Tales of Ravenloft

The Rigor of the Game

The game brought Oliver Arkwright to walk the harrowing roads of Sithicus, just as it had propelled him on other foolish journeys throughout his twenty-odd years as a gambler. To anyone who bothered asking, Oliver bluntly cited greed as his only motivation for such risky ventures. He knew better. The money purchased food and shelter and sometimes even companionship, but he'd realized years ago that he pursued a sharp's life solely for the thrill of tempting fate.

And he'd tempted it sorely on this trip. Since crossing the border from Gundarak three days past, Oliver had seen snakes as long as boar spears and slavering wolves with eyes that glowed like embers, even in the moonless murk of the Sithican night. He dispatched these threats as he did most living obstacles that stood between him and a game — mercilessly, with a lightningquick flash of his falchion. But there were other things in the darkness as well, ghostly things that groaned and shrieked like the damned. Oliver suspected his sword would avail him little against such phantasms. Fortunately, the keenness of the gambler's curved blade was more than evenly matched by the keenness of his wits; he managed to elude the wailing creatures and even catch a few hours'sleep in dry gullies along the roadside.

Now, at last, he stood on the weatherworn threshold of his destination. It was a wayside inn very much like the myriad wayside inns Oliver had frequented in other, equally gloomy lands. The hulking two-story box slouched at the side of the road in the middle of nowhere, as if it had been traveling to someplace where it might share the company of other buildings, but lacked the resolve to finish the trek. And so it huddled on the forest's verge, defeated and forlorn. Only the inn's sign remained defiant. The miniature armor-clad knight affixed to the board clasped an embossed shield in one hand. In the other he clutched a long sword at the sky, ready to smite the very sun.

Oliver spared the knight the briefest of glances before he smiled with anticipation and strode to the door. The fatigue born of the past three days disappeared suddenly. In its place crackled a frisson of excitement.

That excitement dimmed only a little when Oliver discovered the door barred resolutely against him. When his first knock went unanswered, an uncomfortable dread began creeping up his spine. Had he come to the wrong place? He stepped back and again surveyed the sign. The knight's slate-gray armor and the badge embossed on his shield rekindled the sharp's hope — no, this was definitely the Iron Warden. And for all its forlorn appearance, the place wasn't deserted; eight tethered horses grazed to one side, and smoke curled languidly from the chimney.

His falchion drawn, Oliver closed on the portal once more. "Unless you want me to hack it down, you'd best unbar this door immediately!" He broke the answering silence by rapping on the wood with his sword's ornate pommel.

The stout door opened soundlessly on well-oiled hinges, and a large, bulbous head peered around the jamb. It was not nearly so silent as the door. "Bugger off!"

Oliver retreated a step. The bouncer's head was huge, at least twice the size of a normal man's. His mouth was a yawning, scraggle-toothed cavern, his bloodshot eyes two angry dagger slashes beneath a fiercely creased brow.

Brushing aside his initial surprise, Oliver adopted a practiced facade of road-weary impatience. "I was told a game is being played here. High stakes. One afternoon only."

The bouncer's expression remained fierce. "So? "

"So I'm here to play. "A smirk crept across Oliver's lips. "Actually, I'm here to win."

With a flourish, the sharp swept back his travelstained cloak and sheathed his blade. He then took up the small leather purse hanging at his belt. "There's an entry fee, I suppose," he said, extracting a silver coin. "Is this enough? "

"Enough to stop me from pounding you into the turf like a tent peg," the bouncer growled. He reached one beefy hand forward to snatch the coin from the gambler.

From what Oliver could see of the brute, framed within the inadequate bounds of the doorway, his body was completely in proportion with his huge head. The sharp remained impassive as the coin was wrenched from his fingers. He merely stood corpse-still and gauged the brute's agility. Just as he'd suspected, the bouncer fumbled with the silver as he drew it up to his eyes. Oliver was certain he could slice the man's head from his tree trunk of a neck before he landed a single blow. The knowledge cheered the gambler and made him bold.

