Chapter 11 #2
The man across from them had cropped, deep ash locks that fell around his face and sharp features.
The last man beside them wore an even shorter rich chestnut that matched his sun-kissed skin.
How had it grazed his flesh in this grim, frozen wasteland?
I had yet to see the sky any tone beyond shades of gray.
“I rolled a four and you know it,” the ash-haired man said.
“It rolled off the Singer’s damned table—that doesn’t count!” the woman hissed.
The I’phri slammed his hand against the table. “I—” His gaze fell on me. “We have a guest.”
The other man got up and stole a chair from a table with a slumped-over I’phri. “Have a seat. You’re welcome to join us, rider. Are you also seeking to drown the sins of the day?”
I swallowed and nodded, taking the chair. I was too deep to walk away, but their friendliness unnerved me. Aelen assured me these people would put a knife in my gut—if given the chance.
He slid a glass in my direction, with dark wine that came up to the rim. “Drinks on me, so long as you play a hand. Buy in is the usual.” But his stare never left me, even as he began shuffling. “I’ve not seen you around the stables before.”
“I work around the back. I’m still getting my legs.”
They all laughed, but the shrill sound grated on me. “Pray that the accursed star doesn’t steal your limbs before you find them.” Another round of laughter.
“The accursed star,” I mused, peering into the reflection in the wine. It wasn’t me staring back, but an I’phri woman. The reflection’s skin paled.
The I’phri man across from me wagged a finger. “Don’t say his name. None of us can stomach it,” he said, and started doling out cards.
The man beside him pointed at the woman. “He took Lilara’s sworn.” He tipped back his wine glass, gulping desperately. “Her partner.”
She promptly picked up her glass and downed it in a single gulp. “Why do you feel the need to announce that to every I’phri you meet, Nenlyn?”
Nenlyn chuckled, but the man beside him merely reclined and ran his long finger along the edge of the wine glass. “Now, now, you two. Not when we have guests.”
“Guest. Singular,” Lilara corrected, eyeing her hand.
I looked mine over, and while the symbols differed from what we played in the Underquarter, it only took a minute or two to figure them out.
I had a decent hand. Not great, or even winnable, but I had a better gambling face, and that’s all that mattered.
The game began, not with a bang but with daggered stares and venom-laced smiles as we played.
Take a card, discard one, lay one down, and hope it’s better than the contenders, or completes a hand.
Otherwise, you would have to bow out before the price became too great.
For each round, the stakes doubled, whatever they were.
I was in too deep to ask, and no coin littered the table, so my mind played through the various scenarios, and kept landing on them pulling a knife on the loser.
I knew how to play, and play well, yet feared the dice.
You’d add whatever you rolled to the painted dots in the corner, hoping it would match your other cards or create a perfect hand.
The rolls I needed were too variable, so I’d have to rely on other means to ply my way.
Mostly, I needed to keep the game going long enough to get the information that Aelen was hesitant—or rather, outright refused to tell me.
The only issue was finding it without giving away my biggest tell: the identity hiding beneath Aelen’s thinly veiled enchantment.
Only two rounds in, Lilara threw down her hand. “You’re forging your rolls, Taeryl.”
Redness flared across his cheeks. “How? If I had the magic of Maelindiir, I’d hardly be playing in a tavern.” He laid down a card and cocked his head. “Pay up. It’s not my fault you’ve lost. I’ve already given you a single round, free of penance.”
Maelindiir? Who’s that?
“It won’t be that bad, Lilara. It’s only the first round!”
She scoffed, and I expected them to pull a blade, but she unbuckled her leather jack of plate, tossing it to the floor.
Then began undoing her undershirt. I gripped the table so tightly my knuckles went pale as the outside snow and twice as cold.
When she slid her shirt away and bared her chest, I thought my fingers might splinter the damned wood.
I’d found my way into the middle of a round of strip poker. With people who want me dead. And a bracelet tucked just beneath my sleeve that would give me away. Worse, my hand now leaned toward terrible with every awful roll.
My heart drummed in my ears—a loathsome sound. Every peek at my cards didn’t make them better, taking me further from my goal of information, and clouding my judgment. I bit my lip until it bled, and then some. Anything to keep my face from changing.
“How are those cards looking? You look so grim,” Nenlyn said with a toothy grin, eyeing me
My heart dropped. Too late. I might as well throw down and show them my hand. But I couldn’t. Taking off my shirt would end up with blood being spilled. Worse, for all my twenty-eight years, no man had seen my bare form, and I’d be damn sure my first wasn’t in a tavern of I’phri. I wouldn’t lose.
“I’ve been mourning your eventual loss, and it depresses me.” I fanned myself briefly with the cards and forced a smile. “I’ll sing your elegy to the rest of the riders.”
“Wow, I’m almost impressed.”
Lilara crossed her arms and glared. “Hurry up, I’m cold.”
