Game Play (12 page)

Delrael lost three
more games of tic-tac-toe to Journeyman, tied one, and won one. Vailret played
idly with his own set of dice. Tallin dropped down into the clearing, holding
two quail. "Quite an improvement over standard pack food, especially stuff
that's been replenished by a spell too many times."

Bryl looked miffed,
but the prospect of fresh meat seemed to brighten him. He changed his mind,
though, when he was assigned the task of plucking feathers. Tallin spitted the
meat and left it to cook above the flames of the campfire, bowed over the heat
on thin green branches. The smell was deliciously inviting as the quail sizzled
in the smoke. They could hear the meat hissing against the burning wood.

"Is it
finger-lickin' good?" Journeyman asked, watching them eat. They cleaned
every bone on the two carcasses. "I can't believe you ate the
whole
thing!"

After the meal,
Tallin piled wood on the campfire so it would burn all night. Journeyman remained
on watch as the others brought out blankets, settling down on the leaves and
forest grass to sleep. Bryl brushed branches away and moved three times before
he found a comfortable spot. Tallin lay by himself in a light sleep.

Delrael propped his
head against the smooth bark of a maple tree. He bent his knees, rubbing the
pliable
kennok
wood of his left leg, and kept his feet warm by the fire as
the autumn air cooled down for the night. The taste of the meal remained in his
mouth, and he could smell the smoke from the low campfire. He looked at the
young ylvan beside them and felt safe and content as he drifted off into sleep.

Gairoth listened to
the pounding of drums inside his head. Pain made the bones in his skull
vibrate. Leaves and dead grass stuck to his face. He pawed them away, smearing
his cheeks and skin with muddy markings.

The ogre looked
around the hollow. Delroth was gone. The torn, discarded sack showed him that
the little ylvan had also fled
―
and Gairoth's sack was ruined. He
had killed an old traveler for it, though he found little treasure inside. Now
he would never find another sack.

Dark, speechless
anger bubbled up in him, increasing the pain in his head. He sat up, holding
hands against his temples to squeeze the pain back inside.

Rognoth, his pet
dragon, was gone, chased far to the north by another dragon brought by Delroth.
Bryl the magic user had taken away Gairoth's shiny diamond Air Stone. All the
rest of his treasure was gone, too, after his Maw had chased him away from the
Stronghold.

And when he had
tried to go home, Gairoth found a giant river right where his cesspools had
been. Right where his
home
had been.

The ogre felt
outraged, betrayed, saddened. The ylvan called him a Loser
―
maybe
that was true. But it was all Delroth's fault. Gairoth pounded both fists into
the soft ground, then clenched them in a stranglehold around the end of his
club.

The ogre climbed to
his feet. He had nothing else to do now.

His teeth hurt. His
skin hurt. The inside of his head hurt. All of him hurt. Everything had been so
nice before. Before Delroth had come.

Gairoth's mind
fixed on the idea. He would take a quest of his own. It sounded right to him, a
straightforward solution, something he could concentrate on and never forget.
He would follow Delroth, and find him, and smash him with the club. BAM!

He stood up and,
his stomach growling with hunger, he tossed aside the torn and empty sack. It
had been a good sack. Gairoth found the footprints of the group along one of
the clear quest-paths.

The ogre followed
them.

Tallin woke the
others more than an hour before sunrise. He rubbed his little hands together in
the crisp air and blew steam from his mouth. "Come on, let's get
going." He nudged Bryl on the ground. "We've got a hex or two of desolation
to cover. I've never been out of the forest before."

Bryl rubbed his
eyes. "Whose quest is this, anyway?"

Vailret held his
hands over the still-warm embers of the fire. He flexed fingers that were red
with cold.

"He's
right." Delrael got up, stretched, then folded his blanket. "The terrain
should be easy to follow."

Together, the five
of them crossed the abrupt line that severed the hexagon of forest terrain from
the desolation ahead. The lush health of the forest disappeared entirely,
leaving the ground stricken with blight, dying away into a wasteland. The soil
became barren and rocky. Stalks of prairie grass stood in brown patches,
dotting the ground.

The coming dawn
left a curtain of deep shadow on the flat terrain. The dark Spectre Mountains
were visible in the distance as a black jagged silhouette blocking the rising
sun. A few stars still prickled the deep blue dome of sky.

As they walked
deeper into the hexagon, the dead earth became cluttered with oddly identical
boulders, as if something had cut them out of the dirt and scattered them
across the plain. The flat ground had a strange, patterned look ahead of them.

In the dim light,
and with his poor eyesight, Vailret stumbled upon a series of deep hexagonal
wells rimmed by a low mound six feet across. He caught himself, called out to
the others, and stared down. The sharply defined hole plunged into the
blackness of catacombs beneath the terrain.

"I can't tell
what it is," he said.

Delrael picked up a
rock and tossed it down. They heard it strike the bottom a moment later.
"Not very deep," Delrael said. He tossed another stone at an angle.
It pinged against the walls, but gave no real hint about the depth of the
tunnels.

"Could be just
a labyrinth left over from the early days of the Game," Vailret said.
"Back when characters did nothing but wander around in dungeons and
catacombs, looking for monsters to fight and treasure to steal."

Tallin pointed
across the desolation as the daylight grew brighter. "Do you see those
other openings? I can make out at least a dozen more holes scattered
around."

They moved ahead,
and the wells became more and more frequent until they seemed like pores on the
surface of the land, connected by an underground network of tunnels.
"We've got a whole hexagon of this to cover?" Bryl said.

"Now I don't
see why any character would want to leave the forest terrain," Tallin
said.

"All this is
starting to make me remember something," Vailret said. He slowed his pace,
taking time to look around.

