'Wasn't me,' Bottle began, then fell quiet. Gods below, even for me that was lame. Try something better. 'Just looking out for you, Sergeant. Your shaved knuckle in the hole, that's me.'
'Hah, where have I heard that before, eh Quick?'
'Quiet, you two. We're going across now. Grab belts…'
Bottle blinked, and found himself on another deck, and directly ahead, steps leading down. Abyss take me, that was fast. Fast and… appalling. Quick Ben waved them into his wake as he descended, ducking the frame, then halting three strides down the corridor, knocking upon a door to his left. It opened at once.
T'amber, the eyes that gave her her name scanning the three men cramped in the narrow corridor. Then she stepped back.
The Adjunct stood behind her chair at the map-table. The rest were seated, and Bottle stared wildly from one to the next. Fist Keneb.
Apsalar. Kalam Mekhar.
A low moan from Fiddler.
'Sergeant,' the Adjunct said, 'you have your players.'
Players?
Oh.
Oh no.
'I really don't think this is a good idea,' the sergeant said.
'Perhaps,' the Adjunct replied.
'I agree,' T'amber said. 'Or, rather, my participation… as a player.
As I said earlier, Tavore-'
'Nonetheless,' the Adjunct cut in, drawing out the empty chair opposite the one reserved for Fiddler and sitting herself down on Keneb's left. She pulled her gloves free. 'Explain the rules, please.'
Keneb watched as Fiddler cast helpless, desperate looks to both Kalam and Quick Ben, but neither would meet his eyes, and both were clearly miserable. Then the sergeant slowly walked over to the last chair. He settled into it. 'That's just it, Adjunct, there ain't no rules, except those I make up as I go.'
'Very well. Begin.'
Fiddler scratched at his greying beard, his eyes fixing on T'amber who sat to the Adjunct's left, directly opposite Keneb. 'This is your Deck,' he said, lifting it into view and setting it down on the tabletop. 'It has new cards in it.'
'Your point?' the young woman demanded.
'Just this. Who in Hood's name are you?'
A shrug. 'Does it matter?'
A grunt from Kalam Mekhar on Keneb's right. Beyond the assassin, on the same side and immediately to Fiddler's left was Apsalar. Bottle was on the sergeant's right, with the High Mage beside him. The only one who really doesn't belong is me. Where's Blistig? Nok? Temul, Nil and Nether? 'Last chance,' Fiddler said to the Adjunct. 'We stop this now-'
'Begin, Sergeant.'
'Bottle, find us some wine.'
'Sergeant?'
'First rule. Wine. Everybody gets a cup. Except the dealer, he gets rum. Go to it, Bottle.'
As the young soldier rose Fiddler collected the cards. 'Player on dealer's right has to serve drinks during the first hand.' He flung out a card, face-down, and it slid crookedly to halt in front of Quick Ben. 'High Mage has last card. Last card's dealt out first, but not shown until the end.'
Bottle came back with cups. He set the first one down in front of the Adjunct, then T'amber, Keneb, Quick, Kalam, Apsalar, Fiddler and finally one into the place before his empty chair. As he returned with two jugs, one of wine and the other Falari rum, Fiddler held up a hand and halted him.
In quick succession the sergeant flung out cards, matching the order Bottle had used in setting down the cups.
Suddenly, eight face-up cards marked the field, and Fiddler, gesturing Bottle over with the rum, began talking. 'Dealer gets Soldier of High House Life but it's bittersweet, meaning it's for him and him alone, given this late hour. Empty chair gets Weaver of Life and she needs a bath but nobody's surprised by that. So we got two Life's to start.'
Fiddler watched as Bottle poured rum into his cup. 'And that's why Kalam's looking at an Unaligned. Obelisk, the Sleeping Goddess – you' re getting a reversed field, Kal, sorry but there's nothing to be done for it.' He downed his rum and held out his cup again, interrupting Bottle's efforts to fill the others with wine. 'Apsalar's got Assassin of High House Shadow, oh, isn't that a surprise. It's the only card she gets-'
'You mean I win?' she asked, one brow lifting sardonically.
'And lose, too. Nice move, interrupting me like that, you're catching on. Now, nobody else say a damned thing unless you want to up the ante.' He drank down his second cupful. 'Poor Quick Ben, he's got Lifeslayer to deal with, and that puts him in a hole, but not the hole he thinks he's in – a different hole. Now T'amber, she's opened the game with that card. Throne, and it's shifting every which way. The pivot card, then-'
'What's a pivot card?' Bottle asked, finally sitting down.
'Bastard – knew I couldn't trust you. It's the hinge, of course.
Finish that wine – you got to drink rum now. You're a sharp one, ain't you? Now Fist Keneb, well, that's a curious one. Lord of Wolves, the throne card of High House War, and aren't they looking baleful – Fist, where's Grub hiding these days?'
'On Nok's ship,' Keneb replied, bewildered and strangely frightened.
'Well, that knocks you outa the game, though you still get four more cards, since we've made a course correction and the northeast headland's rising up two pegs to starboard. In seventy heartbeats we' ll be sliding closest to that rocky coast, and Nok's ship will be even closer, and Grub will dive overboard. He's got three friends living in the caves in the cliff and here are their cards-' Three more skidded out to just beyond the centre of the table. 'Crown, Sceptre, Orb. Hmm, let's ignore those for now.'
Keneb half-rose. 'Diving overboard?'
'Relax, he'll be back. So, we get to the Adjunct's card. House of War, Guardians of the Road, or the Dead – title's uncertain so take your pick.' He threw another card and it slid up beside it. 'Oponn. As I thought. Decisions yet to be made. Will it be the Push or the Pull?
And what's that got to do with this one?' A skitter, ending up in the middle, opposite both Kalam and Quick Ben – 'Herald of High House Death. A distinctly inactive and out-of-date card in this field, but I see a Rusty Gauntlet-'
'A what?' demanded Kalam Mekhar.
'Right here before me. A new drink that Bottle in his inebriated state just invented. Rum and wine – half and half, soldier, fill us up – you too, that's what you get for making that face.'
Keneb rubbed at his own face. He'd taken but a single mouthful of the wine, but he felt drunk. Hot in here. He started as four cards appeared in a row in front of the one already before him.
'Spinner of Death, Queen of Dark, Queen of Life and, ho, the King in Chains. Like hopping stones across a stream, isn't it? Expecting to see your wife any time soon, Fist? Forget it. She's set you aside for an Untan noble, and my, if it isn't Exent Hadar – I bet he kept his gaze averted back then, probably ignored you outright, that's both guilt and smugness, you know. Must have been the weak chin that stole her heart – but look at you, sir, you look damned relieved and that's a hand that tops us all and even though you were out when it comes to winning you're back in when it comes to losing, but in this case you win when you lose, so relax.'
'Well,' muttered Bottle, 'hope I nev'win one a theez'ands.'
'No,' Fiddler said to him, 'you got it easy. She plays and she takes, and so-' A card clattered before the owl- eyed soldier. 'Deathslayer.
You can sleep now, Bottle, you're done as done for the night.'
The man's eyes promptly closed and he slid down from his chair, the piece of furniture scraping back. Keneb
