January brought a slight variation with our event kicking off in the early afternoon. Fortunately, the cold weather meant we were still quite comfortable.
Our archery tournament featured a dragon soaring above a clutch of eggs. It was a mighty beast that withstood numerous strikes to its body and wings. The skill of our archers was on display as only a single arrow went astray and struck an egg. Apparently one of us missed breakfast and was hungry for an omelette.
After two rounds of shooting Sir Logan and Sir Griff were tied for the highest score. These two archers took the line together launching a final set of 6 arrows each and in the aftermath Sir Griff has 6 more points but Sir Logan earned the win with 8 points.
With the exciting finale of archery completed, we mounted up and traveled to the nearby city of Beaumont for a demonstration and combat tournament at the public library.
We had the pleasure of setting up with musical accompaniment from Sportive Tricks who were performing a concert for the library. Once they had completed their excellent performance the patrons descended upon us like a ravening horde! Well, like a polite and curious horde at least although Sir Logan did receive a number of strikes from the children.
Dame Aurora and Mew, our intrepid minister of archery, handled the tables laden with combat equipment, archery, equipment, books (it was a library after all), and a leather crafting station where patrons were able to dip their toes into the waters of arts (without the paperwork) by decorating leather wristbands or bookmarks.
While the children were largely engaged the Archduke harangued the crowd without going so far off topic as to cause Sir Logan to administer corrective blunt force damage.
Toward the end of the demo we conducted a brief combat tournament involving Sir Logan, the highest ranked active combat knight in Esperance; Sir Griff, the most experienced combat knight in Esperance; Master Ifiol (I'll figure it out later) who was fighting in his first steel tournament and was graced with the boundless youthful energy we elder knights wish we still had; the Archduke in between bellowing at the crows; and joining us in a wild rapier melee was Mew.
As we wrapped up the demonstration we had the crowd weigh in to determine the tournament winner by acclaim. All of our combatants received an rousing cheer but after careful consideration Sir Griff was determined to be the winner for this month. A well deserved win as he sacrificed a number of rivets over the course of the fighting and, as always, handled himself with skill and honor.
A thanks is also due the Beaumont Public Library and their children's librarian staff (I may not be using the right term there) for inviting us out and giving us the opportunity to share what we do.
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