by Alex Bell
The situation was an absolute nightmare. People had noticed him come in and Lex was aware of people pointing at him, for no doubt they recognised him from the previous Game and his presence there at the feast confirmed what the newspapers had been suggesting − that Lex Trent really was going to go up against Jeremiah East in the next Game. The people seated near him at the table wished him good evening and Lex shouted something back. Thankfully, the fact that it was so noisy in the room meant that no one noticed he was speaking louder than usual or that his words were on the slurred side.
Jesse came back just at the moment that the Gods materialised on the stage beside their table. Their image appeared inside the crystal ball, too, as it began broadcasting and, instantly, everyone was on their feet and applauding. Jesse dragged Lex upright and, with a great effort of will, he managed not to sway where he stood.
Lady Luck was dressed in her usual white toga, her blond hair piled up on her head and threaded with pearls. Kala was much smaller than the Goddess of Luck, with very tiny hands and feet and a small, perfect face that made her look rather like a china doll. Her dark brown hair fell about her face in tightly coiled ringlets and she wore a long blue dress with tapered sleeves. Thaddeus, on the other hand, looked more like a demon than a God, with his pointed ears and pointed chin, goatee beard and slicked-back black hair. He wore a dark cloak that fell all the way down to his ankles and had a high collar that came up around his ears.
Lady Luck raised her hand for quiet and, once the applause had finally died down, she stepped forwards and said, ‘Thank you, my friends. Please, be seated.’
Everyone sat down. Jesse quietly pushed a steaming mug of what appeared to be strong black coffee towards Lex, who started trying to sip it surreptitiously. But the truth was that he was suddenly beginning to feel rather sick. And there was a ringing in his ears that meant he could hardly focus on what her Ladyship was saying. He tried to tell himself that it would be all right. The Goddess would give her little speech, the players would be introduced, Lex would stand up and bow graciously and try to look daring and heroic for ten seconds and then the feast would begin and he could quietly slip away to be sick somewhere.
Lex realised the first player was about to be introduced when Lady Luck stopped talking and Thaddeus stepped forwards.
‘I, Thaddeus, God of Illusion, will be using as my playing piece, the enchantress known as Lorella.’
Lex looked over to the far end of the room where a young woman stood up. An enchantress? Now that was a surprise, for Lex had been expecting an enchanter. She looked young, too − surely not that much older than Jeremiah. But then, Lex knew that looks could be deceiving where enchanters were concerned. The female variety were much rarer and their magic much weaker − parlour tricks in comparison with the male enchanters. Pretty magics and the occasional love spell were about the limit of what they could achieve. Lex had seen several enchanters before, but he had never yet seen an enchantress.
The first thing he noticed about Lorella, even through his drunken haze, was her exceptional beauty. The entire hall seemed to still at the mere sight of her. Her hair was a royal, vibrant blue and fell long and loose down past her elbows. Her eyes were the exact same shade − like two sapphires set in her fine-boned face. She wore a grey dress that clung about her lithe form, leaving only the white skin at her throat on display. Everyone broke into rapturous applause and Lorella inclined her head gracefully before resuming her seat.
Kala then stepped forwards on the stage and said, ‘For my player, I shall be using the nobleman, Jeremiah East.’
On the middle table, Jeremiah stood up and there was, if possible, even more thunderous applause for him than there had been for Lorella. It was just that he looked so dashing and noble with his dark blue coat and golden buttons and clean-cut good looks. The crystal ball loved him. If anything, he looked even more handsome in there than he did in real life. He and Lorella both looked so smart. It made Lex horribly aware that he was, at this moment, wearing a shirt that was covered in beer stains. This was all horribly wrong. Lex was supposed to be the best! The smartest, the handsomest, the daringest . . .
Jeremiah gave the crowd a dazzling smile and a graceful bow before resuming his seat.
