Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen

(Three Weeks Later)

The spring-like wind trailed its crisp fingers through Justin's fur as he blasted through the air.

“There!” Lena shouted, thrusting her arm between his antlers.

Justin veered almost straight upwards, zipping between branches, and snatched the shining golden bell that had been hovering just above the treetops with both hands. It was round, about the size of a basketball, and when Justin grabbed it, it jingled with the clearest, most perfectly musical note he had ever heard.

Justin was in his two-legged form twenty feet above the forest floor, with Lena on his back. What he had originally taken for a backrest on his saddle had turned out to actually be an extension to the seat itself. They were designed so that a reindeer could be ridden no matter if they were in two- or four-legged form. Right now, even though Justin was essentially standing upright, Lena was perched on his back and gripping his antlers almost like he was giving her a piggyback ride.

“Good job!” Lena encouraged him, easing him into a gentle descent back to the forest floor. “Now let’s get it to the score zone!”

Justin had noticed a remarkable improvement in his fear of heights over the past three weeks. He no longer became paralyzed at the mere thought of being more than ten feet off the ground, and he had even flown more than a hundred feet in the air yesterday without having a panic attack. Of course, that was only because he’d had Lena on his back, guiding him the whole time. And even she couldn't cure him of his phobia entirely. As impressed as she'd admitted to being with his progress, she had learned quickly that she still had to take their descents slowly or else risk him freezing up with fear.

Even so, Justin had never in his life imagined that flying could feel so freeing. Ironic, since being able to fly was pretty much how everyone else defined freedom, but after spending so much of his life puking any time he was up higher than he could physically jump, it really did feel like a revelation to him.

When they were only twenty feet above the ground, Lena pulled him out of his descent and then thrust his antlers forward, telling him to pick up speed. Within seconds, Justin was rocketing between the trees again, the world around him a hypnotizing collage of greens and browns. He kept the bell tucked under his arm, teeth clenched as he concentrated. Even with Lena guiding him, it took every ounce of focus he could muster to weave between the trees at this speed.

Every reindeer had their own preferred flight stance. Most would stretch their bodies out parallel to the ground, trying to make themselves as aerodynamic as possible. Some would point their hands out in front of them like superheroes, others would hold their arms out to the sides like wings, using them to “scoop” the air around them.

Justin had quickly discovered that he favored an upright stance while flying, almost as if he were skating on thin air. He was slower than he would have been in arrow-stance, as Vixen called it, but it did allow him a greater degree of control. His arms and legs still had their full range of movement in this position, and it never failed to amaze him how raising or lowering them even an inch could mean the difference between flying straight and true, and going into an uncontrollable death spiral.

And, he had been shocked to find out, even with his preferred stance slowing him down, he was still faster than anybody else in his class. Lena had said she’d never seen anyone with his natural gift for speed. Of course, speed meant nothing without skill. If he didn’t know where he was flying, the only thing he would accomplish by going faster was ramming face first into a tree sooner rather than later. That, more than any other reason, was what made Lena such an indispensable asset.

“There it is!” Lena shouted in excitement, pointing at a bright silver ring that was floating between the trees. It slowly flipped and spun, flashing rays of sunlight into Justin’s eyes with its mirror-like surface. She thrust forward on his antlers again, and Justin put on an extra burst of speed. Every drop of blood in his veins was on fire as he—

A red and brown blur crashed into him from the right, and Justin went cartwheeling through the air. Somehow, Lena managed to stay in her saddle through the whole thing, but the bell slipped from his fingers.

“No!” he and Lena yelled in unison as they watched it plummet toward the forest floor, merrily jingling all the way. It was enchanted so that it would vanish if it touched the ground, forcing them to fly all the way back to where they'd found it.

“Go!” Lena commanded him, but this time Justin froze. He had inadvertently gone higher up while trying to regain control, an instinctive move to keep from crashing into the ground, but one that left him a good fifty or sixty feet up in the air. To catch the bell before it landed, he would have to go into a nosedive, flying straight toward the ground faster than he had ever flown before, and…

“I- I can't,” he gasped. “I'm sorry.”

