Grimoires of London 2 by D. B. King

Author:D. B. King [King, D. B.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-08-10T16:00:00+00:00

* * *

The game of centaur polo was like an underground event for the upper-crust. Only outside.

Joe was thinking that it was going to be a hoity-toity affair, where cucumber sandwiches played a pivotal role and everyone was wearing their jumpers tied loosely around their necks. The moment they arrived at the secret, hex-protected venue, though, there was only one thought in his head.

This is something else entirely.

It was more of an event for the young rebels of magical society. There was almost a fraternity party vibe to it, although it was still far more cultured than that.

“It’s a university party crossed with a medieval fate, that’s what it is,” he said to himself in a stunned voice as he and the others pushed through the jostling, laughing, boozy crowd.

The game was being played in a deserted and magically protected part of Syon Park, near the banks of the Thames but tucked out of sight of prying eyes in a copse of handy trees.

There was music filling the air like a golden haze. The afternoon sun bathed the milling spectators, turning the shorn grass to a glittering emerald green. Champagne flowed from fountains, and trays of vol-au-vents floated over the heads of the crowd, descending whenever a peckish guest clicked their fingers.

Joe had never been to the likes of it, nor Lucius.

“Yeah, I mean, it’s not a bad attempt at a knees-up,” Grim said grudgingly.

Joe rolled his eyes at Aida and then mimed along with Grim as the grimoire said, “Not like they used to do things back in the bad old days, which in retrospect were so bloody good.”

“Like a broken record,” Joe said under his breath to her.

Aida laughed.

Grim turned his front cover with its two eye-like dents in Aida’s direction.

“I’m serious, girl,” the grimoire said. “Say what you like about blood sports; they might have had a bad rep by modern standards, but there are few things that unite a crowd and get the collective blood pumping like watching a bunch of absolutely rat-arsed blokes go at one another with spears and swords. That was when the Romans had just rocked up, mind. Loved their blood sports did the Romans. A vicious bunch of bastards, but they accomplished a lot.”

The centaur polo game was a spectacle. There was no other word for it. Joe had never actually watched a game. He’d assumed for the longest time that it wasn’t actually a real sport but just some weird pastime the royal family engaged in during press events.

Joe didn’t really pay the gang in Buckingham Palace much mind, seeing them as divorced from real life as it was possible to be. Still, whenever he heard something about them it was always because they’d been up to something odd. There had been a particular toe-sucking incident that his Uncle Steve never got tired of bringing up around anyone who was particularly pro-royal.

Obviously, the main difference in centaur polo was that the centaurs didn’t have riders. They were both rider and steed.

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