Protagonist Bound

by Geanna Culbertson

  Adding to my current non-existent sense of security, I noticed that a large safety net had risen from beneath the field. It was now hanging fifty feet above the arena floor with a medical-assistance tent stationed directly below it.

  Real reassuring, I thought to myself with a gulp.

  “DUCK!” I suddenly heard someone yell.

  My attention shot back up.

  A pair of black Pegasus hooves barely missed my head. A blur of onyx armor and blue helmet feathers whizzed past me without further courtesy.

  Daniel.

  Personal grudge match aside, I decided to steer Sadie high up into the sky to avoid any more hit and runs while I got the hang of this.

  After a minute or so the two of us broke past an embankment of clouds and found ourselves in a calm area surrounded by blue and bathed in the sunshine that had thus far been unable to break through. Even from up here you could hear the faint sounds of shouting, cheering, and booing from the game below. But I ignored the temptation. I needed a minute to figure this out, otherwise I’d have no shot of making it through in one piece.

  The first thing I had to master was the flying. I soon realized that the part of Sadie’s saddle between the horn and the gullet was equipped with a holster for locking the lacrosse sword into a sturdy angled position when it was not in use. So I secured the staff there for a few minutes as I mastered the basics of riding my new game partner.

  To my grateful surprise, soon enough it did begin to feel a bit like riding a regular horse. The difference I needed to adjust for, though, was consistently shifting my weight and balance to be in sync with Sadie’s wing movements.

  Having accounted for that, it wasn’t long before I had the flying aspect down. Once I did, I drew the lacrosse sword from its sturdy resting place and began messing around with it in one hand while I gripped Sadie’s reins with the other.

  After several minutes of practice I learned that the keys to handling the weapon were mastering fast wrist movements to rotate the staff from basket to blade and (extra elongating function aside) being adept at my own quick extensions for effectively using either end. Having discovered these two basic mechanics, I was stunned at the swiftness with which I began to develop a rhythm for the staff.

  Honestly, considering how flustered I’d been just minutes before, I was amazed at how fast I found myself getting good at this. The staff of the lacrosse sword just felt right in my hand. The weight, the grip, the extension that was so much more versatile then a normal sword—I loved it. And more importantly, unlike most things I’d ever tried, it actually seemed to come naturally.

  “Hee-yah!” I shouted as I gave Sadie another kick of my heel.

  I was ready to return to the match. She clearly felt the same way because she plunged back through the clouds with way more speed and excitement than I’d expected. The two of us dove into the middle of the arena and I saw that the score was already 12 to 11—odd team ahead.

  All right, time to get in this game.

  I surveyed the arena’s airspace. Dozens of Pegasi were darting across the skies. The players were either charging one another or charging after the ball, which I finally spotted flying through the air off to my left.

  That’s also when I saw Blue. She zipped right in front of a knight in golden armor and caught the glowing, green ball in her lacrosse sword’s basket. Immediately four opposing players flew after her in ready pursuit.

  I kicked Sadie into high gear.

  Blue was circling far below—unable to get any closer to the goal because players from the odd team were coming at her from all angles.

  I had an idea.

  While the other players on my team were occupied trying to defend Blue, Sadie and I flew up again. We shot straight above the fighting mass and over my friend, Sadie’s white coat camouflaging into the clouds around her.

  “Up high!” I called down to Blue.

  My friend was startled at first, but soon recognized my manly voice. And when she saw me she did what her opponents were least expecting—she spun her lacrosse sword and lobbed the ball forty feet back, high into the sky.

  I zoomed in without interference and caught the ball. Members of the opposing team began desperately chasing after me, but I was far enough away that none of them posed imminent threats. I was already on my descending dive toward the goal.

  There were only two odd-numbered players directly in my flight path waiting on defense. One went high and one went low. The low opponent was aiming to plunge underneath Sadie, while the high opponent was rotating his lacrosse sword with the weapon side pointed at me as he charged.

