The sergeant snorted. I’d pointed out the importance of testing the winning team, whichever that happened to be, against a wide range of opponents, but the sergeant had been unimpressed. He’d countered by pointing out that my team was just too inexperienced to make a proper challenge. Six of us had been on the field before, true, but not as a united team. Mildred, of course, had never been on the field at all.
“Then go to your base,” Wills ordered. “May the best team win.”
I nodded, trying to hide my jangled nerves as we made our way out of the bunker and into the arena. The rest of the teams jogged past – they looked to have practiced jogging in formation – and vanished into the foliage. I heard a gulp behind me – I didn’t look round to see who’d made the noise – as I led the team onwards. The trees closed in around us, faint flickers of magic darting through the air. It was easy to believe we were all alone in the middle of a vast forest. It was very close to true.
“The base isn’t very well defended,” Mildred said, as the small fort came into view. It looked like a child’s wooden treehouse, a tiny replica of the forts along national borders. I half expected to see a bunch of younger children scrambling in and out of the arrow slits. “Shouldn’t we do something about it?”
I shook my head. “No point,” I said. “We don’t want to stay in the fort.”
“We could,” Jerry pointed out. “They’d have to come to us.”
“We might lose by default,” I said. “We have to take the offensive as quickly as possible.”
I stepped into the fort, checked the wards to be sure we really
Mildred looked pale. “How much longer?”
“Not long,” I said. In truth, I had no idea. Each passing second felt like an hour. “The moment the whistle blows, the game will be on.”
I did my best to give her a reassuring look. It was hard to keep from thinking she looked like a walking joke in her shirt and tunic, her hair tied back in a ponytail that was already threatening to come loose and get in her eyes. She was surprisingly plump, for a magician; a clear sign, for those who knew how it worked, she wasn’t particularly interested in practical spellcasting. I hoped that wasn’t going to bite us too. We’d have to run if we ran into something we couldn’t handle.
“We can do this,” Mark said. “We can!”
I nodded, allowing my eyes to drift from player to player. Mark and James looked professional. Bill and Karen looked a little more nervous … I tried not to notice how well Karen filled out her tunic. Jerry … seemed completely calm and composed. I hoped that was a good sign and not proof he’d already given up, deciding to accept whatever happened rather than struggling to the last. I hoped … I shook my head. We’d trained hard in the last two weeks, making mistakes during training we hopefully wouldn’t make on the tournament ground. We’d done everything we could …
The whistle blew. It was on.
“Go, as planned,” I ordered. “And keep your heads down.”
BattleBorne rules are relatively simple. There are four teams within the arena, a patch of fenced and warded wilderness on the far side of Blackhall. Each team has the same objective: hunt down and take out – immobilise – the other teams, with the goal of being the last team still on the field. Basically jousting, but with magic. If you get taken out – frozen, turned into something, put in a trance – you’re not allowed to free yourself, but your teammates can free you. (It’s considered bad form to free members of another team, although it has been known to happen.) Simple rules, allowing for a considerable degree of cunning, treachery and brute force. I’d witnessed games where one player was put in a trance and ordered to take out their own teammates. Perfectly legal, if it worked.