"In this form?"
"Nay, in mine own."
"Then the introduction be needful."
He had a point. Flach now looked completely different. He had the aspect of a powerful young man. He hoped he would be this solid and handsome when he really did grow up!
Icy was evidently impressed when she saw him. "I knew not that warm ones could be so rugged!" she exclaimed, eying him in a way that made him uncomfortable.
You should be! the inner voice that was Nepe told him. Thai"s one ho! snow demoness! She"s going to find out just what is possible, before this trip is done. She formed a mental image of wolves sniffing tails, then making ready to mate.
Flach shrugged. Nothing was possible, of course.
They got on the sledge, which was shaped to allow them to sit comfortably side by side, their backs supported by the supplies behind and their legs moderately bent in front. Icy took the reins. "Mush!" she cried, and the dogs took off.
But they were high on a mountain slope. The sledge careered down and to the side, skidding toward a drop-off. "Yiii!" Flach cried, grabbing on for dear life.
The sledge turned just before the ledge and zoomed along its edge. Flach hung on, afraid to look down into its dark depths. They seemed about to bounce off the snow and tumble right off the mountain.
"Well, now," Icy said, her frozen breath tickling his ear. Flach opened his eyes.
She was what he had grabbed on to! Hastily he let go, steeling himself to sit upright and ignore the horrendous scene just beyond the sled, and the breathtaking one on it.
The demons skiing behind laughed. So did the racing guard dogs. So, in a moment, did the harnessed dogs. They had done it on purpose, to make him react.
Flach relaxed. If they were so sure of their footing and ley"s safety, he might as well be sure too. They surely knew every inch of these mountain slopes, and could handle them precisely. They had had their fun with him, but he would keep his nerve better from now on.
Soon they were beyond the mountains and heading north across a relatively flat plain. The dogs ran indefatigably, and the skiing demons kept the pace. It quickly got dull.
"Dost know any good games?" Icy asked with a toss of her ice tresses. "We have long to ride."
"Well, there be tag-"
"And which o" us gets off and runs to do that?" she inquired archly.
"It were a stupid notion," he admitted. "I could conjure cards-"
"I have played e"ery game there be for cards!" she said crossly. "A chief"s daughter has much time on her hands."
There"s one she hasn"t played, I"ll bet, Nepe thought. I don"t know what it"s called, but I remember how it goes.
Flach conjured a deck of playing cards. "Mayhap I have one thou hast not."
"Willst bet on"t?"
"Bet what?"
"Consequences."
Flach wasn"t sure he trusted this. "What consequences?"
She shrugged. "I"ll decide, after I win."
"Suppose I win?"
"Then the consequence be thine to decide, for me."
"I have a mission to accomplish. I can"t be diverted to-"
"Innocent tasks," she said. "Like saying "I be a warm ogre bottom!" or mayhap standing on the sledge and sunning the guards."
"Sunning?"
"Mayhap thy kind calls it mooning."
This was beginning to sound like the kind of challenge a person of his generation couldn"t turn down. "An thou dost lose the bet, I define a consequence for thee?" he said, making quite sure.
"Aye. So long as it be harmless and delay our travel not."
This creature is dangerous! Nepe warned admiringly. But you better accept her challenge, or she"ll come up with worse.
"Agreed," Flach said. "The bet be whether I have a card game thou hast ne"er played before."
"Aye. Name it."
"I can"t name it. But-"
"Then thou dost lose!" she exclaimed.
"Nay, that be not the bet!" he protested. "I need not name it, only describe it. An it be a good game thou has played not before, I win."
She reconsidered. "Aye, that be fair. Describe it."
Drawing on Nepe"s information, he described it: "Several can play, or only two. The dealer lays down cards according to a secret rule, and first to guess that rule becomes dealer."
She considered. "I ne"er heard o" it," she confessed. "But be it a real game? Who wins it, who loses? How be points scored?
"The dealer wins, long"s he holds his place. It be like king o" the hill: the one atop wins till he loses. But we could play for points an thou wishest: each wrong guess be the dealer"s point."
"But the dealer gets all the points!" she protested.
"Aye. but the players can become dealer by guessing right, and get points. When the game end, belike one be ahead."
"Aye," she said, considering it. "I like this game. Thou dost win the bet. What wouldst thou make my consequence?"
Flach was tempted to make her sun the guards, but lacked the nerve. "Let"s play the game, and this be my first point."
She looked at him. "Thou dost be generous, Flach. I would have gi"en thee worse."
"I lost my nerve," he admitted.
She laughed. "I like thee, warm one! I will not make thee do aught onerous."
"An thou dost win."
"Ne"er fear, I will win," she said confidently. "I be not Adept, but I be sharp at card games."
Flach marveled at her certainty. Though his own experience with the Proton Game was slight, Nepe had played it often, and her expertise was his to draw on now that they were merged. Also, he had played games with his adopted sibling wolves, among which guessing games were prominent because they could be indulged while running together through brush in quest of game (the other kind). In short, despite his youth, he regarded himself as a good compet.i.tor, quick with his wits. Could this sheltered snow girl be the same?
He shuffled the cards. They were plastic, able to withstand both his heat and her cold. "Wouldst be dealer first?"
"Nay," she said. "How couldst thou have the first point, and thou not be dealer? Lay me out."
He glanced at her, unsure of her terminology. She had undone her ice coat, evidently feeling too warm, and had her feather-ice sweater open to view. It was a remarkably shapely sweater, rather like a contour map with two perfectly rounded mountains.