"I suppose you don't travel much, so the coin's mint must be new to you," Oliver drawled. "The twined snakes on the reverse mark it as Souragnean. It was part of a haul I took aboard La Demoiselle du Musard."

The bouncer pocketed the coin and rubbed his nose, wide and nearly shapeless from being broken so many times. "Silver's silver," he said, clearly unimpressed by the coin's origin. "Now get walking, whiles you still got legs to carry you."

"I'm here to play in the game," Oliver repeated. "If you need to see more of my coin — " The bouncer snorted. "I can see you ain't got enough blunt on you to buy your way in. The others brung theirs in chests."

Oliver held his left arm up, exposing the large diamond studding his cuff. "This little gem is straight from the duke of Gundarak's coffers. The silver it would take to purchase this beauty would fill five chests."

He twisted his arm so that the diamond cuff link flared in the bright, late afternoon sunlight. "Lovely, isn't it?" he lulled. "You'll never see another like it so long as you live." And while the beetle-browed doorman stared at the stone, Oliver stealthily slipped his right hand down to the hilt of his falchion.

"Watch his blade, Unthar," came a sweet, almost childlike voice from within the Iron Warden. "Master Arkwright's cuff links tend to precede his falchion into a fray."

The young woman who sidled past the bouncer matched her voice quite well. She was short, with girlish blond curls and round, cherubic features. The cotton dress she wore was the blue of cornflowers, trimmed with a fine white lace and cut to modestly cover her legs. A missionary's wife stranded in the wilderness. At least that was the impression she gave as she came to stand in the doorway of the derelict inn. Oliver knew better.

"Tisiphone," he whispered. The color drained from his face, leaving him as pale as a victim of the White Fever. And for the first time since entering Sithicus, the sharp was afraid.

Smiling sweetly, Tisiphone extended a dainty hand in welcome. "Glad to see you again, Oliver. It's been almost two years. I do believe that the game in Richemulot was the last time our paths crossed."

A vivid memory of Tisiphone flashed in Oliver's mind. The game had taken place in the fetid, dripping tunnels beneath the ruined city of St. Ronges. Guttering torches cast fingers of light and shadow over the grisly scene.

Bloody to the elbows, Tisiphone straddled a twitching corpse. When the unfortunate man had attempted to palm a pair of loaded dice into the game, she'd torn his throat out with her bare hands. Oliver could still hear her laughter, still see the grin on her pretty face as she licked the gore from her perfectly manicured nails.

Gently Tisiphone hooked an arm in Oliver's and guided him across the threshold. "I'd heard you set yourself up a permanent game in Gundarak. I was sur- prised. You never struck me as the type to settle down for very long."

"I'm not. I only worked the taverns in Zeidenburg for the winter. Otherwise, I've been roaming. "He glanced at the young woman. "Someone told me you'd finally run afoul of Renier's men in Richemulot and got yourself hanged."

She pulled down the high collar of her dress to reveal a smooth, milk-white throat. "Obviously you can't believe everything you hear. Tell me, what do you think of my place?"

From his vantage at the end of the long oaken bar, Oliver surveyed the taproom. It was poorly lit, but tidier than most, even rather homey. The tables were clean, the floor carpeted with fresh rushes. A small fire danced in the hearth that dominated one entire wall. The halfdozen men and women occupying the room gathered beside the flame, drawn like moths to the feeble, flickering light.

Oliver cautioned himself not to relax. If Tisiphone ran the Iron Warden, the pleasant facade most certainly masked something sinister. "Nice enough," he said noncommittally.

"I won the deed to the place a few weeks ago," Tisiphone offered as she poured a cup of blood-red wine. She slid the drink to Oliver and filled another cup for herself. "The man who lost the place to me inherited it when his father was killed by elves."

The sharp fought to maintain his guarded indifference. "Elves? I thought they were only a myth."

"I wish that were true," Tisiphone said darkly. "They avoid the main roads because of Lord Soth's patrols, but the hills and forests are full of them. They're monstrous things, feral and bloodthirsty. The tortures they use are more horrible than any you could dream up." She shuddered and took a long swallow of wine. "More horrible than any I could dream up."