"Come on, I
want to get out of this place," Bryl said. "Something unpleasant
could crawl out of those holes."

"Don't worry.
Be happy," Journeyman said.

"We're stuck
anyway," Delrael said. "According to the map, there's another hex of
desolation after this one, and we can't go any farther than that today."

Vailret nodded.
"It's in Rule #5."

Bryl bit his lip
and said nothing. He pulled the folds of his blue cloak tight around him. The
orange dawn behind the Spectre Mountains looked like fire across the
desolation.

Then, between a
cluster of the hexagonal wells, they came across a place where the dusty ground
was churned and broken. A glossy dark shape lay half buried in the earth.

Journeyman scooped
dirt off the polished black form. "Holy ant farms, Batman!" The golem
stood back, showing the uncovered carcass to the others.

Bryl gasped.
Vailret squinted down, as if trying to remember something he had read. Delrael
and Tallin were hard pressed to remain silent.

They gazed upon the
dead hulk of an ant ten feet long. Its antennae appeared broken, but the hard
exoskeleton retained its shape like a perfect suit of armor.

"Do you
remember stories about the Anteds?" Vailret swallowed hard, "We could
be in a lot of trouble here."

Tallin kicked at
the carcass. "This one's dead enough."

"Yes, but
we're standing on a whole
colony
of them." Vailret turned around, but
the growing light was not enough for him to make out anything. "We may be
better off running back to the last hex of forest terrain and going around the
long way. We've got to make up our minds fast."

"I have a bad
feeling about this," Journeyman said.

Delrael studied the
gleaming black hulk. It wasn't exactly like an ant, but had stockier legs and
more powerful joints to accomodate the increased size. He could kill one or two
of the giant insects, given a few advantages, good luck, and time to fight.

But he couldn't
take on an entire colony, not even with the assistance of his companions.

He looked across
the desolation and a chill feeling went up his spine.

He could see no end
to the colony ahead. Every step they took, every movement they made, sent
tell-tale vibrations to other Anteds waiting below.

A loud chirp echoed
from one of the holes behind them, inviting an answer closer to their left.
Another chirp sounded behind them. The travelers drew themselves together,
looking around. Tallin nocked an arrow in his crossbow. Delrael pulled out his
sword, and Bryl removed his two Stones.

Journeyman balled
his fists into two battering rams.

"It's Howdy
Doody time," the golem said.

The Anted chirps
grew louder and more frequent, closer to them.

Chapter 7:

CATACOMBS OF THE
ANTEDS

"All
characters play games: dice games, games of skill, role-playing games. These
things are for our amusement. But we also play power games, games for conquest,
dominance, and victory
―
games of life and death."

―
Preface,
The Book
of Rules

Delrael knew they
would never make it across the colony that filled the open, desolate hexagon.
They could sense the Anteds out there, coming nearer through the tunnels
beneath them.

He pulled out his
sword, he bent his knees, he narrowed his eyes.

Adrenalin pumped into
his bloodstream, and time slowed down. His
kennok
-wood leg felt completely a
part of him, ready to perform. He swallowed in a dry throat, prepared for
battle. The excitement of the Game filled him.

"Wonderful,"
Tallin said, "I leave my forest to get eaten by bugs." The ylvan
placed a small arrow in his crossbow and stood beside Delrael. His green-splotched
forest camouflage made him look conspicuous on the rocky brown ground.

"Bryl, get
ready with your Stones," Delrael said, not looking at the old half-Sorcerer.
He swung his blade in the air, loosening his arm.

Bryl bit his lip
and said nothing. He clacked the four-sided diamond and the eight-sided ruby
together in the palm of his hand. His skin turned pale with fear.

Vailret pulled out
his own short sword and stared down at the blade. He sighed and imitated
Delrael's stance. Delrael knew his younger cousin lacked confidence, and
interest, in fighting. Maybe that was why Vailret always wanted to plan things
so far ahead of time, to minimize conflicts.

Delrael heard a
clattering in the holes near them, a strange inhuman sound. A glistening black
head rose up, waving antennae like stiff leather whips. Serrated jaws opened
and closed like sabers on well-oiled hinges. The ant head swivelled back and
forth, as if scanning them.

"Sufferin'
succotash!" Journeyman said.

The Anted used
powerful jointed legs to heave itself over the rim of the hexagonal mound. Two
more insects climbed out of nearby holes. Orange dawn light flashed on their
polished chitin. The insects chirped together with a pounding, grating rhythm.
Other Anteds drew nearer.

Acting on his own
desperation, Bryl took the Fire Stone, closed his eyes, and rolled it at his
feet. "Give me luck this time!"

The eight-sided
ruby landed in the soft dirt with the "4" facing up.

Bryl clapped his
hands and snatched the Fire Stone back, calling up the spell.

He surrounded the
five of them with a ring of fire that bloomed up from the rocky ground, bright
and deadly, sealing them off from the Anteds. The nearest insects chittered and
reared back.

"Safe as the
Stronghold walls!" Bryl said.

"Would you
mind explaining what good it does?" Tallin asked. "The Anteds just
have to wait you out."

Bryl avoided the
question. "I've got four more spells after this one."

Delrael paced back
and forth, holding his sword. Behind the flames another shape emerged from a
tunnel opening, moving among the milling Anted forms. It looked human, or
nearly so, and rode on the back of one of the insects. The part-human creature
let out a series of guttural noises, poor imitations of the Anted chirps.

"What is that
disgusting thing?" Tallin dropped his voice so Delrael could barely hear
it over the din of insect chirps and the roar of the flames.

"Is it a human
character?"

The figure gestured
and made more noises, as if barking orders. The bright flames made too many
long shadows in the dim morning, masking out details.