. I’m trying not to think beyond this match this afternoon. I don’t like our game being last.”

“Plenty of time to get nervous, if we were the nervous types.” Thom grinned wolfishly as he threw the practice ball high in the air and caught it. “Good thing we ain’t. Here comes our fourth, Faric.”

Nate didn’t like the fact that Faric had been kept in the player barracks at the practice arena, rather than joining the three of them in the room at the palace, but no matter how hard he protested, the ruling stood. Faric wasn’t known to be dedicated to the goddess and hence wasn’t deemed worthy of special treatment.

At the start of the day, there were forty men gathered in the holding area, waiting their turn to play for the life-and-death stakes. Nate and his team stationed themselves against the far wall from the entrance to the court. He preferred a solid wall at his back, even this late in the proceedings. He didn’t trust anyone, and Lolanta’s threats lingered in his mind. Who in here might be willing to kill them at her behest, given the promise of escape from the altars she ruled? Nate didn’t want to risk a knife in the back or a poisoned drink of water for himself or any man on his team.
 

“Stay loose, don’t think too much,” Nate advised his teammates, telling them to do the opposite of what he was planning to do himself. He’d take the burden of worrying for all of them, since he was the captain.

“Take a look at Kalgitr’s team,” Thom said.

“Where?”

“Over there.” Thom pointed with his chin, and Nate swung around to find himself being glared at by the three men he remembered from the scrimmages, plus a fourth who stood slightly away from his teammates, looking unhappy to be involved.

“Their new guy doesn’t seem to be with the program,” Nate said to his team in a low voice. “That may be our edge. I don’t think he’s an eager volunteer.”

“When we take the field, he’ll want to live as much as any of us.” Atletl’s caution against overconfidence was delivered in a flat tone. “He’ll play hard.”

“Yes, but he isn’t one of them,” Nate said. “He’s a draftee in a high-stakes grudge match. You and Faric played together in your own village, and you’ve been a member of our team since the beginning, so we have an advantage.”

“I miss Haranda,” Thom said suddenly. “Wish we could have saved the poor kid.”

There was silence for a moment.

“All we can do for him now is win this damn thing,” Nate said.
 

Nate heard cheers from the mouth of the arena and watched a team come swaggering in. One of the men was limping, but all four were elated by their victory and consequent escape for another month from a grisly death dealt by the creatures in the well.
 

The head trainer shouted for the next two teams to ready themselves.

“Going to be a long day.” Nate sat on the sand, back to the reassuring wall. “Might as well rest while we can.” He shut his eyes and tried sending a questing thought to Bithia. As in the past two weeks, there wasn’t even a hint of communication. Resolutely, he shut away visions of her and made himself visualize play sets and strategies instead.
Have to get into the game now, before we hit the sand, or risk falling behind on the first ball while trying to loosen up.

Eventually, there was only Kalgitr’s team and Nate’s left in the holding area. Both sets of players did stretches and simple warmups. There was no conversation exchanged.

Then the head trainer was standing in the middle of the room, waving his coiled whip at them all. “Take the field for your match! Get out there!”

He held Nate back for a moment as the others moved out onto the hot sands. “I bet on you, warrior. My whole savings. Lose and I’ll kill you myself before the priestesses can sharpen their knives.”

Nate jerked his elbow loose and glared, sending the man staggering back a step. “You already took your best shot at me, remember?”

The trainer paled and retreated into the waiting room.
 

Nate came into the glaring sun a few paces behind the rest. A low murmur rose from the crowd, unlike the raucous cheering usually accompanying the first appearance of a team. He revolved in a slow circle, his gaze sweeping the crowd, which shrank back almost as one, each person seeking to avoid eye contact, to escape being singled out. In the royal box, Lolanta waved insolently. Her husband glared at Nate with open hatred. Only Celixia, who’d been seated beside Lolanta, stood and cheered for them. Nate bowed low to her and then saluted crisply.

Celixia nodded her acknowledgment of his gesture and resumed her seat, fanning herself lazily, as if unconcerned about the possibility of the game going against her goddess.

Now Nate lined up with his three teammates, next to Thom, who glanced at him quizzically. “Okay?”

Punching his friend in the shoulder, he said, “Let’s do it.”

Sarbordon shouted from his royal box above the arena, and the first ball shot from the middle circle. Kalgitr’s team got possession, the two blockers sending Atletl flying. The other team’s shooter drove straight down the field and made the point in one easy motion.

Nate was livid. “All right, dammit, they got one. We can’t give up any more. Faric, you were assigned to blocking him, remember? This is for real, people, not the damn scrimmage!”

Thom caught the next ball by reflex and passed off to Faric, who failed to redeem himself, losing the ball as he worked his way toward the goal. Atletl managed to steal it back as the opposing man was taking the shot, passed it across to Thom, who scored the point off the low five hole, right between the legs of a defender.

As the third ball emerged, Atletl tripped the man who’d tackled him earlier. The ball rolled free on the sand, and a mad pileup ensued, all eight men grabbing and kicking for possession. Nate came up with it and jerked free of the tangle of bodies. He took one step, hampered by an opposing player’s arms locked around his lower legs, as a Kalgitr player made a desperate grab. Falling, Nate passed to Faric, praying the man had gotten over his earlier jitters. Instead, their new recruit fumbled the ball away, and only a lightning dive by Atletl saved the point. He flicked the ball off to bounce against the far wall and into Thom’s sure hands. Thom again made the point.