The sound of Unthar shuffling across the rushes alerted Oliver to the bouncer's movement just as Tisiphone finished speaking. "If you want to be done by sunset, we gotta start," the brute said.

Tisiphone nodded curtly, and Unthar lumbered to the center of the taproom, where he withdrew a velvet cover from an elaborate dice table. A carved bone rail surrounded a long center of green felt. The center, in turn, was subdivided by thin lines of white paint into various betting areas.

"I welcome all of you to the Iron Warden. The game this afternoon will be death's-head dice," Tisiphone announced as she made her way to the dice-dealer's position along the rail. "For those of you unfamiliar with the game, it's a local version of craps, with two important variant rules."

She swept up a dice boat and emptied its contents — a pair of midnight-black dice with white pips — into her hand. "All Sithican dice have death's-heads instead of ones."

"How morbid. Now I know why I've never bothered to visit here before. "The speaker was a heavyset man, well-dressed to the verge of foppery. He was the only one of the competing players that Oliver recognized, a money-hungry grifter by the name of Dorlon, whom he'd wagered against in Gundarak.

"You don't know the half of it," Tisiphone murmured. She rolled the dice between her thumb and index fingers until both death's-heads grinned at the assembled gamblers. "The icons figure as ones in determining a point to be thrown. But if you throw them as a double on a first roll, you're bust — completely. You turn over everything to the house."

Oliver scowled. "Everything?"

"Are you worried that I'm going to ask for your soul?" Tisiphone replied. Suppressed laughter made her voice a little shrill. "'Everything'means all the coins and jewels you brought into the Warden. That's all."

Tisiphone handed the dice to the closest player. The black cubes were passed from gambler to gambler, so each could check them for loading. While the dice were examined, she continued to outline the game.

"The other rules variation is just as simple: if a shooter rolls a natural — seven or eleven — the house gets a chance to kill it. I roll both dice. If they come up double death's-heads, the shooter loses everything. If they match the shooter's natural, his win is doubled."

The less-experienced gamblers bristled at the harsh irregularities, but Oliver found them enticing. The house always had an advantage in craps; the death's-head variations simply meant the risk of going bust was more threatening, more complete. It was rather like fencing with unbated foils, a practice Oliver still pursued from time to time.

"First shooter," Unthar grunted as he took up his post as stickman. He leveled a finger at a mousy woman with graying hair. "You got here first, you shoot first."

"Rules of the house, I assume?" Oliver asked. "Any others? "

"No," Tisiphone said brusquely. "No other house rules."

At Oliver's side, Dorlon chuckled and slapped him on the shoulder. "Were you expecting her to have some silly unspoken rule she could use to winnow the flatts from the sharps? Not everyone here has your experience, Arkwright, but I assure you that there are no flatts here to be gulled."

"Always learn the rules of the house before you put a penny on the green," Oliver said. "Only a flatt would balk at asking for them."

Dorlon sniffed effetely at the barb, shoving past Oliver and working his way to the opposite side of the table. He lingered there, next to Tisiphone, and waited for the other players to lay into Oliver. After all, the insult had been directed at them, too, since no one else had thought to request the house rules.

But the five shooters remained silent. From the distressed, nervous expressions on their faces, Oliver decided that Tisiphone had drawn nothing but flatts, wealthy rubes who'd soon find themselves bust. He smiled inwardly and plotted the course his wagers would take. If he played this right, he could draw off more than a little of their blunt with side bets before Tisiphone took her haul.

And the game soon proved Oliver right. The first Souragnean silver piece the sharp fished out of his purse was the last of his own money he had to lay down, and he won that back immediately. As the five flatts squandered their cash on foolish side bets, he steadily built a sizable hoard. Only Dorlon avoided his carefully considered wagers; the grifter knew full well that Oliver would never allow himself to be drawn into a side bet that wasn't to his advantage.

Within two hours, the novices had been driven from the game. The death's-heads grinned up from the table time and again, their eyeless gazes proclaiming ruin upon one player after another. And for each disastrous fall of the dice, Oliver felt his heartbeat speed a little, felt his caution dwindle. The rigor of the game was seducing him, as it always did.

