Page 38 of The Realm That Falls to Her

“Well done,” I say to Pyromey as she rides past, back to our starting side. She throws me a dangerous smile.

“Just you wait. A goal that early means they’ll be pissed.”

She’s right. Somehow the other side look even more ferocious than before the game started, glaring across the arena as if they’re trying to gut us with their eyes.

The horn blows, and I’m firm with Parsley this time. As the race for the ball begins, I hurry him up the east side of the rushing bodies. I might not be strong or fast enough to get to the ball first, but I can get ahead of whoever does. The ball doesn’t get stuck in the center under a pile of beasts like the last round, but instead is quickly scooped up by a player with bright yellow eyes who’s on our side. The saber-toothed fae on the opposing team charges for him on his ursinian, and I drive Parsley forward to block his attack, planning to defend my teammate. Wistal gets there first, though, an unstoppable wall of muscle as he knocks over the opponent’s ursinian, his huge bull’s horns colliding brutally with the rider’s soft flesh.

The yellow-eyed player in possession makes good progress across the circle, and I urge Parsley to chase after him, keen to stop any other potential intercepts. I’m not alone—the other players are streaming after him like a shoal of fish.

But it’s not physical attacks we should be worried about. A flash of light stops the yellow-eyed player in his tracks as he releases a bloodcurdling scream. For a moment, I don’t know what’s happened, then I see his clothes go up in a blaze of unnaturally violet flames. He drops the ball and throws himself from his steed, rolling on the ground to put the flames out. I look around for the source of the magic, but there’s just a sea of determined Unseelie faces acting as if this is entirely normal. It seems they’re quite happy putting their powers into play when things start going badly for their team.

The players rush for the dropped ball, and I start to do the same. But Jasand finds himself in front, just as the stag player comes charging in the opposite direction. Head lowered, teeth bared, its sharp-tipped antlers catch Jasand squarely in his flank, impaling him and tossing him back down onto the ground. A terrible whine of canine pain pierces the air, but the stag continues to drive its head into the wolf’s side, flicking blood in scarlet trails across the ground. The rest of the players run on, the ball their sole focus, but I figure that if we’re going to win this, we need good players like Jasand still in the action.

I give Parsley a poke with my heels, and he canters over to the stag with a growl of warning.

“Oi!” I shout, for want of something better to say. The stag lifts its head, its small, red eyes glinting at us, and Parsley lowers his head for the charge. Their two sets of antlers clash with a horrible rattle of bone on bone. I lean back, trying to keep my face far away from the sharp horns, but this pushes my legs further forward, and I get an idea. I lift my heel, holding on for dear life as Parsley and the stag, antlers locked, jerk their heads from side to side, sending their whole bodies lurching. I wait for the moment the stag twists its head to one side, exposing its angry little eye, then I bring my heel down onto it, kicking as hard as I can.

It wrenches its head back, squalling and nearly pulling Parsley over with it, but the clever ursinian manages to disentangle its antlers to avoid us getting dragged along.

I see with satisfaction that my kick was more forceful than I’d anticipated, and it’s managed to break the stag’s skin, blood now streaming down its brow, blinding one eye. As it shakes its head, trying to clear its vision, Jasand, who’s had some time to recover, struggles to his feet. His wolfish eyes blink at me in thanks before he lopes away.

The players are scattered across the circle now—the ball arcing back and forth, temporarily stymied by attempts to tackle whoever’s in possession or to intercept a throw before it lands. I look around for other ways to be useful.

Then a searing pain rips through my thigh. Parsley roars, and my world is black for a moment.

When my eyes clear, I see Climent riding past me, his ursinian’s antlers dripping with blood—my blood, I realize, head registering the throb in my thigh. I’m still in my saddle, thankfully, but realize he must’ve caught me with his ursinian on the way past. Now he’s turning his steed around, and I can see his eyes narrowed, focused intently on me. This wasn’t an accident or attempt to score points—I was nowhere near the ball. But any player on the field is fair game for attacks—and he’s making the most of it.

I swallow, the ground beneath me shaking under the thunderous footfalls of the players, and try to force my brain into action. Climent’s bear is much bigger than Parsley, and I reckon his antlers won’t be enough to protect me. I have seconds before those gouging spurs of bone are buried in my flesh once more, and all I have to defend myself is my wits and my magic.

Climent digs his heels deeper into the side of his steed, urging it to go faster. The movement is enough to draw my eyes to the glinting metal of his stirrups.

I plunge my awareness inwards, scrabbling for my power and throwing it out towards his feet. Climent’s eyes widen as the stirrups lift away from his ursinian’s flanks, pulling his heels with it. Then with grim determination, I wrench the metal in a full circle, twisting it round on itself.

Climent screams as his feet rotate, the stirrups snapping his ankles so violently I see bone exit skin. No longer being steered, his ursinian veers off course, just as another cheer of collective joy and groan of anguish spills across the arena. I turn to see that the other team has scored.

The horn blows twice, and the players begin to dismount. But when I go to do the same, I’m immediately stopped by a flare of white-hot pain. I look down to see the flesh of my thigh torn open. I’d somehow forgotten about it, but now that I notice the shiny pink mess of my mangled skin and muscle, I feel quite sick. I groan, the sound helping a little.

“Here.” Huge hands lift me from my saddle and set me gently down, and I look up at Vaccia gratefully. My heart rate—which hasn’t stopped thudding against my ribs since I entered the arena—starts to slow.

“Is that it?” I ask as the team trudges towards the edge of the circle. “Is it a draw?”

Pyromey scowls. “It’s half time,” she says, massaging a bruise on her jaw. The Unseelie who went up in flames is only now being dragged off. Even the healers can’t fix him right here. I try not to focus too much on red-raw, oozing wounds that reach right up to his neck.

“We’re going to need to do better than that if we’re going to wipe that smirk off Turis’s face,” grunts Wistal as he swaggers towards us, back on two legs again.

“Or get any one of us on the king’s council,” says Pyromey, looking meaningfully at me. “Nice trick with Climent Falconside, by the way. We could do with more of that in the next half.”

I glance over to where Climent is with the healers. He had to give in and go to them or risk permanent damage to his feet, I guess, which means he’s out of the game. Turis and the orange-haired female are with him, and they seem deep in agitated discussion. Climent looks like he could spit acid, he’s so angry.

“I’d watch your back from now on if I were you,” says Jasand, following the direction of my gaze as he gingerly limps up to us, his side bloody with his wounds from where the stag got him. “Climent is his number two. If they weren’t out to get you before, they will be now. Thanks for playing defense, by the way.” He nods to my thigh. “You can’t get that healed yet, but they will give you bandages for it.”

I feel sick again. If I thought the first half was a fight to survive, now I have the opposing team actively looking for revenge, and a gaping wound to slow me down.

“The game’s over after the second half hour, right?” I ask. Thirty whole minutes. I don’t know if I can do this.

“Unless one team scores four times in a row,” grunts Wistal. “Then it’s an automatic end to the game, no matter how the existing points stand.”

I blink, wondering why they didn’t mention this earlier. Or maybe Pyromey did on the way over to the ursinian paddock and I’d just been too distracted to absorb it. Still, it’s a ray of hope. Maybe we can end this thing fast, before Turis has a chance to take his revenge on me for Climent.

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