Luckily for them both, the blur that had knocked Justin off course chose that moment to make another appearance, streaking out from between the trees just in time to grab the bell before it hit the ground.

“Ohhh, I'm sorry!” Lucas laughed, floating past them with a gloating smile on his face and a dark haired elf on his back. “Was this yours?”

He took off again before Justin could respond, making a beeline for the silver ring.

“You're faster than he is,” Lena exclaimed, thrusting his antlers forward. “We can still catch him!”

The embarrassment of losing the bell, as well as his inability to get it back, burned Justin from the inside out. He needed to redeem himself. He surged forward, quickly picking up speed until the forest was whizzing by in a blur again. The spinning silver ring gleamed in the midday sunlight, almost making it painful to look at, but Justin could still make out Lucas ahead of them. Lucas was flying in arrow-stance, his arms pinned as closely to his sides as he could get them with the bell tucked under one of them. It was a risky technique. His sleek form let him rip through the air like a torpedo, but if he ever needed to make an emergency adjustment, the split second it would take to move his arms could end in disaster.

Lucas' elf glanced backwards, then said something to him. Lucas responded by veering to the left, into a thick copse of trees in an effort to lose his pursuers. Lucas had told Justin that he’d been on Santa’s flying team for the past three years, but he was still required to retake his flying lessons before Christmas to make sure his skills were still sharp. That meant that Lucas had experience that Justin lacked, and was able to zip between the trees without touching a single one of them or even slowing down.

“Go in low!” Lena commanded, and Justin obeyed, swooping down until he was only a few feet above the ground. Then she jerked his antlers to the left, and Justin banked sharply in that direction. He didn’t know what Lena was planning, but that was fine. He trusted her.

Sure enough, her skill revealed itself when Justin skirted the edge of the thicket without Lucas gaining any distance on them. She thrust forward again, and Justin sped up even faster. Within seconds, he was flying directly below Lucas. Lena pulled back, and Justin veered upwards.

“Look ou—” Lucas’ elf tried to warn him, but it was too late. Ducking his head so he didn’t accidentally gore Lucas with his antlers, Justin slammed into the other reindeer from below. Lucas was flipped over onto his back, though he stayed up in the air, and the sudden disorientation sent him crashing straight into a tree.

“The bell!” Lena yelled, pointing as it went flying off by itself.

“But what about—”

“If he’s hurt, Vixen will send him to the infirmary! Now get that bell!”

She thrust forward, and Justin went speeding after it. He still spared a glance behind him, though, and was relieved to see his friend frantically disentangling himself from the big pine tree’s branches.

“Eyes forward, you stupid moose!”

“Call me a moose again, bad I'll buck you off, dwarf!”

“Call me a dwarf again, and I'll start wearing spurs!” Lena dug her heel into his side for emphasis.

Lucas’ momentum had allowed the bell to keep flying on its own for a good distance, but now gravity was starting to reclaim its hold. Justin fixed his eyes on the scarlet orb and, for the first time that day, leveled his body out in arrow-stance to get an extra burst of speed. He held out his hands—

And yet another reindeer shot up from beneath him to steal it away.

“Hey!” Justin yelled in surprise.

Lena expertly guided him into a u-turn, and then he shot upwards after the third deer. This one was a doe, he quickly realized by the length of her hair and her more feminine figure. At first it had bothered him how he could look at something that clearly wasn't human and still be able to call it feminine, but the fact that he wasn't human either had eventually won out. Not that it mattered right now. There was no gender discrimination up in the sky. Justin quickly caught up to her and threw his shoulder into her back. She grunted in pain, flipping upside down, and the bell jangled as it dropped from her fingers.