Dorlon acquitted himself no better than the flatts, falling victim to the death's-heads just before sundown. As the foppish grifter pulled his fur-trimmed cloak around his shoulders, Oliver flipped a coin at him. It disappeared into the rushes at Dorlon's feet. "For the road home," the sharp said. "Maybe you can pay the elves to leave you alone."

The grifter took the coin and left without comment, but Oliver heard Unthar grumble a curse under his breath.

"Is there a problem?" the sharp asked coldly.

"Unthar rode with Soth's patrols once," Tisiphone explained as she scooped up the dice and handed them to Oliver. "He saw firsthand what the elves can do."

"Maybe you'll see them cut someone up," the brute rumbled. "You'll be real close and have to watch everything, all the blades and the needles. Then we'll see if you can joke about it."

Tisiphone glared at the bouncer. Oliver recognized the look from the bloody game in Richemulot. Her mask of sweetness had cracked just enough to reveal the horrible fury lurking just below the surface. But there was something else in her eyes now as well. Desperation, perhaps. Or was it fear?

"We have to close up soon," Tisiphone said at last. "Lord Soth's orders. The game has to be shut down by dark."

She was lying. Oliver had no doubt about that. And as he tried to piece together a reason for her fear and her obvious, desperate lie, he realized what was troubling the woman so: she knew she was going to lose.

"Fine," the sharp said. "Let's get this over with."

All afternoon, Oliver had avoided being the shooter as best he could. He'd passed the dice frequently, preferring instead to earn himself a better position through side bets and wagering alongside the house, fading the other players. Now, he heaped all his coins on a nearby table, capping the hoard with the diamond cuff links he'd won from Duke Gundar. "Everything on this roll," he said calmly, then gathered up the dice and threw them down the center.

The first die turned up a death's-head, and Oliver's guts clenched. He watched the other die spin wildly on a corner, for what seemed an eternity. A wave of despair washed over him. "Come on," he hissed.

The die dropped as a three.

"Your point's four," Tisiphone said, voice quavering.

Oliver rattled the dice confidently. He'd stood on the brink of ruin and come away unscathed. There was no way he was going to lose now. Fate was smiling on him, bathing him in a radiance that blinded the death's-heads to him.

Certain of his good fortune, he cast the dice again.

"Double two. Shooter wins," Tisiphone said. The words slithered from her on a ragged sigh. But before Oliver could even congratulate himself, she added," I can't cover your wager."

"What?" he shouted.

"One of those cuff links is worth more than all the silver I took from Dorlon and the others," Tisiphone said.

Oliver stalked to her side. "You don't have anything else? No gems? Nothing hidden beneath the floorboards — besides the former owner, I mean? "

"I have the deed to the Warden. That's all."

The tears that began to course down Tisiphone's cheeks only hardened Oliver's heart against her. Did she think he was some bumpkin just wandered in from the fields to be swayed by such histrionics?" Then I suppose I'll just have to take the inn," the sharp said.

Shoulders hunched in resignation, Tisiphone took a rolled sheet of parchment from under the dice table. "This is the deed. "She tossed it to Oliver. "The Iron Warden's yours."

"I won't be staying here. If you want to manage the place for me, we might be able to work something out."

"No, thanks," Tisiphone said. The tears were abruptly gone, as was the quaver in her voice. She signaled to Unthar. "Hurry. The sun's gone down."

"You're leaving?" Oliver stammered. "What about the elves? "

"I'd rather take my chances with them than with what's coming here," Unthar blurted as he retrieved two packed saddlebags from behind the bar and hustled one over each broad shoulder.

The curved blade of Oliver's falchion hissed like a serpent as it slipped from its scabbard. Sword raised before him, the sharp started across the taproom toward Tisiphone. "No one's leaving until I get an explanation," he said menacingly.

The inn's front door slid open then, revealing a tall, armored figure, black against the crimson and gold of the twilight sky. "No one is leaving until I have my turn at the table," it corrected in a sepulchral voice.

Tisiphone and Unthar dropped to their knees. "Lord Soth," they murmured, gazes downcast.