Lady Luck then stepped forwards and a great sense of panic swept over Lex. He was concentrating on sitting very, very still because he was sure if he moved so much as a muscle he would be sick and yet, any second now, he was going to have to stand up and try to look impressive and wave and bow without giving away the fact that anything was amiss. He could see Jeremiah and his friends looking his way and sniggering already.
‘I, the Goddess of Fortune and current Gaming champion, shall be using as my player the thief, Lex Trent.’
The applause for Lorella and Jeremiah had been enthusiastic but the audience practically wet themselves when Lex’s name was mentioned. No one had forgotten what he’d done in the last Game − how exciting and thrilling and entertaining the rounds had all been because of him. Through the haze of his intoxication, Lex felt a glow of smug pride. Jeremiah certainly wasn’t looking so pleased with himself now, he noticed. Lex was the favourite, Lex was the champion, Lex was the one who everyone loved . . .
He got up from his seat and bowed so low that his nose practically touched the floor. Then he straightened up − his head protested at the sudden shift, nausea rose up viciously in his throat and there was an abrupt tapering off of applause as everyone watched, shocked and dumb-struck, as Lex Trent threw up where he stood, before crumpling up to pass out underneath the table.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE MORNING AFTER
Lex woke up the next morning with a dry mouth, a sore head and sensitive eyes. And, to top it all off, he was in a cell.
‘Howdy,’ said Jesse, who was also in the cell with him.
‘Urghh blurghh,’ Lex replied, unsticking his tongue. ‘Gods, my head!’
The questions what’s going on? and where am I? rose in his throat but Lex refused to ask them because they were . . . silly. The sort of silly thing silly people said in silly situations. Lex prided himself on always knowing exactly what was going on and exactly where he was. And exactly how he was going to get out of it, too, come to that.
The ‘where’ part was obvious, anyway. Lex recognised a cell when he saw one; after all, he’d been in them before. It was the ‘why’ that took him a moment. He’d been at the feast . . . with the Gods . . . and he’d been unwell, suddenly − wasn’t that it? But it hardly seemed fair to lock someone up just because they’d been ill. Lex was just considering the horrible possibility that he had some sort of dire, incurable, highly contagious disease when it all came flooding back to him in rather a sickening way.
‘Jeremiah East spiked my drink!’
‘Yep,’ Jesse replied.
‘I was drunk!’
‘Yep.’
‘I was sick and then . . .’ The fact that Lex couldn’t remember what had happened after that seemed to be a pretty clear indication of what had taken place.
‘Yep.’
‘Is that all you can say? Yep?’ Lex raged, rounding on him viciously. ‘It’s not even a proper word! That’s the best you can do? Why are you even here?’
The cowboy was sprawled on his bed, leaning back against the wall with his arms behind his head and his ankles crossed, hat tipped back, watching Lex lazily. He shrugged slowly in response to the onslaught of questions and said, ‘Beats me, partner. First time I ever got locked up for someone else getting drunk. Maybe it’s because they don’t want us switching bodies. Or could be because of all this talk of us being disqualified, I guess.’
‘Well, I think it’s an absolute disgrace!’ Lex seethed, imagining the awful scene of his being carried away to prison last night whilst everyone no doubt roared their stupid heads off with laughter. ‘I’m the victim here! That good-for-nothing, arrogant, snot-nosed brat, Jeremiah East, is the one who ought to be—’ He broke off suddenly to stare at Jesse. ‘
What did you just say?’
Jesse shrugged. ‘When?’
‘Just now. You said . . . You said something about us being . . .’ Lex could hardly bring himself to say the word, ‘disqualified! Surely you don’t mean . . . from the Game?’
Jesse sat up on the bed. ‘Their high-and-mightyships, Kala and Thaddeus,’ he said gravely, ‘are demanding it.’
Lex gaped at him like a landed fish for a moment before managing to croak, ‘Why?’
‘Underage drinking at an official feast is disrespectful to the Gods, they say.’