The game continued with me rolling well enough and refusing to let the smile drop.
The small round table felt closer to a refectory as I panned everyone, searching for weapons.
I only had the small paring knife that always found its way to my hip.
The blade was enough to maim someone, but not to kill three I’phri.
Teryn wiped his brow after he rolled a three. “Godsdamnit.” He needed either a two, four, or six. Really, any even number would do. Almost anything was better than a three.
On cue, Lilara leaned onto her elbows, peering at his hand. “Singers, I hate the day. I’d rather be knee-deep in dragon’s droppings than here.”
But his lips curled into a wicked grin. “Go ahead. Go back to those stables, Lilara. Let the forest consume you, it might even be kind enough to peel back your flesh first. Anything to quiet you about my dice rolls.”
Nenlyn looked past the two of them, tipping his goblet in my direction. “Are you going to share a name? Or should we refer to you as the beautifully spoken, yet nameless rider?”
I swallowed, once again hit with a wave of nausea that rocked me in the chair—and I nearly fell out of it when the shadows slid among the walls.
I blinked, and they stilled. I couldn’t peel my gaze away.
“Lorelana,” I repeated, in the way I had a thousand times.
With no titles, no fanfare, and not an ounce of regality.
Nenlyn blew out his cheeks and tapped the goblet, producing a hollow ring. “That name feels almost familiar.” He shared a look with his companions before shrugging it off. My pulse ticked up.
“Must be the wine,” he shrugged.
Taryn didn’t last beyond two more rounds before he tossed his cards across the table and withdrew with no small amount of complaining. When we met him with disdain, he reluctantly removed his jack and undershirt, and then squeezed himself out of his tight leather pants.
He adjusted his thin linen underwear. They left little to the imagination. A brief image of Aelen in them flashed across my mind, but I shoved it away and threatened it with my measly pairing knife.
Do not darken my mind with that image ever again.
Nenyn resumed as if there weren’t two half-naked I’phri beside us, and rolled. The only thing that would help him was a four. The die spun and settled, and those four dots seared into my soul.
Four.
He broke into raucous laughter, rocking on the chair’s heels.
I ground my teeth. “I’m not taking off my clothes.”
“Singers, that’s not the price of a loss, it’s a kiss. Doesn’t have to be me, you can go for any of us, but be aware—” he pointed to Lilara. “She’s a filthy and cold woman. If I were you, I’d pick one of us.”
My cheeks blazed like a wildfire, and I feared it would consume me. But as he stared at me and continued to rock, his moving shadow began to ripple, like someone had dropped a stone into it. It stretched upward, but no one else noticed.
Aelen grabbed me from behind, and I spun to face the pallid I’phri. “Why are you here? We need to go,” he whispered so low only I could hear. His fingers clawed deep into my shoulder as he wrenched me upward.
“Well? Pick one of us, we’re waiting,” Nenlyn said.
Teryn shivered, wrapping his arms around himself. “Hurry. She’s correct, it’s chilly.”
My pulse knocked in my veins, and my mind emptied. I pointed behind to Aelen. “Him. I’ll kiss him.”
“Kiss who? The wall? Or the tepid air?”
I glanced over my shoulder, but the digging fingers were gone, as was Aelen. There wasn’t a hint he’d ever been there, and the ache of his touch had already faded.
A cold sweat broke out across my spine, and I searched for words and air but found none.
“You look ill,” Teryn sneered.
“Let’s do this at a later time. Meet us by the stables for another round. You should go lie down before the ceremony begins,” Nenlyn added.
I didn’t have to be told twice and fled from the stifling table and cramped tavern.
The winter air hit me, but I could only focus on the bustling crowd that formed.
Before I was swept away, Aelen grabbed me by the back of my leathers and tugged me away from the center.
“This is beginning to get dangerous. We need to leave.”
How had he disappeared, then reappeared with demands?
“Where did you go? You were supposed to kiss me!”
His neck nearly snapped when his gaze locked onto me. “What?”
“Nothing,” I said, searching for the right words. “I need more information. Are you going to give it to me?”
The crowd became deafening. I tried to pull my arm from his grip, but he was relentless. “Fine, but not here. Do you not see what danger you’re putting yourself in?”
“Not when you won’t tell me a godsdamn thing.”
But silence settled across the crowd, and everyone began kneeling in the street. We were the only ones left standing, and he yanked me to the ground. “Shit.”
His breath hitched as a few scantily clad I’phri descended upon the center of the square. When a dark-robed I’phri man turned to the gathering, Aelen wrapped an arm around me and shoved me against his chest.
The man loomed near the center sculptures and gazed at us with solemn acceptance. “Rectorindel Maelindiir has decreed today that we remember what we lost, and the sins of centuries past. Today, our gods have come to die.”
My stomach twisted and churned as I whispered up to Aelen. “We need to go.”
“It’s too late. The forest is coming.”