Space Knights: The Arrival by Gregory Samuelson (buy e reader .TXT) 📕

in every arena. You’ll learn to ride and battle on foot and on horseback. You’ll also learn to use a winged horse or your own horse with its flight pack for either normal flying or being like one of them and flying and doing battle in space.”

Trance was stunned and took a deep breath. He really wanted to be a Golden Griffin and knew he’d be able to fight on foot as well as horseback; however, he didn’t know that he’d also learn to fly his horse in space. “Is there a flight pack that would enable Odin to fly in space like those horses?” he asked.

“I think so,” Corena answered, “I know that you have a regular flight pack for Odin, but I haven’t seen one that might fit Odin so he could fly you in space. I’m sure that as resourceful as you are that you could find one that would work.” She smiled and leaned over and kissed him again.

Hours passed and the couple talked on some more. Eventually they fell asleep still holding hands. Trance was the first to awake and he carefully withdrew his hand and reached into his carry-on bag for his book and read for a while. After reading for an hour he got a little bored so he replaced his book in the bag and pulled out a rather old magnetic travel chess game. He set down his tray and set up the game and started to play himself.

It was a very old pastime of his. He remembered that his uncle Martin had been the one to teach him to play so long ago in his youth. Martin was also the one who had first sparked his interest in knights. Trance thought about Martin and his family.

They were much closer back on Earth, but since they had arrived on Althora they hadn’t seen much of each other. However, since Trance was becoming better known for his exploits in the knight class he’d seen his uncle’s family more. The more he succeeded the more he saw of both his dad’s side of the family and also his mother’s. It seemed that he was meeting his extended family more and more with many of them attending his battles and then going over to his family’s house for a barbeque.

He moved the pieces and played quietly, trying to play both sides and rather enjoying himself. He was halfway through his game when Corena woke up. “What are you doing?” she asked curiously as she rubbed her eyes and looked at the unfamiliar game.

“It’s a very old Earth game called chess,” he explained. “My uncle gave me this game as a Christmas gift when I was eleven. He had taught me to play two years earlier and thought that I would enjoy having my own chess set.”

“Oh. The pieces look interesting,” she said, taking in the game pieces. “Could you teach me how to play?”

“Alright,” Trance replied, waking up more with the new excitement of showing her how to play. “I’m not the best player there is, but I’ll do my best to show you how to play.” So for the next ten minutes Trance taught Corena how to play chess. First he showed her all of the pieces and what they were called and how each piece could be moved across the board. He told her what he knew of the history of the game and that it had been around on Earth for several hundred years and that it was played all the way up to the global exodus.

“Wow! I was going to tell you when you told me what the pieces were called that there weren’t any knights on your world anymore,” said Corena as she lifted one of the simple plastic white horses that was one of the knights.

“Yeah, the game was originally invented and played when there were still knights for my planet’s militaries. I guess people liked the romance that the game brought to mind. That’s why I always enjoyed playing. It was a reminder of the time when there were knights, kings and queens, princes, and princesses,” he said, blushing slightly as he looked into her eyes.

After a few breathless moments Trance set up the board again and started showing the Princess how to play. The first couple games didn’t take long for Trance to win. He had the great advantage of knowing the game and how to play. He did his best to help Corena out; however, it didn’t take long for the Princess to learn the game and she was soon playing herself against him.

It was apparent that she had figured out a strategy against him, mainly using her queen and bishops, while he relied on more of his pieces, mainly his queen, knights, and rooks. Trance won twice more before Corena beat him. As they played again, Corena was enjoying the challenge the game presented and soon some of their teammates came over to see what was going on.

They watched curiously and Trance took the time once again to explain the pieces and demonstrate how to play. Corena beat him again and Trance had a bright idea and invited one of his team to play Corena. She beat him even as Trance tried to help him out, and then there was another player that took his place. Corena seemed to be on a real roll when Zam approached and beat her. Trance had taught him and Gracer how to play much earlier in the year, and now they could beat him.

More kids got to play and after a few more games, Trance and Corena played each other. King Maximus came over and looked down, intrigued at the game and inquired if he could play a game. “Alright,” said Trance slightly nervous. He had taught the game to most of the kids now, but here was the King of Cator wanting to play. With careful skill he taught the King to play and was amazed at how