  Their play was obvious. High guy was going to attack so that I would be forced to rotate my staff to its weapon side to defend myself. And, as a consequence for the rotation, the ball would fall out of my net basket and the player below me would be in the perfect position to swoop in and catch it.

  Come on, guys. Not very creative.

  High guy was closing in. However, instead of rotating my staff downwards like he expected, I waited. Then, precisely when he was within range, I released the reins and used both hands to powerfully swing my staff while pressing the extender function on its grip.

  The cross-handed haymaker smacked my opponent’s staff right out of his hand and sent him veering out of control. As a result, the lower opponent was left confused, empty handed, and, most importantly, in my dust as Sadie and I shot toward our destination.

  I shrunk the staff back to five feet and with another fierce swing I heaved the ball through the goal post—evening the score 12–12. The arena filled with cheers and I grinned beneath my helmet.

  Game on, boys. Game on.

  The competition continued fervently from there without break or lull. If one team had the upper hand at any point, it wasn’t for long.

  With every passing second I became increasingly enthralled by the heated, relentless nature of the sport. But, more than that, as the tournament went on, there was another aspect of the game that I found to be even more powerful than the intensity of the match itself—the realization that I was actually really good at it.

  Oh, let’s be real. I was fantastic!

  I genuinely couldn’t believe it. My whole life I’d felt deficient at everything I’d ever tried—from curtseying to woodcarving. But this . . . this I connected with. The lacrosse sword worked for me. And the feelings of success and ease that came with that skill were unlike anything I’d ever experienced.

  In short, it was phenomenal. I was having so much fun that I didn’t even get annoyed when Chance Darling took off his shirt after scoring a goal and the dramatic display got more applause from the girls in the arena than the actual point had.

  Nearly an hour into the match I’d scored five goals, Blue had scored two, and time was almost up with the game tied at 22–22.

  The closeness of the match did not concern me though. For arguably the first time in my life I felt unstoppable. I had the ball in my possession and Sadie and I were plunging through the sky on our way to seal the even team’s triumph.

  What were the only obstacles keeping us from doing so? Merely two players in charcoal-colored armor (17 and 19) coming into my line of sight with another high and low attack.

  Oh, please, I thought to myself as I readied to swing at the high player like I’d done before.

  Unfortunately, I never got the chance. This defensive play turned out to be nothing like before. Without warning the low player suddenly dive-bombed beneath me in an arc. He swung the basket side of his lacrosse sword upwards, pressed the extender function on his grip, and caught Sadie’s right front hoof within its trap. The force of the move was so strong and tragically accurate it caused Sadie to flip over—tossing me off her in the process.

  No! No! No!

  I tumbled through the clouds with one hand clutching the staff of my lacrosse sword and the other hand flailing. I thought I was totally done for until by some miracle I saw Sadie swooping around far below. She was coming back for m
e.

  I adjusted my body to fall at a slant—my trajectory curving as I got closer to her. Amazingly enough, it worked. In fact, it worked perfectly! When I was about a hundred feet from the net that draped across the stadium’s floor, Sadie was flying right below me. A few moments later when she was within reach, I grabbed her mane with my free hand and pulled myself onto her back.

  Grasping the reins tightly once more, I leveled Sadie off just in time and the two of us zoomed back into the sky to the sound of roaring applause.

  The fool that had knocked me off Sadie (17) now had the ball and I was eager to chase after him. It seemed Blue was too because seconds later she pulled up alongside me and joined in the pursuit.

  As we followed him, we watched in disgust as he executed one dirty move after another on his way to our goal. He and his cohort (19) knocked so many opposing players off their steeds that it looked like the sky was raining with our fallen teammates. One by one they dropped to the arena’s safety net and were taken out of the game.

  “I’ll ram him on the left!” Blue yelled. “When I knock the staff out of his hand, you catch the ball!”

  I nodded and she sped up to fly ahead.

