By the time the room cleared out, going back to bed was completely out of the question. Aside from his morning routine of washing up in the basin next to his bed and going to the training yard for an hour's sword practice, Steven didn't have time to do anything before he was due at the kingball court. He didn't even have time to speak with Amie beforehand, and had to meet her there, blindly trusting that she knew what she was doing (something he found difficult to do after finding her lurking in his room like some kind of witch the night before).

Arriving at the court, Steven saw a lot of the people who'd been inhabiting his bedroom last night. In fact it seemed like, aside from Lord Spaulding, everyone who lived in, worked in or was visiting the castle had turned out for this. Certainly every visitor from Advorton had shown up. Tournaments were a big deal to them, and they were here to cheer on their champion.

Despite the man's title, Steven could not help but notice how sober and steady Sir Geoffrey the Inebriated looked. Nor could he fail to appreciate the fine craftsmanship of the paddle Advorton's champion was carrying. Looking at his own dingy paddle, Steven realized he should have gone to the village to see if he could find a better one, but it had completely slipped his mind.

Steven was unaware of Amie's presence until he felt a rush of wind spin around him, followed by a sort of tingling and a brilliant flash of light that momentarily engulfed him. Looking around, he spotted Amie leaning lightly on her staff at the sidelines. She waved in a cheerful way, but the look in her eyes behind the mask was unreadable. It concerned Steven that he didn't feel any different, and it concerned him even more that he wasn't clear on the rules of the sport he was about to play, but he was here now and it was much too late to back out, if indeed that had ever been an option.

In place of a trumpet (which Freedonia didn't have) the town crier and Minstrel Rhianwen had gotten together with their respective bell and lute, and composed a tune to signal the start of the match.

Sir Geoffrey, as the visitor to the court, got the honor of "making the first serve," a phrase Steven did not at all know the meaning of until the ball was flying towards his head.

For the next several hours, Steven knew nothing outside of trying not to get hit in the face by the ball as he had been yesterday, and endeavoring to keep it from hitting the ground. He understood nothing else of what he was trying to accomplish. Consequently, he gained a few faults for stepping "out of bounds," whatever that meant. All that seemed to mean was that the ball was given to Sir Geoffrey, who then had a fresh opportunity to try and pitch the heavy ball of iron at Steven's head. Steven didn't know it, but he could have gotten into even more trouble by flinching and running from the ball, but his own dedication to the task at hand forbade such an act of self preservation.

Though truthfully Steven never did feel any different with regards to before and after Amie's spell was cast on him, he was aware that he was able to keep up effective defense with his paddle for much longer than he'd been able to when practicing yesterday.

Despite the profound handicap of not knowing what he was trying to do besides not get killed in a hideous ball-related accident, Steven managed to keep going strong longer than Sir Geoffrey, who began to tire and fumble the ball towards the end, resulting in Steven's being able to score enough points to win the game. Still, it felt a little wrong to him that he'd done so, knowing that he'd had a wizard's spell to keep him going until the very end.

Amie met him as he was coming off the court. Apparently she'd recently blown off steam at someone else, because she seemed quite happy when she addressed him.

"That was great, Steven!" she exclaimed, apparently genuinely, "Now here, take this for the drinking contest," she pressed a stoppered bottle of blue liquid into his hand, "I need to go prepare a spell for this evening's duel. It's supposed to be late so the booze can wear off, but you shouldn't have to deal with that problem."

"Why not?" Steven asked.

"Because the stuff in this bottle should keep you sober, and also stop you from getting sick after," Amie replied, in a tone that suggested she thought he should already know this, "Come on, even an amateur spell-caster knows about Drunk-Me-Not. That's, like, the first potion we learn how to make. Seriously, you've never heard of this stuff?"

"You're the kingdom's first wizard," Steven reminded her.

"So what do you do when you get sloshed?" Amie asked.

"Pass out on the floor, just like everyone else," Steven said, adding, "I don't really have a lot of time to waste drinking and being drunk any more."

"Whoa, then you're really not conditioned for this, are you?"

"No," Steven answered.

"No wonder you were begging for my help," Amie said, "Anyway, I've got to go prepare that spell. See you at the training yard later."

"Sure," Steven said, not bothering to remind her that he had asked for her help specifically because Lord Spaulding had told him to, and he hadn't been begging.

He didn't have time to argue with her anyway, as the crowd was already migrating towards the tavern in response to Minstrel Rhianwen's musical summons to the next round of the tournament.

Not remotely sure when he was supposed to drink the potion, or if he was supposed to consume the whole thing, Steven put it in the bag with Firefly's meat snacks, and promptly forgot about it.

The tavern was absolutely packed, such that it was difficult for Steven and Sir Geoffrey to make it to the bar where they were to have their contest. A number of people at the bar were clearly not from the court, and had drunk more this morning than was healthy to consume in an entire day. A woman in a brown dressed was passed out on the floor beside a drink pitcher that had somehow missed being placed on one of the several tables in the tavern.