“Two to one, not bad, but don’t ease up!” Nate shouted above the roar of the crowd. “Thom, Atletl, try to stall them.”

“What the seven hells? What are you going to do?” Thom yelled as Nate raced past him. “You’re going the wrong direction!”

“Changing the damn game plan. Just hold them!” Nate charged Faric. “I think you’re playing for the wrong team, you bastard. What did they offer you?”

The man shrank back until he stumbled against the painted wall of the court. “I play for you, warrior, for the goddess!”

“I don’t think so.”
 

Trying to sidle away, Faric mumbled, “They offered me life, win or lose.”

As Faric broke away and ran toward the entrance to the holding area, Nate launched himself into the air and landed a knockout blow with his left foot, coming down neatly on the other side of the traitor as Faric slumped to the sand in an unconscious heap.

“Get over here and block, dammit!” Thom’s desperate shout in Basic cut through the noise of the crowd.

Nate spun but was a few yards short of the action when the other team made their second point, going right through the overmatched Thom and Atletl.

“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Thom said in between breaths as he sprinted to the other end of the court, where the final, fatal ball flew out of a red-painted circle. “You cold-cocked our teammate?”

“He was a ringer. We’re safer without the chance of him interfering. Now play!”

Outnumbered by one man, Nate and his team managed to get possession of the ball and move it upfield, passing and feinting. Nate directed his troops on the run. “Atletl, take it! We’ll guard! Thom, anything goes. Gotta get this point!”
 

Atletl caught the pass out of sheer reflexive terror and ran toward the required spot to shoot for the designated circle. Thom and Nate made a stand to buy him time and keep the opposing players from outflanking them to tackle their smaller teammate. A disbelieving outcry from the crowd rose to the skies as Atletl slammed the ball in for the third and final score.

“All right!” Nate gathered his two teammates in a tight circle, slapping each man’s palms in victory.

The black-robed priestesses came onto the sand to loop the losing team in the chains of death. Nate wheeled to stare at Sarbordon and an obviously enraged Lolanta. Celixia beamed.

“Your gods lost, admit it,” he said, the taunt ringing out loud and clear as the crowd fell silent. “Our Lady T’naritza showed her power over Huitlani today. Now set us free.”

The ruler glared at him. “Not so simple and easy, warrior. I admit you won the game. I keep my word—you’ll live. But your goddess has something I want, and you’re going to help me get it.”

“What do you suppose he means?” Thom asked as the king left his box in the stands above them.

“I imagine we’re going to find out soon,” Nate told him. “Here come the guards. I bet we’re going into the maze again, to her.”

Thom shot him a speculative glance. “Which is fine with you, of course.”

“I figure our best chance is to keep playing out this ‘warriors of the goddess’ act. We might get a break, an opportunity to escape. Remember she indicated she might have a plan.”

“I’m with you,” Thom said. “What about Atletl?”

“He comes with us,” Nate said, both to Thom and to the guards surrounding them on the sand. “He’s in the service of the goddess.”

“True. She appeared to me, I serve her, she protects me,” Atletl said grandly.

Murrax furrowed his brow for a moment, but apparently his orders were to get them into the palace to meet the impatient man in charge as quickly as possible, so he motioned for the three of them to follow him off the playing field.

“And this man?” The head trainer knelt by the unconscious Faric.

“He’s a traitor. I don’t care what you do with him,” Nate said.

The rest of the guards fell into step with him, blocking any thought of escape for the moment. Escorted by the soldiers, he proceeded through the now deserted holding area and ascended the stairs leading into the palace.

CHAPTER FIVE

Nate observed Sarbordon and a pair of the black-robed priestesses waiting at the end of the corridor. There was no sign of Lolanta, whose absence made Nate glad. Celixia came out from behind the other two priestesses as the men walked up.

“Doesn’t he have to preside over the hideous public ceremony in the square? At the well?” Thom said.

Nate shrugged. “Maybe Lolanta’s handling the duties for both of them. I’d rather she was there than here. She’s one scary lady.”

He came to where the king waited, tapping one foot impatiently. The squad surrounding the team halted, Murrax and the guards saluting their ruler. Nate stood loosely, ready for action, secure in the knowledge that Thom had his six. Now that they’d won the sapiche game, he believed the balance of power had subtly shifted even further in his favor than it had after his miraculous recovery from the whipping. The team might still be prisoners, but their enemies were forced by their own belief system to view Nate and his men as backed by a higher power, making Nate a person to be seriously reckoned with.

Although he was concentrating on the king, Nate’s peripheral vision was excellent. He was aware that the priestesses were examining him nervously, whispering behind their black feather fans. Their unhappy agitation at his state of health gave him satisfaction.

Celixia took a step away from the two Huitlani priestesses. She bowed her head to Nate. “Congratulations on your victory, warrior. The match was thrilling to watch.”

“We go to see your goddess now,” the ruler said. “She’ll give me what I want today. You’ll tell her to comply.”