  Blue circled down below before brusquely charging back up to cut off 17 from the front. He tried to evade her, but she was right in his flight path and he had no time to move out of the way. Her Pegasus’ body-slammed into his, causing both him and his staff to fall.

  While he seizured like a maniac on his way down to the net like he so rightly deserved, I set my sights on the ball that had been knocked loose from his lacrosse sword. It was free-falling up ahead and it was totally mine. Or so I thought.

  Just then I heard a very distinctive yell coming from behind me. It was Blue. Even masked in manly essence I could recognize my friend’s voice, and recognize that she was in trouble.

  I glanced over my shoulder as Sadie sped forward and saw that 19 had gone after Blue in revenge for taking out his buddy. The rider had rammed Blue from behind with his lacrosse sword, knocking her off her own Pegasus as recompense.

  Her armor glinted through the clouds as she toppled downwards—her steed nowhere to be seen.

  I took another quick look at the increasingly close ball. It illuminated temptingly against the sky as it fell—the goal right behind it with no opponents to stop me from winning the match and sealing my glorious victory . . .

  Without hesitation I yanked at Sadie’s reins, swerved her in an immediate U-turn, and we nose-dived after Blue instead.

  Placing the lacrosse sword in its holster would have gotten in my way at that point so—unstable as it felt—I passed it and the reins into one hand while I extended the other. “Blue!” I yelled as Sadie and I got closer. “Take my hand!”

  Even with her face hidden behind that helmet I could tell she was surprised to see me. Nevertheless, she steadied her drop as much as possible and reached forward with her free hand as I approached.

  When Sadie and I were parallel with Blue, I grabbed her hand and pulled her in with a strong jerk. She settled behind me on the saddle and the three of us changed direction back toward the action.

  Blue lifted her visor. “Why did you come back for me?!” she shouted as we maneuvered across the clouds. “You could have gotten the ball and scored the winning goal! Do you know what that would have done for your reputation? You could’ve taken off your helmet and finally gotten people to take you seriously as a hero like you’ve always wanted!”

  Sadie swerved to avoid running into a disoriented Pegasus that had lost its rider.

  “Blue!” I called back as I searched the sky for the missing ball. “You’re more important to me than my reputation. If I let you fall, you’d get examined by the nurse on the field like all the other guys who go down. You do that, and everyone will see who you are. So yeah, maybe my reputation improves. But none of the guys—let alone any of the girls—will ever let you forget that you of all people couldn’t hack it up here with the heroes. There’s no way I’m letting that happen!”

  Blue didn’t say anything. Not that there was time for more conversation. I’d finally spotted the object I’d been after. Two riders who’d been fighting over possession of the ball had let it slip through their grasps and now it was dropping through the air straight ahead of us.

  “Get ready!” I ordered.

  Blue reached out her right arm, extending her lacrosse sword as far as she could. She was just about to catch our prize when a pair of familiar black hooves sailed over my head. Someone else swung down his own lacrosse sword and snatched the ball before we had the chance.

  Daniel had it now. And he took off toward our team’s goal with haste—paying no mind to Blue, Sadie, and me as we pursued him. Our other team members attempted to slow his pace, but barely broke his stride. They did, however, give us a chance to catch up to him, and that was something I could work with.

  As the distance between us closed, the cogs in my brain began to churn out another one of my classic, unorthodox, and debatably stupid ideas.

  There was no way we could flat-out challenge Daniel with two riders on one Pegasus. It was allowed and everything. Frankly, pretty much anything was up here. (Why do you think we’re wearing such sturdy armor?)

  But having more than one person on a Pegasus threw off speed, balance, and the effectiveness of any offensive attack. In other words, there was basically zero possibility we could take the ball from Daniel so long as Sadie was supporting two riders.

  Ergo, one of us had to go.

  “Fly below Daniel and catch the ball when it drops!” I instructed Blue as I twisted the reins around the saddle’s horn to hold them in position.

  “Wait! What are you gonna do?”

