A (not so) simple game of marbles leads to an interesting conversation, and an important realization for Kaiya.
(See the end of the work for notes.)
“Your move.”
“Hmm.”
Kaiya sat cross-legged on the floor as she watched Kelaki sitting across from her, pondering her next move. The area between them was scattered with shiny, multicolored glass marbles, within a circle drawn into the floor with white chalk.
“Hmm…”
With a quill in one hand and a straight-edged stick in the other, Kelaki made a careful sketch of a possible move on the hide in front of her. The hide was full of similar sketches, peppered with little notes and angle calculations.
“Laki,” Kaiya said wearily, “Come on.”
“Just a little more…” Kelaki made one more calculation, then nodded. “Okay!” She placed a hand next to one marble, and deftly shot it. The marbles scattered in various directions as she followed them with her eyes. As the last marble rolled to a stop, she grinned. “As expected!” she said proudly. Turning to Kaiya, she said, “Your turn.”
“Finally.” Kaiya eyeballed the marbles and made her move. As the marbles scattered, Kaiya could almost see the wheels turning in Kelaki’s head. “Go,” Kaiya said, resigning herself to another long wait. She observed as Kelaki made more sketches and calculations on the hide, and sighed. “It doesn’t have to be perfect,” she murmured.
“I want to make sure my move is just right,” Kelaki said, scribbling on the hide.
Is this supposed to be fun, Kaiya? Mabonth asked. I can’t tell! She and Laishanth were curled up together nearby, watching the game with their heads lowered to the floor.
Kaiya shrugged in answer. I’m not sure either, Mabonth.
When she first rediscovered the marble game during her last visit to the Archives, it quickly became popular with her weyrling classmates. Games were quick and chaotic, with players eventually devolving into trash talking and throwing marbles at each other – all in good fun, of course.
But Kaiya hadn’t expected Kelaki to take to it so seriously. As she observed Kelaki making her sketches and calculations, putting in as much effort into them as a Harper assignment, she wondered if the other girl was having any fun at all.
“You’re really working hard at this,” Kaiya said faintly. “Do you want to play something else instead? Maybe dragon chess, or dragon poker?”
“Not really,” Kelaki said absently. “With dragon chess, it got so boring when I started beating all my opponents. And dragon poker is a scam.” She nodded down at the scattered marbles. “With this game, at least, I can push my abilities.” She finished her calculations and made another careful move.
Kaiya laughed nervously. Was this a game or a mathematics lesson? Kelaki was the only person she knew who truly enjoyed learning numbers and not just learned them because she had to. She must have been a handful for the Harpers at her home Hold.
With that thought, Kaiya wondered what it was like to see the world the way Kelaki did. In patterns and numbers. Ratios and proportions. To have the curiosity, the drive and the urge to know more about the world and how it worked in terms of science and mathematics. In that way, Kelaki and Laishanth were perfectly matched.
Kaiya made her next move with the marble pile and grimaced when the marbles scattered wildly.
“You know,” Kelaki said matter-of-factly, “if you aim a marble so that it hits the others at exactly a certain angle, you can knock a lot of them out of the arena.”
“I… see.” Kaiya glanced over at the large pile of marbles gathered at Kelaki’s side, compared to the few she had. Despite how tedious Kelaki’s strategy looked, she appeared to be winning.
“I wonder how different the game would be with another player involved,” Kelaki mused, “Or with more marbles.”
“Another player would be more chaotic,” Kaiya replied, “and less understanding.” And would have probably banned all writing utensils from the game, to Kelaki’s dismay.
“Not sure if I like the sound of that,” Kelaki answered, “Though the additional chaos would be welcome.”
“And speaking of more marbles,” Kaiya said suddenly, “what happened to the bag of marbles I gave you? I thought it was strange that you asked me to bring mine when you invited me here!”
Kelaki frowned. “Those? Well…” Her eyes darted toward Laishanth for a moment, then back to Kaiya.
Uh oh… Kaiya thought, here it comes…
“Laishanth ate them.”
They were both silent for a moment, while Mabonth’s amused cackle echoed through Kaiya’s head.
“She… ate them?” Kaiya repeated.
“They… well…” Kelaki said haltingly, “They looked like candy to her!”
Laishanth was disappointed they didn’t taste like anything, Mabonth spoke up, and they gave her horrible indigestion!
I’m sure they did, Kaiya answered her.
Whose turn is it now? Mabonth asked. I’ve lost track!
“Uh…” Kaiya looked down at the marbles on the ground, then looked at Kelaki.
Kelaki laughed. “Okay,” she replied, “how about this? Let’s switch things up. I’ll play without writing down my calculations.”
Kaiya sighed in relief. “Good.”
A slight smirk appeared on Kelaki’s face. “Not so fast. You get to calculate your moves now!” She slid the hide and quill over to her, and placed the straight-edged stick neatly on top.
“Huh?” Kaiya blurted out, “Why?”
“So we can both get better,” Kelaki said, “You can work on your moves, and I can work on calculating in my head!”
Kaiya looked unsure for a moment. Then she saw the genuine, excited smile on Kelaki’s face, and realized Kelaki was actually having fun.
“All right,” Kaiya replied in an upbeat voice, “Let’s do this.” She picked up the quill and straight-edge. “Teach me your ways!”
Kelaki beamed as Kaiya prepared for a crash course in marble shooting.
The main inspiration for this piece was a character in another, unrelated fanfic I wrote recently - a girl whose only skill was shooting marbles. When determining her backstory, I figured that to be really good at marble shooting would mean she was probably really good at math.
Also, replaying the Dragonchoice game recently made me think about dragonrider characters in unique situations. How would a math/science prodigy fare as a dragonrider? If they lived in the Holds, how would the backwards culture affect them? Would they be discovered by the Crafts and their interests nurtured? When coming up with Kelaki's background, I figured that giving her a strong math and science background would best fit her dragon's curious and inquisitive nature.