And it was riotous fun. Lancelot jumped high to dodge a particularly well-aimed zip of the ball, and Vera held up a ready hand to congratulate him.
He looked at her fingers and back to her face. “What’s that? What are you doing?”
“A high five,” she explained, tickled that, to the best of her knowledge, she was performing the first ever high five with the legendary Sir Lancelot. “You slap my hand with yours.” She mimed it for him, clapping her raised hands together. “It’s like a ‘Well done!’ sort of congratulations thing.”
“Oh,” he said as he gamely slapped his palm to hers. He grinned. “I like that.”
Play carried on around them, and Vera was caught with a ball to the shoulder while still laughing about rewriting the high five’s history. The players grew rather quiet in the seconds following until she threw her head back in playful frustration and climbed over the wall. That was permission enough for the fun to resume. She mercilessly rooted against Lancelot, and when he was pegged by a poor bounce off the wall, she roared with glee, and he rolled his eyes in the first sign of annoyance she’d yet seen from him. This delighted Vera even more. Her new friend evidently liked to win. But he wasn’t a poor sport and was soon cheering on the remaining players.
During the next game, with luck and a hefty amount of hiding behind larger competitors, Vera found herself one of four remaining. She vaguely noticed that the crowd grew quiet but was too focused to try to figure out why. The ball was in her area, and she kicked it as hard as she could. She’d been aiming it at one of her opponents, missed, hit the wall, and it ended up ricocheting conveniently off two remaining players, leaving only Vera and a sturdy man across the pit vying for victory.
The ball stopped near her opponent, meaning he would start the volley. His eyes darted from the ball to Vera and back to the ball before he lobbed the most pathetic kick at her. She pursed her lips as if that could contain the indignation coursing through her. Vera marched forward, picked up the ball that had stopped rolling not halfway across the pen, and went over to the man.
Murmurs rippled through the surrounding crowd, but one voice carried to Vera’s ears above the rest.
“What’s she doing?” It was familiar, and she would have turned to look, but Vera had recognized her opponent. In fact, he wasn’t a man at all … just a boy in a man’s body.
“It’s you!” she said. It was the boy she’d stopped at sword point on the road—only he’d clearly had a bath and haircut and was no longer dressed in rags. One feature from before remained: the fear on his face. If it was possible, he was more petrified now than he had been during their first encounter.
“You’re the queen! I can’t play against you, Your Majesty.” He said it so softly that Vera had to lean in close to hear him. And his eyes darted up every few seconds.
“Of course you can,” she said. If only he knew how very insignificant she was.
“Not in front of Sir Lancelot … and definitely not in front of the king.”
Vera’s neck would hurt later from how quickly she whipped around. Next to Lancelot, who leaned casually against the wall, stood Arthur. Her stomach dropped. She hadn’t caught more than a passing glimpse of him since her first night. He wasn’t dressed formally, but his hair was pulled back at his neck, and he wore a gold crown. His hand rested on the pommel of his sword as he watched. At least he was in the same vicinity as her, and Vera noticed he wasn’t scowling. She turned back to the boy, very much needing not to think about Arthur’s presence.
“He’ll kill me,” the boy went on. “Especially after what happened—after what I did,” he corrected himself, his words dripping in shame.
His eyes were pained, tortured even. She smiled sadly at him, wondering exactly how young he was. “What’s your name?”
“Walter,” he said, staring at Arthur.
Vera lowered her voice and moved closer to him. “Look at me, Walter.” She waited for him to tear his eyes from the king. “He doesn’t know about that. But if you let me win this game in the name of some misplaced chivalry, I will march right over there and rat you out.” She said all this with grave severity, but she ended it with a goading grin. “Come on, now. Show me what you’ve got.”
She pushed the ball into his hands. Vera wished she could convey to Walter that she was as nervous as him. Arthur stood precisely at the spot on the wall opposite Walter, which, of course, was the place it made most sense for Vera to stand in front of. She could feel his eyes on her back as Lancelot’s voice joined with the crowd’s cheers. “Stay in it, Guinevere!”
When Walter smacked the ball into play, Vera jumped out of the way and heard a resounding thud behind her as the ball slammed into the wall. He wasn’t holding back this time. Good. She gave a good show of it, successfully dodging a handful of strikes and even getting in a few solid whacks at the ball, but she wasn’t much of a match for Walter. Vera was off balance and distracted after catching a glimpse of Lancelot and Arthur, their heads inclined toward one another. Lancelot was talking quickly and gesturing at her as Arthur’s lips pressed flat together into an unreadable line.
Walter swiped at the ball, and amid her preoccupation with Arthur, it bounced off the wall behind Vera and nailed her forcefully, dead on in the middle of her back. She fell gracelessly forward onto hands and knees in the dirt and heard a collective gasp from the crowd as Walter launched into a stream of horrified apologies.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry!” He rushed to her side and reached out toward Vera’s shoulders, then pulled back, then reached out, apparently unsure whether he should touch her. Vera grabbed Walter’s hand to settle the matter, and he pulled her to her feet.
Her dress must have been filthy, and strands of her hair had escaped her braid’s valiant attempt to restrain them. Vera also felt the heat in her cheeks. There was no scenario in which falling in the dirt in front of strangers, let alone a real-life mythically famed king, was not humiliating. She’d forgotten they’d all keep looking at her once the game was over.
Nevertheless, Vera could sense that this moment was precarious for Walter. She beamed at him and raised his hand to signify victory. The tension in the crowd broke as the onlookers cheered and clapped with more enthusiasm than before.
“Thank you,” Vera said to Walter. “That was great fun.”
The soft-spoken boy in a man’s body blushed scarlet and bowed to Vera while backing away.
As many from the crowd clambered over the walls to join in for the next round, Vera made her retreat. The crowd had grown, no doubt, due to Vera and Arthur’s unexpected presence. Having spent her whole life being markedly, even unnaturally forgettable, the attention heaped upon Vera made regret swirl within her at having played in the first place, especially after insisting on a competitive end to it. She’d no sooner swung her feet to the other side of the wall than, everywhere she turned, she found someone vying for her attention.
“Welcome home, Your Majesty!”
“Quite a fall. Are you all right?”
“Fine game, Ma’am. Well played!”
She smiled sheepishly at the well-wishes, but there were whispers from some, too. She distinctly heard “inappropriate” and “shameful” as she made her way through the crowd. Vera felt a hand on her elbow and turned to find Lancelot with Arthur a half step behind him.
Lancelot bestowed Vera a slack-jawed chuckle. “I was not expecting that,” he said.
She chanced a glance at Arthur and was relieved that he didn’t look angry. He wasn’t smiling, though.