“We can catch it this time!” Lena exclaimed, immediately guiding him into a roundabout descent that wouldn’t trigger his phobia. Justin kept his eye on the falling bell as he spiraled downwards. It wasn’t the ideal move by any means, but the other reindeer were far enough away by now that he should still have been able to reach it first.

Again, he drew closer to it, arms outstretched—and he laughed out loud when he snatched it out of midair.

“Incoming,” Lena warned him. “Left and right!”

She guided him into a dive, just a quick one that she knew wouldn't scare him, and a split second later Lucas went rocketing straight over his head. A split second after that came the doe from earlier. Both of them missed, but while the doe wheeled around to come at him again, Lucas performed a flip that—even with his recent improvements—made Justin's palms sweat, and the two reindeer found themselves facing off against each other.

“Let's make this easy on both of us,” Lucas called with a smirk. “How about you just give me the bell?”

Justin grinned back. “How about you come and take it?”

“Friends don't take things from each other, ” Lucas pointed behind Justin. “So I'm going to let her take it from you, and then I'm going to take it from her!”

“Behind us!” yelled Lena, but Justin was already shooting upwards. He wasn't quite fast enough, though, and the doe's head slammed into his hooves, sending Justin somersaulting away from the ring yet again. But this time, before he could regain his balance, Lucas had pounced on him!

“Just keep your hands on the bell!” Lena yelled as he grappled with his friend. “I'll handle this.”

Before he could ask what she meant, she had leaped from his saddle and, with more dexterity than he knew she was capable of, began to run across their backs as he and Lucas tumbled through the air. It reminded Justin of those log rolling contests they’d had back in the human world, except they were nearly forty feet in the air and no log on earth could roll as unpredictably as a pair of fighting reindeer.

Lena reached behind her, grabbing the short, white stick strapped to her back. She hadn’t worn that before today, and when Justin had asked about it all she’d said was that she hoped he would give her the chance to use it. Now she drew it, and in an instant it had more than doubled in length. Giving the bowstaff a spin, she raised it over her head and then swung it downwards. It whistled as it cut through the air toward Lucas’ skull—but at the last second, Lucas’ elf thrust his shield forward, deflecting the attack with a loud CRACK.

“I see absolutely no way this can end badly,” Lucas grunted, furiously trying to yank the bell out of Justin's hands.

His elf wielded a small wooden shield in one hand, and a club in the other. They, plus Lena's staff, were weapons designed to be effective but not lethal. The dark haired elf seemed much less sure of himself on the uneven, constantly shifting, footing, but he still managed to stay upright and swing a counterattack at Lena.

“This is going too far, Lucas!” Justin said as they crashed into a tree, bouncing off the thick trunk like a pair of antlered pinballs. “Someone's going to get hurt! Let go!”

“If you're so worried, then you let go!” Lucas shot back.

“Don't you dare!” Lena yelled down at him.

Justin could feel their little feet dancing back and forth across his body as they fought, filling the air with the sound of wood striking wood. Lucas' elf took a swing at Lena's head, but she ducked beneath it and came back up aiming a savage blow to his chest. Her staff thudded against his shield, but before he could retaliate, Lena spun in the other direction and cracked the end of her staff against his shin.

The dark haired elf yelped in pain, teetering as his leg went numb. Showing no mercy, Lena spun again, her staff whizzing through the air. The elf managed to raise his shield in time, but it didn't matter. With only one leg supporting him, he couldn't maintain his balance, and with a scream he fell off the wrestling reindeer's backs.

“Lucas, help!” he yelled.

Lucas sighed. “Be right back.”

With that, he let go of the bell, put his hooves on Justin's chest, and kicked off. He immediately went into a nosedive that made Justin dizzy just watching him, hand outstretched to catch his falling Rider.

“Let's go,” Lena said, swinging back into the saddle. “Hurry, before they come back!”

Justin spun until the silver ring came back into view, and launched himself toward it yet again. The doe was still there waiting for him, hoping that she would only have to deal with whoever won the scuffle between him and Lucas. Tucking the bell beneath one arm, Justin darted to the right, and when the doe moved to intercept him he swerved sharply to the left instead. He raised his arm to throw the bell into the ring, but…

“No, not yet!” Lena warned him.