"Some cards," she clarified, laughing so that the mountains shook. Well she knew the nature of his confusion and his distraction.
When I grow up, I"m going to practice to make my sweater move like that! Nepe thought enviously.
That helped clarify things for Flach. He had found that sweater oddly intriguing, but hadn"t quite realized why. No doubt when he became the age he had made himself appear to be, he would have no trouble realizing why. Apparently there was a greater correspondence between the interests of demons and men than he had appreciated.
"Then thou must shuffle," he said. "That be standard, to a.s.sure I cheat not."
She laughed so hard that her sweater threatened to ripple apart and hurl the mountains into limbo. "Thou fool! Canst be serious?"
"Aye, serious," he said, annoyed. "Needs must the game be played fair."
"Willst bet on that?" she asked, suppressing a chortle.
"Aye! I would not cheat!"
She calmed down enough to face him directly, but the mountains still quivered with merry aftershocks. "This be no random dealing, Flach," she said. "This be cards laid down by secret rules. How canst thou have a rule, an thou deal randomly-"less random be thy rule?"
Ooops! She had caught him in an embarra.s.sing blunder. Even his simulated aspect blushed. "Thy point," he admitted.
Her head darted forward, and she kissed him on the cheek. The magic of the illusion was such that her cold lips scored on his own flesh, though it was not quite where the flesh of the older youth seemed. "But I tike thine honesty," she said. "Thy foolishness becomes thee."
That made him blush worse. He tried to ignore it. "Now must I put the cards back in order," he said.
"Easy, Adept!" she said, taking the deck from him. "Make us a table-a sheet o" ice will do-and I will play a game o" clock solitaire."
"But a game will just mix them up more!" he protested. "And what be this about a clock? Time be not o" the essence."
She shook her head wonderingly. "I had thought it to be dull, shepherding a boy into the bleak. Methinks I forget the joys o" naivete. Watch-nay, no pun!-and learn, lad."
He conjured the sheet of ice she wanted, and they laid it across their laps. His woolly clothing and protective spell prevented his heat from melting it, and her body would only freeze it colder, so it was an excellent table. She put the cards down in a circular pattern of twelve piles, and a thirteenth pile in the center. "This be the clock," she announced. "North be twelve, south be six, and the rest in order. An I complete the numbers before the center, I win-but that be seldom."
"One chance in thirteen," he remarked.
"How cle"er o" thee to figure it!" she said, smiling. He knew she was teasing him, but he felt a surge of pleasure. She"s mistress of her trade, Nepe thought appreciatively.
She lifted the top card in the center pile. It was an ace. She put that face up under the 1 pile just right of the 12 pile, and lifted the top card of that pile. This was a 6, so she put that under the 6 pile, and took its top card.
So it went, from pile to pile, each one showing the way to the next. ley"s snow-white hands flashed cleverly from pile to pile, placing and lifting cards so quickly it was hard to follow. Obviously she had played this game many times before-and many others. She had spoken truly about her experience in this regard.
The first king showed up, and went to the center. Later another, and a third. Then the first of the circle to reach all four cards appeared: the 3 pile. Then, after only a few more moves, the fourth king.
"Hot lava!" she swore. "I be lost ere I have more than one hour on the clock! That be a bad omen."
"I hope not!" Flach said. Omens were serious things.
She shrugged, and again the mountains moved. "Mayhap not. They say lucky cards, unlucky in love, and I have e"er been luckiest at cards. An my luck turn, my father may find a good demon for me."
"He can find not a demon for one as fair as thou?" Flach asked, surprised. "Be appearance not the first thing men seek?"
"Aye." Her hands resumed their motion, as she lifted the top card on the 12 stack and continued the placements. That card was an 8, and the next a 10. "Many be eager enough, but it seems I have a curse." The 8 pile was completed, then the 2"s, and the 4"s.
"A curse? It be not apparent to me."
Her quick hands brought up the fourth queen for the 12 pile. "Fire! Lost again." For the 9"s and 11"s remained incomplete. She took one from the 11"s, and in a moment all the piles were done. Then she picked them up: the four aces, four 2"s, and so on. The deck was in numerical order. "An thou needst suit order, I can play a game for that," she said.
"Nay, this be good enough," he said, taking the cards. "But what be this curse on thee?"
"Let me see those," she said suddenly, taking them back and turning the pack over. "I ne"er looked at the backs! This be one o" the fairy folk!" For the picture was of a winged girl in gauzy green, flying up to pick foliage.
"Aye. I met her when I was a wolf, so put her on my cards. It were when I was in hiding."
"Thou wast hiding?"
"From the Adverse Adepts, four years."
"And they found thee not?"
"They found me after those years. Then it were difficult, till Stile merged the frames."
"But were thy sire and dam not on our side? My father taught the Rovot Adept to play chess."
"Aye. I hid from him, till he searched me out."
"Thou didst have a difficult life," she said sympathetically.
"Nay, it were a good life, only not with my parents. But why dost thou turn aside the subject when I ask about thy curse?"
" "Cause it be my shame," she said. "An thou beat me at cards, thou canst make me tell thee for consequence."
That seemed fair enough. He picked out the 10 of hearts and laid it down. "When thou dost think o" the rule, make thy guess," he said. "It must be apparent within four cards, "less thou preferest other. An thou guess wrong, my point. An thou not guess it in eight cards, my point."
"Aye. Lay thy four."