CHAPTER

9

BOOK TWO

At first, listening to Keeper’s explanation, Skylan thought the Para Dix was similar to a child’s game he and his friends had played as children known as Torval’s Mountain. One of them was the god Torval. He selected warriors from the Hall of Heroes and arranged them in a shield wall at the top of the hill. The other children played the Dragon Ilyrion, who formed her own shield wall to try to push Torval off his hill.

The game had been a favorite with Skylan and had usually ended in a general free-for-all with small boys and girls rolling down the hill, ending up dirty and tired and happy, with scraped knees.

The Para Dix involved ten warriors on one side and ten on another. The goal of each team was to seize the sacred fire, which blazed in a pit in the center, then protect it from the other team.

The game was immensely popular in Sinaria. The Para Dix was played in the large new arena—a gift from Aelon to the people. Wealthy men, such as Acronis, sponsored their own teams. The common people crowded onto the concrete benches that circled the arena. The nobility, shaded by umbrellas and cooled by feather fans, watched from boxes furnished with cushioned chairs.

The Para Dix had been played for centuries and, like Torval’s Mountain, symbolized the eternal battle waged by the gods for the world. Philosophers had once made the symbology of the game the subject of lectures, but that was prior to the coming of Aelon’s priests, who saw no need for philosophers or their lectures or the game. Aelon reigned supreme, unchallenged. There could be no doubt about that. No game must dare depict Aelon as weak.

Many years ago, the priests of Aelon had tried to shut down the Para Dix. The people of Oran did not much care about the loss of the old gods, but they cared passionately about the loss of their sport. Faced with rioting in the streets, the priests had resumed the game, bringing the Para Dix under the auspices of the Church. Aelon was now the hero god, valiantly defending the fire of creation from evil interlopers.

Aelon might have saved himself the trouble. Few Sinarians knew or cared about the religious symbology. All they cared about was whether their team won or lost. The Church had abolished the practice of gambling on the games; it was unseemly to be gambling on a god. The only change this brought about was that the gambling was taken over by the street gangs.

The Legate had built a replica of the playing field on his estate, and this was where Keeper took Skylan to begin his training. He explained that eventually all the Torgun would be players, but that Skylan, who had a crucial role to play in the game, would require extra training. Keeper explained the rules as they walked, an explanation to which Skylan paid little attention.

He heard the ogre say the game involved fighting and that was all Skylan needed to know. He paid no heed to the rest, something about moving from one square to another and how certain pieces could only move to certain squares and how the Legate would dictate his movements. All Skylan knew was that he was going to be given a sword.

“You say the training involves fighting,” he said, interrupting the ogre in mid sentence.

“Yes,” said Keeper, eyeing him as though he knew what he was thinking.

“Then my people do not need training, especially from the likes of you,” said Skylan. “We know how to fight. I myself have been wielding a sword in the shield wall since I was fourteen. I once killed an ogre godlord.”

He cast a significant glance at this ogre godlord and added, “Single-handed.”

Keeper shrugged, not impressed. “You and your people are such great warriors, yet now you are marked with the tattoo of a slave.”

“Because of a damn traitor!” Skylan said angrily. “We were ambushed. My men were not even armed! If we could have fought these bastards, there would not have been one left standing!”

He glanced at the soldiers walking behind him and raised his voice so they would hear. “The Southlander whoresons are cowards, afraid to meet true warriors in battle!”

The soldiers were talking together and they continued their conversation, paying no heed to him.

“You are wasting your breath. They don’t even hear you,” said Keeper. “To them, you are a dog barking in the night.”

“A dog, am I?” said Skylan grimly. “Some day this dog will rip out their goddam throats!”

“I felt that same anger once,” said Keeper. “You’ll soon get over it. You are a Para Dix player. You will be well-treated. They will kill you with kindness, as the saying goes.”

Skylan recalled Zahakis’s words: You might even get to like it here.

“I don’t want to get over it! I don’t want to be like you, fat and content,” said Skylan. “You like being a slave. The Legate takes care of you, feeds you, clothes you—”

“I hate it!” Keeper ground out the words. His passion startled Skylan. The ogre looked far off in the distance and pointed. “In that direction lies my homeland. I have been a slave for many years. My mate must think me dead. She has likely found someone else to warm her bed. Another man may be raising my children.”

He sighed. “Yet I have no fire in my belly.”

Keeper glanced ruefully at Skylan. “Once I was like you. For a year after my capture, the fire burned hot. Then one morning I woke to find that the fire had gone out. I didn’t care anymore. Strange, because my name is Keeper of the Fire, a name I was given in my vision quest when I was a youth. I thought it had meaning. I guess it didn’t.”

They arrived at what the ogre termed “the playing field.” Several circles within circles were painted white on the clipped grass. In the center was a fire pit with no fire. A great many boulders, also painted white with black runes, stood scattered about the circles, seemingly at random. Two platforms constructed of wood on the rim of the outer circle faced each other on opposite sides.

“This is where the game is played and where we will train,” said Keeper.

Skylan cast a bored glance at the field. He had only one interest. “When do we fight?”

Keeper chuckled. “You must first learn the rules. You are the only Vindrasi I have ever trained to play the Para Dix. I have fought your people, but I do not know much about you. In my land, we play a game on a wooden board marked off in squares, using stones that hop from square to square. Do your people have something similar?”

“Nothing as stupid-sounding as that,” said Skylan. The thought of his homeland made his heart ache. The fire in his belly burned. He intended to keep it that way.

He saw, out of the corner of his eye, Acronis coming onto the field to watch.

Skylan folded his arms across his chest and said loudly, “We play a game called ‘Screw the Ogre.’ ”

Keeper quirked an eyebrow. Skylan decided that this ogre must be the stupidest ogre in the world since he obviously did not know when he had been insulted.

Keeper made a sweeping gesture. “Think of that as the game board. Think of yourself and your men as the game pieces.”

He poked Skylan in the chest with a thick finger, then called to the Legate, “He is ready, lord.”

“Tell him move to boulder number ten,” said Acronis. “He can’t read, so you’re going to have to teach him how to recognize which that is.”

“The boulder with the X is number ten,” said Keeper. “The Legate has moved you to that area on the board. Go stand beside it and wait for further instructions.”

“Tell the Legate he can go piss on the boulder with the X on it,” said Skylan. “And if you touch me again with your filthy finger, I’ll break it off.”

“The Vindrasi slave says he finds the rules difficult to understand, lord,” Keeper yelled.

“Then make them simple for him,” said Acronis, smiling.

Keeper kicked Skylan in the gut. While he was groaning, the ogre lifted Skylan with one arm, slung him over his broad shoulder, and carried him to the boulder. With a heave, Keeper threw Skylan to the ground.

“And that is how you play the game,” said the ogre.