Melchior Joust

And just as the trumpet sounded, a thought came to him. He did not have time to analyze it. Only for one blinding moment did the idea flash into his head. But in that instant he knew exactly what he could do—and he realized that the thought had come from Goel!

At the trumpet blast Thunder lunged forward. Down the field Sir Melchior leaned over his saddle, making himself a smaller target, his lance leveled.

It was for that brief time as though everything else had faded away. Reb could not hear the cheering crowd or the crying trumpets as he raced toward his opponent. All he heard was the sound of Thunder's hooves and the creaking of his armor, and all he saw was Sir Melchior. It was as if he were looking through a tunnel, and there, facing him, eyes blazing through his visor, Melchior seemed to be laughing at him.

Reb suddenly felt that the whole world had stopped and that he and Melchior alone were moving, and slowly at that. The horses were galloping, galloping, closing the distance, but all seemed to be happening very, very slowly. He was now close enough to see the fine scrollwork on Melchior's armor. He saw also the tip of the lance that was aimed directly at him.

“No time.” he gasped. “This will have to work!” Shutting out all thoughts of failure, he got ready to perform a movement that he never would have dreamed of and that no one in the arena had ever seen.

The point of jousting, he knew, was to put the tip of your lance into the shield of your opponent—before he put the tip of his lance into yours. Theoretically, if one man had a ten-foot lance and one man had a twelve-foot lance, the man with the longer lance would win the joust because his lance would arrive a split second sooner. However, the art of jousting had evolved to such an extent that all lances were practically the same length.

Reb had already decided that he would have no chance whatsoever in a head-on crash, even if his lance reached the shield of Sir Melchior at the same instant that Sir Melchior's touched him. He knew that the heavier weight and skill of the older man would topple him. So he did what had come to him in his brief, flashing thought.

A split second before Sir Melchior threw himself forward—a shout in his throat and victory in his eye, with his lance piercing the air, headed straight for Reb's shield—Reb touched Thunder with his left knee.

Now jousting horses knew to keep straight on the track, but at Reb's touch the fiery stallion abruptly swerved to the right.

Melchior was not prepared for that—nor was he prepared for what Reb did next. At the same instant Thunder veered right, Reb moved his lance across his body—pointing directly to the left. The point was not aimed at Sir Melchior's shield or head at all.

What happened then was almost inevitable. Reb felt Melchior's lance graze his arm. Six inches farther and he would have been knocked off the horse. A split second later, as Reb braced himself, Sir Melchior ran into the lance Reb held in his path. It caught him right under the chin, and the force of his horse and the force of the blow worked together. Sir Melchior pitched backward and hit the ground with a clanging clash. His horse ran wildly on.

Thunder did the same.

As soon as Reb could get control of his horse, he whirled around. And now heard the screaming crowd.