David Wise - Tales of Ravenloft

"You are the owner of the Iron Warden," Soth said hollowly. "As stated in the charter you hold, this is the day of appointment. You will play me in a game of death's-head dice for the title warden of the Iron Hills. If the chain of office is yours after the contest ends, you will lead my troops this very night against the elves that dwell there."

A wretched groan escaped Oliver's lips. Tisiphone hadn't been fearful of losing. She'd been afraid that she wasn't going to pawn the deed off before Lord Soth arrived. She'd gulled him like the most pathetic of flatts.

As Lord Soth turned toward the dice table, another stranger hurried into the taproom. Clad in the finery of a court seneschal, he was no more than four feet tall from the heels of his iron-shod boots to the top of his bald pate. His muttonchop sideburns and thick mustache were the white of old bones. And while age had stooped the seneschal's shoulders decades past, it hadn't lessened his energy; he bustled after his master, a chain of office draped over one arm. "I have the warden's badge, mighty lord," he said. The words sounded like the creaking of ancient trees in a windstorm.

"Place it on the table, Azrael," Lord Soth replied.

Tisiphone came forward on her knees, her voice full of feigned sweetness and humility. "Begging your indulgence, Lord Soth, but if you won't be needing us for the game, we'd like — "

A blow from the seneschal silenced her and sent her sprawling into Unthar. "Lord Soth didn't ask you to speak," Azrael rumbled. He shook his fist in front of her bloodied face. "Open your yap out of turn again and I'll bash your teeth in."

The suddenness of the attack unsettled Oliver, but Tisiphone's reaction to the blow chilled the sharp to the core. She kowtowed to the dwarf, then crawled into a corner with Unthar, begging the lord's forgiveness all the way. If a barbarous, cold-hearted murderer like her knelt before Soth, what sort of infernal creature must he be?

"Come, Azrael," Soth said. "Let us appoint the new warden so the troops can begin their march to the Iron Hills."

The lord of Sithicus positioned the warden's chain of office on the green. "There is my wager," he noted as he snatched up the dice. "It is the only thing of value I have carried to the table. "He tossed the ebon cubes almost as soon as he'd picked them up.

"Death's-heads," Soth reported without looking at the dice. "I've lost. The chain is now yours."

Oliver stared in horror at the twin skulls with their leering, rictal grins. The walls of the taproom seemed to close in around him, the beamed ceiling seemed to lower. He wanted to scream, but there wasn't enough air in the room to fill his lungs. After a moment, the gambler managed to gasp out a simple question: "I get a throw as well?"

Soth nodded. "Win and you earn your freedom. Since I have nothing left to cover your bet, I can offer you only that."

With trembling fingers, Oliver took up the dice. They felt like cubes of black ice, drawing the warmth from his palm, numbing his fingertips. He clenched his hand, but the cold only spread to his wrist. Soth's touch had chilled the dice, he realized. Cursing, Oliver flung them away.

"Seven," Soth said.

Oliver could hardly believe his ears. "I won," he breathed softly, trying to convince himself of his victory. The feeling began to flow back into his hand.

"Not yet," said the Knight of the Black Rose, reaching for the dice. "As dealer, I can kill the roll by throwing double death's-heads."

Soth's words took Oliver unawares, like an assassin's blade in a close alley. And when he looked at the knight, the gambler saw something that finished the murder of his hopes. The leather gauntlet had slipped away from Soth's wrist. The exposed flesh — what little of it remained — hung in scabrous tatters from blackened bones. Whatever the knight was, he most certainly wasn't alive.

Oliver knew then that any dice Lord Soth threw would turn up death's-heads. He was doomed. "No," the sharp blurted before he even realized what he'd said. "You don't get a kill roll."

Lord Soth paused. "What? "

"H-House rules. I own the inn, I can set whatever house rules I want. "Oliver tried to muster a more authoritative tone, but failed miserably. "You should have asked what they were before we smarted the game."

Snarling madly, Azrael charged at Oliver. As the seneschal scrambled across the taproom, his features flowed and blurred like an image viewed through a rainsoaked pane of glass. His face elongated. His nose and mouth lengthened into a snout. Hands transformed into paws that bristled with razor-sharp black claws. Arms and legs thickened until they resembled an animal's limbs more than a man's. And all over his body, coarse fur sprouted in a thick coat. Azrael's features and the striping of his fur marked him as a terrifying admixture of dwarf and giant badger.

Oliver managed to get his sword clear of its scabbard, but not even the sharp's battle-honed agility could bring the blade to the ready before the werebadger vaulted the dice table. Horror-struck, he stared at the mad thing leaping for his throat. A prayer flashed through his thoughts: let me bring my sword to bear before Azrael tears my heart out. At least then I might drag the creature down to death with me.

But Azrael never reached the gambler. As he passed over the center of the table, Lord Soth upended the heavy board and dashed him from the air. The bone rail splintered against the werebadger's skull. He landed in a heap, surrounded by shattered wood and torn felt.

"You're right," the Knight of the Black Rose said, as if the conversation with Oliver had continued uninterrupted. "I should have asked for the rules of the house before wagering."

Soth let the dice slip from his hand onto a chair. They came up death's-heads. "You see why I use this place to lure gamblers in, Azrael. They're much more clever than the drill-dulled military-types who would covet the commission."

The werebadger grunted and struggled to his feet. "And the gamblers you make warden live at least two or three days longer than anyone else you throw against the elves."

Cautiously Oliver backed toward the door, but Soth stopped him with a fiery stare. "You aren't going anywhere," the knight said.

"But the wager," Oliver began.

"Was more than paid when I saved your life from Azrael. "Lord Soth recovered the chain of office from the ruins of the dice table. He held it up and examined it, then turned toward Tisiphone and Unthar. "The inn's charter states that, should the owner of the Iron Warden escape his duty, I am free to choose a replacement from the populace. You two will share the job. Azrael, get them ready to make the journey to Nedragaard Keep."

Unthar opened his cavernous mouth to protest, but Tisiphone silenced him with a somber shake of her head. "There's no way to beat him," she whispered. "Not when he makes the house rules for all of Sithicus."

As the werebadger herded the new wardens of the Iron Hills out into the night, Lord Soth faced Oliver once more. "You are confined to the inn," he said. "I will return in a few weeks — or perhaps a month — to play again for your service. Undoubtedly I will need a new warden by then."

Soth reached out and gripped Oliver's hands tightly. The chill that had radiated from the dice was a touch of the summer sun compared to the bitter, aching cold that Oliver felt in the death knight's grasp. His hands went numb quickly, but not before needle-sharp slivers of pain sliced into his flesh and began a slow, agonizing crawl up his arms.

"In case you have any ideas about gambling the deed away," was all Soth said before he abruptly whirled and strode from the taproom of the Iron Warden.

Oliver guessed the meaning of the knight's obscure statement even before he fumbled the dice into his painracked hands. But he had to test it, had to know for certain what Soth had done to him.