Before he could ask why, the doe came speeding around the other side of the ring. She had committed to her course rather than try to double back, and if Justin had thrown the bell it would have flown straight into her hands.

Justin let himself fall a few feet, his stomach shooting up into his throat, hoping the doe would fly straight over him and have to make another lap around the ring. She thought faster than that this time, though, and extended a hand to catch him by the antler as she streaked overhead. Justin cried out as pain flashed through his skull, and suddenly he found himself being dragged behind the doe as she flew away from the ring at a breakneck pace.

“Hey, those are mine!” Lena shouted, whipping out her staff again. “Hands off!”

She gave the doe's hand a sharp whack, and suddenly Justin was free. Justin surged forward, canceling out his backwards momentum, and moments later he was cutting through the woods back in the direction of the ring again.

The doe wasn't going to let him get away that easily, though. She reappeared on his left, hair whipping chaotically behind her in the wind, and slammed into his side. Justin rolled with the impact, narrowly avoiding plowing face first into a tree. Not giving him time to recover, the doe came at him again, spinning around so that she was flying backwards, and darted in front of him to snatch the bell away.

Justin could see the ring in the distance. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to bring the bell straight to it, only for the doe to steal it and score instead of him!

He yanked the bell away from her, then gasped, his eyes widening. The doe spun around, obviously thinking she was about to fly backwards into a tree, and Justin took the opportunity to skirt around her and blast toward the ring like a rocket. Cursing, the doe chased after him—and then she shifted.

Half a second later, Justin felt her skull slam into him from behind. She had avoided using her antlers against him, but the impact was still enough to knock the breath out of Justin’s lungs. He was sent spinning around and around again, and while he desperately tried to get his bearings—

“No!” he shouted when the bell was plucked right out of his hands.

The doe was already halfway to the ring, the bell clutched tightly by her Rider. In her full reindeer form, she was even faster than Justin. Lucas had explained that was why Santa gave them the ability to switch between the two forms at will. Their two-legged form gave them greater dexterity, and the chance to live a more fulfilling life than a mere animal. Their four-legged form, however, took their physical abilities and increased them tenfold. Justin may have been the fastest reindeer in his flight class, but even the slowest full-deer was faster than him in his two-legged form.

“You know what you have to do,” Lena said, and he nodded.

Taking hold of the magic that he still didn’t fully understand, Justin let it spread throughout his entire body. His clothes vanished, baring his fur to the crisp air. His hands hardened into hooves. Energy flared to life inside of him, and his eyes zeroed in on his target.

He launched himself after the doe.

In an instant, Justin had already accelerated to a speed far beyond what his two-legged form was capable of, and he wasn’t even pushing himself yet. Luckily, his new form altered the way his brain worked as well, letting him react to things much faster than he would have been able to otherwise. He swept in between the trees so fast that showers of pine needles were left in his wake. They were nearing the ring. He had seconds to make his move!

At Lena’s urging, Justin went down low again. Like a shark planning an ambush on an unsuspecting swimmer, he caught up with the doe from down below. She reared back in midair, and her elf raised the bell above his head, throwing it as hard as he could toward the ring.

Now!

Justin rocketed straight upwards, shifting back into two-legged form in the process. He shot right in front of the doe and her elf in the blink of an eye, snatching the bell from midair with a triumphant jingle. The doe bellowed in outrage, but Justin ignored her. Coasting on what was left of his momentum, he arced gracefully above her, raised his hand to throw the bell, and—

A thick arm reached out from behind him and wrapped itself around his neck. Justin let out a very un-deerlike squawk, fighting to pry the arm loose, but it was like he’d been caught by a beam of solid steel.

“You don’t seem to know how this story ends,” a familiar, and very unwelcome, voice muttered into his ear.

