Game Play (5 page)

Tyrone set down a
plate of bread chunks he had cut from the middle of the loaf. "It's good
―
try it. Have I ever let you down?"

"Yes,"
Melanie and Scott said in unison.

"Oh, just try
it."

David sounded gloomy
when he spoke. "Are you
sure
we want to keep playing?" Melanie
caught an undercurrent of hesitation in his voice. She didn't even feel like
speaking to him. He made her frightened and angry at the same time.

She uncovered the
map, draping the damp blanket on a chair. The blue line of the Barrier River
stood out like a scar, reminding them what had happened the week before.

"What's going
to happen this week?" he asked. "Are you sure you're not afraid?"

"I'm not
afraid," Melanie said.

Scott could barely
keep his eyes off the blue line that had appeared by itself the week before.
"I'm not afraid really, either." He frowned. "But I'm very
curious to see if anything else happens."

"We pretty
much finished up Mel's adventure last week, with the dragon being killed and
all," Tyrone said. "What are we going to start with?"

"There's more
to the adventure than that," David said.

"A lot
more." Melanie realized she had snapped at him.

"Come on,
guys. Make nice." Scott kept his voice down, then caught himself.

"I'm going to
send my characters on a quest to the east," Melanie said.

"Delrael,
Vailret, and Bryl
―
the usual bunch."

"For what?
What are they going to do?" David asked.

"They have to
find out about that Scartaris monster you sent against them. No better way than
to go there themselves."

"I'll squash
them. I've got so much to put in their way."

Melanie stiffened.
"Yes, but you can't know they're coming unless one of
your
characters encounters them. By the rules. Just because you know what's going on
yourself, David, doesn't mean your characters will know."

She tapped her
fingers together. "And speaking of that, I want to introduce a new
character tonight. It's a golem." She looked at the map, but in the bright
light over the kitchen table she could not tell which hexagon she had
repainted. "I'm going to have him encounter my characters in Tyrone's section."

"You can't
just do that!" David stood up.

"Why not? She
hasn't introduced anybody new in a long time." Tyrone took a sip of his
soda. "And we've never played a golem character before."

"I rolled all
the details already. Here's a printout of his statistics." Melanie passed
around a sheet of paper with numbers jotted down in columns. "His name is
going to be Journeyman."

"You should do
that when we're around." David frowned at the paper, the numbers.

Melanie made a
disgusted sound. "Come on, David. I'm just saving us time. You think I'm
trying to cheat or something? Look at the scores."

"I think a
golem would be neat," Tyrone said.

Apparently seeing
he wouldn't win any arguments on the subject, David shrugged. "Doesn't
matter you know. Not against Scartaris."

"It
might," Melanie said with a slight smile and looked at the map in the
light, tracing the line of the Barrier River, the sections of terrain between
her characters and David's ruined portion of Gamearth. She hoped her plan would
work.

She distributed new
printouts of the log sheets. She kept track of every week's game in her
father's computer. Over the years she had compiled a three-ring binder, a
book-length journal of all their games and adventures.

They glanced at the
new pages and shuffled them aside, except Scott stopped, picked up his copy,
and stared down at it. "Hey, when did that happen, Mel?"

"What?"

David blinked at
his printout and turned pale. He pressed his jaws together.

Tyrone looked at
Melanie's copy as he reached for his dip. "This says that Bryl's got the
Fire Stone. And what's this? 'Enrod came to destroy the land with the Fire
Stone. He tried to cross the Barrier River on a raft and was stopped by the
return of the Deathspirits, who cursed him to journey back and forth across the
River forever. They presented his Fire Stone to Tareah, who gave it to Bryl in
his quest.' Interesting, Mel, but ... well, shouldn't we have
played
it?"

Everyone looked at
Melanie. She blinked her eyes, baffled. "But ...this isn't something I
wrote up at all."

Scott made his
mouth a straight line. "Nobody else has access to your Dad's computer,
Melanie."

David sighed and
put both elbows on the table. He looked pale and afraid. "Of course it
happened that way! You know it's right." He stared at them, then shook his
head. "Didn't you guys
dream
it? It was so vivid I woke up
sweating.

"I could see
Enrod. I could hear what he was thinking about blasting all the trees around
the Stronghold, and building his raft and crossing the River." Sweat
appeared on his forehead; he brushed it away in impatience. "And those big
black hooded things coming up and yelling doom and gloom at him and taking away
the Fire Stone. You had to dream the same thing."

"I don't
remember my dreams," Scott said.

Tyrone scratched
his cheek below his ear. "You know, now that you mention it, I do remember
something like that. And it was weird because it wasn't
me
in the dream.
Yeah, I remember it now."

Melanie recalled
the dream too, like a vivid slap in the face. "There's more going on here
than I thought." She felt a perplexed hope, but she didn't know what to do
with it. "If the Deathspirits came back, what about the Earthspirits?"

Scott pursed his
lips. Melanie watched him; he became very uncomfortable when he didn't know how
to explain things. "Wait a minute
―
I thought we decided not
to play the Spirits. They were gone for good because they were too much for us
to handle."

"The game is
starting to play itself," David insisted. "It's coming alive. It's
out of control.
This
is reality
―
" he slapped a palm on the
tabletop. Their glasses of soda and the dice jingled on the table.

"We have to
stop it!" The urgency in his voice was frightening. "Let's all agree,
all right?" David's eyes pleaded with them. "We can try a trivia game
or something if you still want to keep meeting on Sunday nights. Let's just
stop
this
game."

