Lyndon Hardy - Riddle of the Seven Realms

Fulfilling her prophecy instantly, a strong voice suddenly rang through the din. "A challenge, a challenge of true virtue to masqueraders on our left."

Immediately the crowd fell silent and all the hostilities ceased on the casino floor. Kestrel craned around to see Milligan standing on the top of a small boulder near one of the tunnels with a megaphone to his mouth. Evidently Jelilac's had been one of the last contingents to arrive.

"We do the great practice of our art disservice by such crude measures," Milligan continued. "Avoiding mines and the shrapnel of grenades takes a measure of luck, to be sure, but it in no way answers which of us has the greatest power and hence the authority to rule." Milligan paused and circled to address the stands at his back. "Remember our heritage," he said. "This very edifice is enshrined with the name of the grand casino-not the arena, not the stadium, but the casino where all is ruled by chance. The events to be decided here are to be based upon the pristine twisting of gaseous luck, not the slashing of bloodied blades."

The crowd roared in approval, but Milligan motioned them back to silence. "Yes, luck is to be the mechanism of decision-luck, pure and unsullied with irrelevant skill."

He pointed at his side to a large glass bowl with two transparent tubes snaking out of the top and filled with tiny white spheres. "Of all those who have assembled to struggle here Jelilac is the most mighty, the one with the greatest hoard of fortune. He issues a challenge to one and all. The first to have three numbers discharged will be the victor. The vanquished will cease their struggles and submit all talismans to aid in the greater cause." Milligan paused and then shut his eyes. Extending his arm, he pointed out across the casino floor and spun about three times, quickly pirouetting to a sudden halt.

"You!" He laughed as he sighted down the length of his arm toward a small fortification across the floor. "You shall be the first to test that Jelilac's luck is the most potent of all."

Kestrel turned to watch a young aleator rise from cover and shake his head. "No, that is not my plan," he protested. "My only hope is to win against others similarly endowed and capture what luck they have remaining after the battle. Only by that means would I have the chance to face the likes of Jelilac in the end."

The crowd roared in disapproval. For a long while, the high walls of the casino echoed with their lust for the confrontation. Kestrel squeezed Phoebe's hand and tried to settle into a comfortable position. At least for the moment, everyone was distracted and no grenades were hurling their way.

He watched Milligan and two other retainers set up a wooden frame and then drape it with tapestries embroidered in intricate designs. A long hose was connected to one of the tubes protruding from the glass bowl and run back behind the panels where Kestrel could not see. In an instant, the tiny spheres began to dance in the confines of the bowl, like a boiling liquid just about to erupt. In the distance, Kestrel saw that each ball was inscribed with a few strokes of precise lettering in black ink.

"Your numbers," Milligan shouted over the fading din of the crowd. "Everyone here demands it. Remember the fourth tenet-luck favors the believer. If you have doubts and hesitate, then surely you will fail."

The aleator across the casino floor looked wildly out into the stands and then slumped his shoulders. He grasped at the handful of talismans about his neck and tightly clenched shut his eyes "Seven, nineteen, and thirty-seven," he shouted after a moment. "And by the third tenet, may these charms beget all the fortune that I will need."

Milligan laughed and marked the selected numbers on a huge slate handed to him from within the canvas framework. "Nine, forty-two, and forty-three," he called out without apparent thought and added them in a line below the first. "Now we shall contest in the manner in which it has always been intended."

Milligan removed a cover from the second tube emerging from the bowl, and the crowd again fell silent. No one moved while the white spheres churned and frothed. After a short while, one of the balls bounced into the conical orifice that fed the exit and popped out into Milligan's waiting hand. "Forty-two." He laughed as he held up the orb and waved it over his head. "Forty-two on the very first ball, even though over two hundred spin about."

Before Milligan had finished speaking, a second sphere followed the first. Another of Jelilac's retainers dashed out from the cover of the framing and caught it as it arched into the air. "And forty-three." Milligan laughed again. "I can see the marking clearly from here." He looked across the casino floor and shook his head. "You may as well make ready. It appears that the we you wager against Jelilac is meager indeed."

Milligan turned his attention back to the glass bowl just in time to receive the third ball emerging from the tube. "The third is nine," he said. "Yes, after the first two so suddenly, there could be no doubt."

Most of the crowd broke into enthusiastic cheering, although Kestrel saw one small grouping high in the stands sit silently with faces pulled to their chests Milligan waved both arms over his head to keep up the volume of sound as he tripped across the casino floor to the aleator who had been defeated. With a theatrical flourish, he accepted an armload of talismans and carried them back to Jelilac's framework.

"Who is next?" he shouted. "Who is next to challenge? Jelilac is ready to battle with one and all."

Kestrel looked at Myra out of the corner of his eye. He saw the old woman slowly shaking her head. "Not yet," she muttered. "Each contest dissipates a little of Jelilac's wealth back into the ether. And there is always the chance that he will not be able to beat them all. I will wait until the last, when my own opportunity is the best."

Kestrel scanned the casino floor and saw the wave of a banner from another of the fortifications. A new cheer went up from the crowd. "Five, thirty-nine, and fifty-two," a voice heavy with resignation sounded in the distance. "I may as well be next. It seems that at the last moment, my luck turned fickle. This fortification is made of anvilwood, not simple fir or pine like the rest."

The cheer reverberating in the stands suddenly stopped. Milligan nearly doubled over with his laughter. "Barrier logs made of anvilwood," he said. "The custodians of the casino have prepared for this contest better than most." He waved back at the glass bowl and the churning balls. "One, two, and three," he said. "Let us proceed quickly so we can get on to the next."

Anvilwood, Kestrel thought quickly, the very reason for coming to the casino in the first place! He touched the rucksack still hanging on his back. Again he scanned the rising stadium seats and the array of contestants on floor. "Astron, where are you?" he muttered.

He glanced down at Phoebe and shook his head. With a sigh, he settled beside her and watched the dance of tiny, white balls. With all the contingents on the casino floor, it would take some while to get to Myra. Maybe by then the demon would appear-or failing that he could figure out how to get a flame lit for phoebe on his own.

The roar of the crowd was deafening. Of all the contingents that had swarmed onto the casino floor so many hours before, only Myra and Jelilac remained. Kestrel felt the tension grow in Myra's retainers. With each new challenger, they had hoped that Jelilac's luck would turn, but it held steady and true. Some of the opponents had taken more effort to defeat than the others. For one, over seventy spheres of no consequence popped free of the miniature maelstrom before Jelilac received his third victory. Another actually had one of his selections and for a moment trailed only two to one. But in the end, Milligan's master emerged triumphant over all, collecting the largesse of talismans and adding them to his store.