  I kicked Sadie to go faster. “Shake things up!”

  I gripped onto Blue’s arm for support then carefully crescent-kicked my left leg over Sadie’s head so that I was riding sidesaddle. Clutching her mane while still holding my lacrosse sword, I egged her on despite the fact that I was barely able to keep myself steady.

  “I’ll come back around and scoop you up like you did me,” Blue said as we narrowed in on Daniel.

  “No, don’t,” I responded. “Take the shot. It’s your best chance. Once you clear the goal and win the game all the riders will descend to the field and won’t have to report to the med tent like the fallen do. So all I have to do is hang on until then and I’ll be fine.”

  “He’s going to fight you. You could fall like I did.”

  “I won’t,” I answered without a hint of doubt in my voice or my head.

  I am not a damsel in distress. I can be a good hero and I’m going to prove it to everyone right here and right now.

  Sadie charged behind Daniel—wings flapping at maximum power. Our ambitious team got closer and closer until we were flying about eight feet above him on his left side. He glanced at us and pressed the extender function on his staff ’s grip preemptively, but kept going strong—confident he would be able to counter any strike I threw at him in this unbalanced state.

  Still, I could tell he was keeping an eye on my lacrosse sword just in case I decided to try something. My lacrosse sword and not actually me, mind you. So, although he was startled, he was able to respond in time when I hurtled the weapon at his head a second later.

  Just as I’d expected, Daniel ducked to avoid the blow. Right when he did so, I released Sadie’s mane and jumped—my eyes focused solely on Daniel’s staff.

  He turned his head just in time to see me coming and reacted as I’d predicted by shoving his weapon firmly into its saddle holster. But, that was all he’d had time for. The moments he’d wasted ducking my throw kept him from flying away, which kept him from keeping me from grabbing hold of his staff.

  I clung from it now—dangling in the air momentarily before my left foot found its way into his saddle’s toehold and gave me the boost I needed to support my body weight.

  I looked over my shoulder and saw that Blue had driven Sadie downwar
ds and was flying steadily about thirty feet below—waiting for me to make my move. Of course, that task was easier said than done. Daniel was still headed toward our goal post at full speed and, while I may have been holding on to his lacrosse sword, the basket end clutching the ball was out of my reach. Add to that, Daniel was intensively maneuvering his Pegasus left and right in an attempt to toss me off.

  Try as he might though, I held on tightly and refused to loosen my grip or my resolve. Instead, keeping my left foot in the toehold, I leaned out and shimmied my right hand up as far as it would go on the staff. And then, shifting my weight, I began to forcibly shake it.

  “Are you crazy?!” I heard Daniel shout. “Let it go!”

  “Not a chance!” I yelled back as I kept swinging my weight back and forth, lurching the lacrosse sword as hard as I could.

  After a few seconds my mad method triumphed. I was able to knock the ball loose from the staff ’s basket, causing it to fall. Below, Blue swiftly caught it and took off in the opposite direction toward the other team’s goal.

  Whoot! Whoot! Go get ’em, Blue!

  We’d done it. We were gonna win. More importantly, Blue and I had proven we could totally hold our own amongst the heroes. I was thrilled; on top of the world (or at least pretty close to it at this altitude).

  Unfortunately, this euphoria didn’t last. An instant later it was unexpectedly replaced with quite possibly the most awful feeling I would ever know.

  It felt like someone had simultaneously slammed me on both sides with a pair of really robust, invisible Pegas, but worse. Worse because the pains kept coming like one strike after another with no apparent way of stopping their agony as I didn’t even know what was causing them.

  My body convulsed so hard that I lost my grip on Daniel’s staff. My foot, however, was twisted within the toehold of his saddle. So, rather than falling off the Pegasus altogether, I was now dangling from it upside down.

  The position made the helmet fall from my head, which allowed my hair to spill out. It blew around my face erratically as I was dragged through the clouds like a flying rag doll.