Melanie swallowed
hard and drew herself up. In annoyance, she flicked her hair behind her ear.

"If it's truly
coming alive, David, then it's a wonderful, magical thing. Something here is
greater than we ever dreamed of. We have no right to kill it."

She snatched the
dice on the table. "Let's get started."

Chapter 3:

ACROSS THE BARRIER
RIVER

"When
embarking on a quest, characters travel primarily on foot, according to the
guidelines set forth in Rule #5 and the accompanying tables.

However, characters
shall be free to use any other available transportation to speed them on their
way."

―
The Book of
Rules

Though important
quests usually started at dawn, Vailret, Delrael, and Bryl set out from the
gates of the Stronghold in the dark hours before morning. The near-autumn air
carried a cold snap, and the stars shone bright and sharp.

On the crest of
Steep Hill, the Stronghold overlooked the terrain all around, the hexagonal
fields, the rapid stream that rushed along the hex-line.

A double-walled
stockade surrounded the main buildings, defenses that had withstood many
attacks and fell only once, to Gairoth the ogre.

Vailret stretched
his arms back, felt the warmth of his jerkin and the woollen sweater wrapped
around it. He had not gotten much sleep, and his muscles ached
―
but it felt good. Vailret ran his fingers through straw-colored hair, tangled
from tossing and turning all night.

Delrael moved about
with energy and excitement, obviously eager to be off again. He was a character
of action who hated to ponder things until all spontaneity was gone. Of course,
he often got himself into trouble because he never thought about what he was
doing. He bore a sturdy sword from the weapons storehouse and left the bow and
arrows behind this time.

Tareah waited with
Vailret's mother Siya at the main gates to see them off. Beside them stood the
old bald veteran Tarne, awake and alert with bright eyes.

When Sardun's
daughter waved good-bye, Vailret felt amazed at how she changed in the month he
had known her. They spent a lot of time together, exchanging legends and
stories they unearthed, clarifying historical details that Tareah had learned
from her father.

But Vailret could
see the stars in Delrael's eyes when he looked at her, and he cared for his
cousin too much to risk a potentially difficult situation. And fighter
characters spent much more time impressing women than nearsighted scholars did
anyway.

Tareah still looked
disappointed that she would not be accompanying them, but she drew herself up,
proud to have the responsibility of guarding the Stronghold.

Beside her, the big
veteran Tarne appeared grim and ready. He had kept the villagers protected in
the forests during the months when they needed to hide from Gairoth and his
ogres. Now Tarne crossed his arms over his chest and nodded farewell to them.

Siya, though,
looked devastated and afraid for them. Her husband Cayon had been killed in a
senseless quest. He had been the typical Gamearth fighter character: cocky,
talented, living for the moment and adventuring for the fun of it. But Cayon
was slain by an ogre on one of his "fun" adventures. It had destroyed
Siya.

She was a new type
of character on Gamearth. She wanted an end to all of the tedious questing. It
was time to settle down and establish their lives, support themselves, grow
their crops, take care of the villagers and the other characters. But while she
ran the domestic affairs of the Stronghold, she still felt left out, not
treated with respect. She was overprotective of Vailret. She tried to do the
same to Delrael, but he ignored her.

Vailret knew
everything she was thinking
―
he could see the emotions ripple
like changing waves on her face. But Siya held her tongue because she realized
how much was at stake this time. Vailret greatly respected her for that.

As they departed,
Siya said only, "Luck." Vailret smiled. The three of them started
down the path into the darkness.

The lights in the
village below had been doused for the night. Only a dull glow came from the
blacksmith's workshop, where Derow always kept the fires banked. Before dawn
seeped into the eastern sky, the questers left the village behind and crossed
the first line of hexagonal fields bounding the forest terrain.

Bryl mumbled,
"If characters have stopped questing so much, why do I always find myself
walking back and forth across the map?"

Vailret's hands
were numb from the chill; he crossed his arms and kept his fingertips under
them. He turned to look at Delrael. His cousin's face was grim, concentrating
on the journey.

Delrael's lost
father Drodanis had sent them a spectral message from the Rulewoman Melanie,
describing the threat of Scartaris and commanding them to find some way to stop
the end of the Game. The three of them had created the Barrier River to protect
them for a time.

But Drodanis had
sent no other message, provided them with no further suggestions. Together,
they were aware of the Earthspirits trapped in Delrael's silver belt, but they
couldn't speak a word of that out loud.

Characters could
never know when the Outsiders might be listening.

The quiet between
them seemed uncomfortable, strained. Vailret cleared his throat and spoke in a
bemused tone. "I wonder if we really grasp what we're doing. Think about
the implications beyond our adventuring to defeat Scartaris."

He raised his
eyebrows. Delrael shook his head, as if tired of thinking.

"Do we really
want to save Gamearth if it means rekindling the Wars all over again?"

Bryl wiped his
hands on his sky-blue cloak, trying to get rid of some pitch on his palm.
"What are you talking about?" He scowled at the pines around him.

"Well, isn't
that what we're trying to do, get the Outsiders interested again by stirring up
as much trouble as we can? Our normal, peaceful existence is so boring to them
they want to quit the Game. Maybe the only way we can keep their interest is to
start all those endless battles and constant slaughter again."

Vailret sighed. His
half-formed thoughts began to frighten him.

"Starting the
old Sorcerer Wars was a pretty trivial thing in the first place.

We shouldn't have
too much trouble if we want to do it again."