“Tornado!” Lena shrieked. “You know it’s against the rules to grab the other players by the—”

“The good guys always win,” Tornado said, pulling the bell out of Justin’s hand. “And the bad guys…”

Suddenly, he let go—and then his fist connected with Justin’s spine like a cannonball. Justin was sent flying, pain lancing up and down his entire body. Pine trees seemed to explode as he smashed through them, raining splinters and pine needles down on him. And when he crashed into the ground, he bounced, then slid across the forest floor until he struck a boulder fifty feet away from where he’d landed.

A sharp pain erupted in his skull, and he reached up to find that the tip of one of his antlers had broken free.

“Justin!” Lena yelled, running around to face him. She had a couple of bruises, but otherwise seemed unharmed. “Are you okay? Can you stand?”

With his head buzzing, Justin looked up to see Tornado still hovering near the score ring, the bell looking almost comically small in his hand. He disinterestedly tossed it over his shoulder, and then took off at a speed that rivaled Justin’s. The doe caught the bell and just held it for a few seconds, the shock on her face evident even from so far away. Then, clearly not knowing what else to do, she tossed it into the ring.

The sound of trumpets blasted a joyful tune through the forest as Lena helped Justin to his hooves. He sighed, hanging his head.

Apparently after Justin’s failure on the obstacle course his first day, Tornado had declared that the lightless one had been defeated and wouldn’t dare show his face around their training grounds ever again. When Justin showed up the next day to do exactly that, Vixen’s grandson had taken it as a personal insult, and had spent the next twenty one days tormenting him every chance he got. At first it had just been insults and the occasional punch when Vixen wasn’t looking, but when Justin hadn’t shown any signs of giving up, things had escalated quickly. Now it was at the point where Justin wondered if the moose-shaped deer was actually trying to kill him—and if not, how long would it be until he was?

His only consolation was that his classmates all seemed to find Tornado’s brutality almost as disturbing as he did.

A minute later, the entire flight class had gathered around the ring, with Vixen and the doe in the center of the group.

“The skill with which you flew and the determination with which you fought were commendable, Willow,” Vixen said, putting a congratulatory hand on her shoulder. “You have earned your victory here today.”

“She shouldn’t have won!” Lena yelled. “Tornado broke the—”

“I am also pleased to announce,” Vixen spoke over her, “that in order to help you all further sharpen your skills as fliers, Santa gas declared that the Reindeer Games shall commence tomorrow morning!”

In an instant, the entire crowd of students had gone into a frenzy, cheering and hollering so loud that it made Justin’s ears ring.

“Hey, you all right?” Lucas asked, coming to join them. “I heard that Tornado…” He made a face when he saw the missing chunk of Justin’s antler. “Ooh, yeah, he did a number on you.”

“And where were you?” Lena demanded. “I thought you said you weren’t going to let this happen again!”

“It’s not my fault, okay?” Lucas shot back. “I couldn’t catch Tanraak in time, so I had to take him to the infirmary. Remind me who it was that threw him off my back, again.”

Lena blinked, then looked away. “Sorry.”

“What are the Reindeer Games?” Justin asked.

“It’s the biggest event here in Val Luminara,” Lucas explained excitedly.

“Second biggest,” Lena interrupted. “Christmas is and always will be—”

Lucas talked over her, “It’s like the Superbowl and the NBA Finals combined, only about a thousand times better!”

“And,” Justin said tentatively, “everyone gets to play?”

“All of the reindeer, and their Riders too,” Lena confirmed. “And anyone who isn’t playing will be watching.”

“This is the perfect chance for you to do your thing!” Lucas exclaimed. “Show them all that your light hasn’t really gone out!”

“He’s right,” Lena agreed, nodding with excitement. “Justin, if you do well enough in the Games, they’ll have to admit—”

“ENOUGH!” Vixen shouted, and everyone fell quiet. “Get plenty of rest tonight, and be here sharply at the sound of the bell tomorrow morning. You are dismissed!”