The Knight of the Black Rose walked slowly into the room. By the wavering light of the candles, Oliver could see that the ancient armor Soth wore had been scorched, as if blasted in some mammoth furnace. The intricate embossings of flowers and kingfishers that had once patterned its surface were scarred almost beyond recognition. The icon spared the most destruction — a rose on the breastplate — showed hints of its original crimson hue, but soot, or blood, had stained most of its petals black.

Soth's cape of royal purple swirled behind him as he moved, a banner borne up by ghost winds. At first glance, the cape appeared regal and richly embroidered. But as the knight got close to Oliver, the gambler noted that the fabric was bloodstained. Like everything about the lord of Sithicus, the cloak recalled distant victories, battles won for noble reasons long ago transmuted by fanaticism, honorable men long ago tainted by depravity.

The knight stopped less than a sword's length away from Oliver, disdainful of the gambler's naked blade. He regarded the sharp with eyes that glowed like wills-o'the-wisp within the darkness of his helmet, then pointed at the parchment clutched in the man's hand.

"You are the owner of the Iron Warden," Soth said hollowly. "As stated in the charter you hold, this is the day of appointment. You will play me in a game of death's-head dice for the title warden of the Iron Hills. If the chain of office is yours after the contest ends, you will lead my troops this very night against the elves that dwell there."

A wretched groan escaped Oliver's lips. Tisiphone hadn't been fearful of losing. She'd been afraid that she wasn't going to pawn the deed off before Lord Soth arrived. She'd gulled him like the most pathetic of flatts.

As Lord Soth turned toward the dice table, another stranger hurried into the taproom. Clad in the finery of a court seneschal, he was no more than four feet tall from the heels of his iron-shod boots to the top of his bald pate. His muttonchop sideburns and thick mustache were the white of old bones. And while age had stooped the seneschal's shoulders decades past, it hadn't lessened his energy; he bustled after his master, a chain of office draped over one arm. "I have the warden's badge, mighty lord," he said. The words sounded like the creaking of ancient trees in a windstorm.

"Place it on the table, Azrael," Lord Soth replied.

Tisiphone came forward on her knees, her voice full of feigned sweetness and humility. "Begging your indulgence, Lord Soth, but if you won't be needing us for the game, we'd like — "

A blow from the seneschal silenced her and sent her sprawling into Unthar. "Lord Soth didn't ask you to speak," Azrael rumbled. He shook his fist in front of her bloodied face. "Open your yap out of turn again and I'll bash your teeth in."

The suddenness of the attack unsettled Oliver, but Tisiphone's reaction to the blow chilled the sharp to the core. She kowtowed to the dwarf, then crawled into a corner with Unthar, begging the lord's forgiveness all the way. If a barbarous, cold-hearted murderer like her knelt before Soth, what sort of infernal creature must he be?

"Come, Azrael," Soth said. "Let us appoint the new warden so the troops can begin their march to the Iron Hills."

The lord of Sithicus positioned the warden's chain of office on the green. "There is my wager," he noted as he snatched up the dice. "It is the only thing of value I have carried to the table. "He tossed the ebon cubes almost as soon as he'd picked them up.

"Death's-heads," Soth reported without looking at the dice. "I've lost. The chain is now yours."

Oliver stared in horror at the twin skulls with their leering, rictal grins. The walls of the taproom seemed to close in around him, the beamed ceiling seemed to lower. He wanted to scream, but there wasn't enough air in the room to fill his lungs. After a moment, the gambler managed to gasp out a simple question: "I get a throw as well?"

Soth nodded. "Win and you earn your freedom. Since I have nothing left to cover your bet, I can offer you only that."

With trembling fingers, Oliver took up the dice. They felt like cubes of black ice, drawing the warmth from his palm, numbing his fingertips. He clenched his hand, but the cold only spread to his wrist. Soth's touch had chilled the dice, he realized. Cursing, Oliver flung them away.

"Seven," Soth said.

Oliver could hardly believe his ears. "I won," he breathed softly, trying to convince himself of his victory. The feeling began to flow back into his hand.