As they shouldered their way through, Steven and Sir Geoffrey had their first opportunity for a conversation. In the chaos of the morning, and the rush to get the kingball game underway, they'd had no time to talk other than to shake hands and come out fighting.

"I wanted to congratulate you on your victory at the kingball court," Sir Geoffrey said, "I must admit that I underestimated you. When you first stepped onto the court, I was sure you had no idea what you were doing. I anticipated an easy victory. I was wrong. I should have had more respect for Freedonia's champion."

"Don't mention it," Steven mumbled, feeling more guilty now than ever about his magically won victory, but not daring to say that Sir Geoffrey's assumption had been correct.

Steven knew that such a revelation would derail the entire tournament, and possibly ruin forever Freedonia's chances of annexing Advorton. Freedonia needed the territory of Advorton, and the fact that Advorton was willing to be annexed if they lost this tournament suggested that Advorton would benefit from the arrangement as well, and that this was just a matter of protecting their pride.

But that knowledge did little to make him feel better.

Once seated at the bar, each champion was presented with a pint of ale. It wasn't normally Steven's habit to chug a pint, but it was rapidly apparent that here was where Sir Geoffrey had earned the title of Inebriated, for the champion of Advorton tilted his head back and gulped down the pint in a matter of seconds. Steven knew he had to step up his game and slammed back his first drink, finishing when Sir Geoffrey was halfway through his second.

As soon as Steven put down his first pint, he was served a second, which he dutifully picked up and did his best to chug. Pretty soon he lost track of the cheering crowd, and also which pint Sir Geoffrey was on, entirely focused on trying to consume more alcohol in the next three hours than he had in the past year, and feeling progressively worse as the contest went on.

The guilt that had been gnawing at him really took hold now, making it harder to lift each pint. It also became a contest of getting the drink into his mouth before he could start blubbering and telling the whole story about the magic spell and the potion he was carrying even now (was he supposed to take it now, or after he was done? No time now, too many pints to drink).

Steven had no way of knowing how many pints he'd consumed before he finally reached out and found the bar empty. Dazedly, he looked around, and found Sir Geoffrey had passed out on the floor. The crowd cheering his victory battered at his senses. Stumbling to his feet, Steven tripped over his bar-stool, nearly fell, and staggered out of the tavern.

Once out of sight, Steven pulled out the Drunk-Me-Not, struggled with the stopper, managed to get it, and drank the entire potion in one go. He waited a few minutes, watching the world spin sickeningly around him, but he didn't feel any better.

This was bad.

Before his duel with Sir Geoffrey this evening, Steven had to head over to the castle and spend a couple of hours training Lord Spaulding in the finer points of swordsmanship. He couldn't just blow off his monarch, but just now Steven wasn't sure he could make it home without passing out.

He felt awful in every way possible, and could not imagine subjecting himself to this torment and misery on purpose recreationally. He wondered how much worse off he'd be without the potion. Since he'd done alright at the kingball court, he decided to trust that this potion of Amie's would start helping in short order, and he forced himself to move, meandering drunkenly back and forth across the uphill path to the castle, but managing to keep his feet nonetheless.

Lord Spaulding had not attended the kingball match, or the drinking contest, as he had deemed himself much too busy looking for a seller of mustache wax in the village. But Steven found Lord Spaulding in the study beside the throne room, writing a treaty of some kind.

Steven was grateful that he didn't have to talk just then, as Lord Spaulding already knew what he was here for. Lord Spaulding kept his personal training dummy upstairs, stairs which Steven had a great deal of trouble navigating today.

Later on, Steven would realize he had not taken in one single aspect of Lord Spaulding's quarters, nor did he remember any of the advice he'd given his monarch. What he did remember was propping himself against the wall, feeling more and more miserable and eventually nauseous, before finally throwing up on the floor (to his intense mortification), and reluctantly continuing the training session with Lord Spaulding after being assured that Irving would be delighted to finally have an actual dirty spot on the floor to clean, instead of just having to mop the floor for his own amusement.

After that, still feeling quite ill, Steven staggered home, fell into bed and took a much needed nap.

"What do you mean you drank the potion after?" Amie probably had a lovely singing voice, but she had also mastered the slightly ear-piercing shriek of rebuke, "It's a preventative, stupid! You take it before you get drunk, not try to get un-drunk by drinking it! What is wrong with you?"

"Besides the fact that I'm hungover?" Steven asked very quietly.

"Some champion you are," Amie continued, "You can't even cheat properly."

"You say that like it's a bad thing," Steven observed.

"Have you seen yourself?" Amie retorted.

"I don't own a mirror," Steven replied slowly.

