her, and set the platter before her dark eyes, glowing warm in the candlelight. I lifted another cloth to reveal newly polished knives and forks.
Annise didn't know what to do. She was open, honestly charming. She gave me little joys without knowing or understanding how much they meant. I would have told her of the pleasure I got if I thought she wouldn't draw away. Instead, I demonstrated the proper process. Following my lead, she picked up the knife and fork, cut a delicate piece of fish, sticky with a slice of orange, and brought it to her lips. Annise stopped, breathed in the scent, then tasted the fish, luxuriating in the flavor.
I poured the wine into matching glasses while Annise chewed slowly, her eyes closed. Smoke from the candle curled into wreathes around her hair and spiraled toward her throat. The pendant filled me with the same languor as her eating. I reached out to touch it. Her eyes were closed; she wouldn't know, if I was careful. My animals were no longer calm. They were moving back and forth, excited.
Annise breathed deeply. I jerked my hand back just before she opened her eyes. Smiling at me over the rim, she sipped her wine, oblivious. I filled her cup again before she could find words, then finally sat down. Annise motioned me to eat, but the power of the pendant drew away my appetite. I forced myself to swallow anyway.
Some words passed between us, but we were both in different places-elevated-she by the grandeur of my offerings, I by her joy of the moment. My thoughts slipped to the pendant. I couldn't help it. This was what real gamblers had, what kept them apart from the poor more than doors and walls and guards. Everything I'd tasted up until then was nothing but rainwater, impure- the shallows. I wanted more of this power, for it would give me victory over Dumoss and let me keep her.
'What?' she asked.
I was staring at my mantis. My mouth was dry. I'd been muttering. Something needed to be spoken, something deep in my thoughts, something true. It was a gamble to bring it out, but I'd been lucky these past weeks.
'I said… I appreciate you. Just appreciate you.'
I knew no man had ever told her more than that he wanted her. I suspected she heard it often at the casino from pit bosses and gamblers. I could picture them, the same look in their eyes when they glanced from her to the arena, the arena to her. They wouldn't see any difference in the prizes.
She blinked into the candlelight, smoke bringing tears to her eyes. She wiped them away and laughed. 'Eat,' she said.
A single, clean river ran through the city before the soldiers and the Brothers' War. My time then had always been spent working. Pushing vending carts had often taken me to the riverside. There were opportunities to steal moments, wash my face, rinse my aching feet.
Sunlight would make the river silver, sometimes too bright to look at. Stars created a ribbon of sparkling jewels-like Annise-too precious to touch. In the city there were few fish, if any, and nobody tried to catch them except the boys. They threw them back to be caught again.
One day back then the horizon-the mountains- were hidden in a red haze, sunlight angry till it rose overhead, again turning yellow. Birds lifted and flew away. Small animals hid themselves. The boys still caught fish, at least the dead ones that floated on top. That night, the moon burned the same angry red, even overhead. The river was no longer the plane of silver, the band of jewels. It became blood, became a black gash through the city. That was when the first dust fell.
I remember when all the birds left, streets vacant of their calls and songs. Everyone felt the danger, even with weak magic-everyone in the city had some. The sun stayed red till it set. The sky had no stars. The dust fell more thickly.
The great wave of heat and wind from the mountains happened when I was out with a cart. The morning was warm, nobody was buying, staying indoors, protected, they thought. I had wanted to wash my face. The water from a public fountain had stopped, clogged with dust. There were dead animals, squirrels in trees, mice, young birds who hadn't the strength to fly or sing. My gaze went to the mountains, wind rustling my hair. I could feel a power drawing near, outside my body, inside the Flow. At the time I knew little about it. There may have been a scream.
Then I was knocked over by wind, heat, and dust. Clouds coughed up the flesh of mountains, ashes choked the sky. Roaring power shot through the city, scattering everything. This was the power, we learned, of the Brothers' War. This was the aftermath of destruction.
Days and days passed when the only sound was the howl of outrage, of wind and dust and rocks pelting buildings, devouring the essence of the city, drinking its life. What remained collapsed from its own weight. Buildings fell, some overnight, and nobody could walk the streets. I huddled beneath dusty stairs for three days without food or water, staring into thick, rushing air. Things crawled over me. I didn't move.
The city was wrecked. The storm, as if alive, moved to find fresh prey. Memories of the end are cloudy now, but this memory is clear. Something changed, tore away the mantle of my previous life. I was determined to live. I reached down and by a shear force of will I survived. At the end of those three days I had found power-new, confused power relegated by luck. Nothing after that was ever the same.
Before it could recover, the city was set upon by soldiers leaving the Brothers' War. They took everything of worth. Like the wind, the soldiers cut a line from the city's past to the city's bent future. It took a long time to rebuild from the initial plunder.
I noticed a change in myself, as well as the city and the people. The end of the Brothers' War started smaller wars all over the world-fortunate against unfortunate, rich against poor, those with magic against those without.
Crawling, I had returned to collect the remains of the cart. I still wanted to wash my face. Most of the animals were dead, more bodies in the streets. Reaching into the river, I felt new, ugly sensations of death, failure, and hatred. The river was gone. My hand was covered in riverbed muck, gray ooze-a cold, sucking, solid mass that slid down my fingers toward my arm as if it were hungry. I shivered then, though the air was uncomfortably warm. The mass fell away from my hand with a hard shake. It left behind not a smell but a strange memory of weakness, fear, and failure.
I buried my rat now in the river muck. I'd had it with me for five days. The riverbed was still moist, though nobody knew why. There was little rain. All these memories of the city returned with the failure of my magic, my control. I had matched the rat against another player's snake at one of the bigger houses. The snake was fast, but my control over the rat was faster. The duel went on for some time, and I never let up. Then, when the rat was finally ready to strike, I lost control, just for a moment. The Flow stopped, the luck changed. One moment was long enough for the snake to strike. I had lost for the first time in a long time.
The other player had figured me out, had figured out my magic. I had seen this man several times, watching me. He was dressed in rich blue, gold lace at the cuffs and collar, the color of a pit boss's clothes. Gold lace meant he was from the casino of Dumoss. If he had been sent against me, Dumoss was a greater enemy than I suspected.
The little cage and animal sank from sight. With it went a measure of my blood, my life. Annise was doing much better, luck from the pendant served her well- better than I feared. My failure was like the death of the city, the death of my hope, my life.
I spent five days alone brooding over the death of my rat. When she came home, I was already gone. When she could find me, I told her I had somewhere important to go. I could not meet her eyes. She knew about my loss because she could see a cage was missing. She said nothing, we never questioned one another. She did not want to be touched, I did not want to be questioned. I longed to touch her, the pendant. I was sure I could have won if it had been with me.
There was something in my magic, a weakness, something the player in blue found by watching. I sat at the edge of the dead river, staring at the mountains. What did he see? Dust fell on me at night. I ferreted into old buildings, avoided the gaze of the shuffling poor. They angered me, with their eyes filled with pity.
They would not pity me if I had control, if I had won. Control was everything. My control was imperfect, and the man in blue knew it. It didn't matter to him if the Flow changed. It only affected me. I couldn't find an answer to my question. How would I live without her if I couldn't win?