"Not yet," said the Knight of the Black Rose, reaching for the dice. "As dealer, I can kill the roll by throwing double death's-heads."

Soth's words took Oliver unawares, like an assassin's blade in a close alley. And when he looked at the knight, the gambler saw something that finished the murder of his hopes. The leather gauntlet had slipped away from Soth's wrist. The exposed flesh — what little of it remained — hung in scabrous tatters from blackened bones. Whatever the knight was, he most certainly wasn't alive.

Oliver knew then that any dice Lord Soth threw would turn up death's-heads. He was doomed. "No," the sharp blurted before he even realized what he'd said. "You don't get a kill roll."

Lord Soth paused. "What? "

"H-House rules. I own the inn, I can set whatever house rules I want. "Oliver tried to muster a more authoritative tone, but failed miserably. "You should have asked what they were before we smarted the game."

Snarling madly, Azrael charged at Oliver. As the seneschal scrambled across the taproom, his features flowed and blurred like an image viewed through a rainsoaked pane of glass. His face elongated. His nose and mouth lengthened into a snout. Hands transformed into paws that bristled with razor-sharp black claws. Arms and legs thickened until they resembled an animal's limbs more than a man's. And all over his body, coarse fur sprouted in a thick coat. Azrael's features and the striping of his fur marked him as a terrifying admixture of dwarf and giant badger.

Oliver managed to get his sword clear of its scabbard, but not even the sharp's battle-honed agility could bring the blade to the ready before the werebadger vaulted the dice table. Horror-struck, he stared at the mad thing leaping for his throat. A prayer flashed through his thoughts: let me bring my sword to bear before Azrael tears my heart out. At least then I might drag the creature down to death with me.

But Azrael never reached the gambler. As he passed over the center of the table, Lord Soth upended the heavy board and dashed him from the air. The bone rail splintered against the werebadger's skull. He landed in a heap, surrounded by shattered wood and torn felt.

"You're right," the Knight of the Black Rose said, as if the conversation with Oliver had continued uninterrupted. "I should have asked for the rules of the house before wagering."

Soth let the dice slip from his hand onto a chair. They came up death's-heads. "You see why I use this place to lure gamblers in, Azrael. They're much more clever than the drill-dulled military-types who would covet the commission."

The werebadger grunted and struggled to his feet. "And the gamblers you make warden live at least two or three days longer than anyone else you throw against the elves."

Cautiously Oliver backed toward the door, but Soth stopped him with a fiery stare. "You aren't going anywhere," the knight said.

"But the wager," Oliver began.

"Was more than paid when I saved your life from Azrael. "Lord Soth recovered the chain of office from the ruins of the dice table. He held it up and examined it, then turned toward Tisiphone and Unthar. "The inn's charter states that, should the owner of the Iron Warden escape his duty, I am free to choose a replacement from the populace. You two will share the job. Azrael, get them ready to make the journey to Nedragaard Keep."

Unthar opened his cavernous mouth to protest, but Tisiphone silenced him with a somber shake of her head. "There's no way to beat him," she whispered. "Not when he makes the house rules for all of Sithicus."

As the werebadger herded the new wardens of the Iron Hills out into the night, Lord Soth faced Oliver once more. "You are confined to the inn," he said. "I will return in a few weeks — or perhaps a month — to play again for your service. Undoubtedly I will need a new warden by then."

Soth reached out and gripped Oliver's hands tightly. The chill that had radiated from the dice was a touch of the summer sun compared to the bitter, aching cold that Oliver felt in the death knight's grasp. His hands went numb quickly, but not before needle-sharp slivers of pain sliced into his flesh and began a slow, agonizing crawl up his arms.

"In case you have any ideas about gambling the deed away," was all Soth said before he abruptly whirled and strode from the taproom of the Iron Warden.

Oliver guessed the meaning of the knight's obscure statement even before he fumbled the dice into his painracked hands. But he had to test it, had to know for certain what Soth had done to him.

Wincing, the sharp spilled the dice onto a tabletop. Two death's-heads grinned up at him, just as they would each time Oliver Arkwright cast dice for the rest of his short life.