"You're a mess! You're in no shape for a duel. Even my help probably isn't enough to deal with this. Why couldn't you have just done the drinking contest properly?"

"You seem very invested in this," Steven said.

"Imagine how this will reflect on me!" Amie exclaimed.

"Your part in this won't be made public," Steven reminded her.

"A wizard's work seldom is. Nobody wants to admit they drank an elixir of allure right before they proposed or a luck potion right before they sat down to a card game. But people know if you're a good wizard or not, and if it gets around that my Drunk-Me-Not potion didn't work for you, that will seriously cut into my clientele, since half of them know they want it, and the other half figure it out after I've had a talk with them."

"They'll never hear anything from me," Steven promised.

"Oh? And how many people saw you drink that thing outside the tavern?" Amie asked.

"I didn't see anyone," Steven answered.

"You didn't see anyone," Amie spat mockingly, "You were so sloshed you wouldn't have seen a unicorn if it had jumped out of the bushes in front of you."

Steven knew this was probably correct, but he protested anyway, "Unicorns aren't real."

"As if you would know," Amie snapped, "You only patrol the forest three times a week. I, however, am the magic expert. If I say there are unicorns, there are unicorns."

"Could you try talking less loudly?" Steven asked, "Or... farther away from me?"

"Can't. My dinner is almost done cooking."

After a surprisingly successful hunt for a deer, followed by Firefly returning with fresh rabbit, Steven had been startled to find Amie waiting in his room again. Having realized that Amie couldn't hunt for herself, and didn't have a great deal of money to afford nice things, Steven had graciously offered her half of the meat he'd acquired. She took a piece of venison and the rabbit, the latter of which she was now stewing for her dinner in Steven's fireplace cauldron.

Amie had not exactly asked to use his cauldron, but had simply explained that she'd spent so much time that afternoon looking for sagewort to put in the potion that she hadn't had time to fish for her dinner. She had gone on to explain that her presence here the night before had been due to the fact that Steven's cauldron was so much nicer than hers, and so she'd decided to cook her dinner in it. When Steven woke up, the first excuse she'd thought of was the Endurance spell, even though she didn't need to cast it until right before the kingball match.

After that of course, things had gotten too out of hand for her to explain herself.

"It didn't occur to me that a knight could have insomnia," Amie said, walking out to the foyer where there was a stone bench to sit on with her bowl of soup.

Steven didn't have a table with chairs.

Reluctantly, Steven followed her. He didn't feel like eating just now.

"I suppose anyone could have it," Amie continued, "But I always had knights pegged more as the blood thirsty, drunken, gambler types," she sighed, "Then again, I guess most people think the worst thing about a wizard is that they're cowards or puny fighters, not that they'll suddenly say something and hurt your feelings," she paused, then softly added, "I did hurt your feelings just now, didn't I?"

"I'll live," Steven assured her gently, content that Amie had at least lowered her voice a little.

"I really am awful," Amie told him, "I just... I see all these people, and they're so unbelievably stupid, and then I just can't help myself. How do you tolerate them?"

Steven sighed, "With a great deal of patience."

"Funny, I don't see that as a personality trait of yours," Amie said.

"It's more of a hidden skill," Steven replied.

"Ah."

There were a few blessed moments of silence as Amie finished her soup. Then she started talking again. Not that Steven hated listening to people talk, but just now any noise was very unpleasant, something Amie no doubt knew, but wasn't thinking about.

"That really is a fantastic fireplace," Amie said, "You wouldn't believe the difference it makes."

"Actually it's a recent addition," Steven replied, happy to be on a more neutral subject, "I had to take a lot of the stuff in that room out to the village to sell it so I could afford the fireplace and bed."

"I'm guessing a good bed is important with your particular problem," Amie said, "We wizards don't use beds you know. We draw our energy from the magical essences which surround us through meditation. I'm told it looks very beautiful, but of course I don't have my eyes open when I meditate. I wonder how insomnia would affect meditation."

"At a guess, I would say badly," Steven ventured, "It's very disruptive."

"I suppose it must be," Amie said thoughtfully, "So much of your work depends on a healthy body, and that requires a good night's sleep. No pun intended."

"I hadn't really thought about it," Steven said, "It's a problem I've had for a long time."

"How very inconvenient for you," Amie said, apparently with genuine feeling.

Somewhat embarrassed to find Amie so concerned with his problems, Steven cleared his throat awkwardly, and changed the subject, "Yes... well, now you're done with your soup, we should probably go to the training yard, which is where we agreed to meet in the first place."

"That was before I heard you threw up in Lord Spaulding's quarters," Amie pointed out, "At which point it was obvious that something had gone extremely wrong."

"Yes, well..." Steven, flushing slightly at the reminder of his enormous error, looked for some way to steer the discussion away from that subject, as he didn't feel it needed to be rehashed, "I'll try to get it right this time, shall I?"

"You do that," Amie replied.