‘Since when has any player been disqualified for being disrespectful? Besides, it wasn’t my fault!’
Jesse shrugged. ‘Don’t matter so far as they’re concerned.’
Lex stared at him for a moment longer, trying to get a grip on the awful mixture of panic and rage rising up inside. Then he crossed the cell to grip the bars and shouted as loudly as he could, ‘I demand to speak to someone in authority right now! Hey! Hey! CAN ANYBODY HEAR ME?’
‘Shut up, kid,’ came the muffled response from behind the closed door that led out to the office.
Lex scowled blackly. How old did he have to be and how many extraordinary things did he have to do before people stopped referring to him as kid?
‘Where the hell is Lady Luck?’ Lex fumed, rounding on Jesse again. ‘Have you seen her?’
The cowboy gave a lazy shrug. ‘Last time I saw her was at the feast.’
‘You mean she hasn’t been here to see me? Not once? Surely she doesn’t think I got drunk on purpose, does she?’
Before Jesse could answer, the office door opened and Lex whirled around expecting and hoping to see his patron Goddess, but seeing Mr Schmidt, dressed in a suit and carrying a briefcase, instead.
Lex stared at him, experiencing an uncomfortable moment of déjà vu, for he had been locked up in this very prison right before the last Game and Schmidt had appeared on the scene unexpectedly then as well.
‘You’re not here to testify against me, are you?’ Lex demanded, looking at the lawyer through the bars.
‘The thought had crossed my mind, but no, I’m not. I’m here to help you.’
‘You mean you can get me out of prison and back into the Game?’ Lex asked excitedly, gripping the bars tightly.
‘I can get you out of prison,’ Schmidt replied, ‘but you’re going to have to get yourself back into the Game, I’m afraid.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘There was a special hearing in court today to decide what’s to become of you. Thaddeus and Kala were all for disqualifying you straight out but Lady Luck insisted on there being a hearing.’
‘Why in the name of the Gods wasn’t I there?’ Lex demanded. ‘Surely I deserve a say in the matter, don’t I? I mean, it was my hearing! What about due process? What about habeas corpus? What about the prosecution’s burden of proof? I should have had the chance to tell my side of the story!’
‘The hearing was set early − deliberately early, I should imagine. You weren’t in a − ah − fit state to attend. I volunteered to attend on your behalf.’
Lex pinched the bridge of his nose. He had a thumping headache and all this was not making him feel any better. ‘Did they come to a decision?’
‘The Gods are imposing a penalty round on you. Only if you complete it successfully will you be able to rejoin the Game.’
‘What about Jeremiah? Doesn’t he have to play a penalty round, too?’
‘There’s no proof that he spiked your drink.’
‘But he did spike my drink. He and his friends all did! You saw them!’
‘I saw one young man doing it; I never saw Jeremiah East himself in the act. However, I informed the court that it was my belief Mr East had shared some of the responsibility.’
‘And?’
‘He’s denying it and so the Gods are not prepared to do anything. Lady Luck wanted him disqualified but Thaddeus and Kala refused because there was no eye witness.’
Lex groaned and resisted the urge to shoot his arms through the bars in an attempt to grab the old lawyer by the throat. ‘For once in your life,’ he said between gritted teeth, ‘why couldn’t you just have lied?’
Schmidt gave him a disapproving look. ‘I’m not like you,’ he said coldly.
‘A fact for which I am eternally grateful!’ Lex snapped. ‘Fat lot of good you are! Why did you even go to the hearing at all if you weren’t going to bother to help me?’
Schmidt regarded him in silence for a moment before saying in that same frosty tone, ‘Seems to me that you’ve always managed perfectly well at helping yourself, Lex. So I don’t think I’ll give you this key the warden gave me a moment ago.’ He drew the cell key out of his pocket and held it up to the light. ‘I think I’ll just leave it here and you can get it yourself, and good luck to you.’
Instantly, Lex changed his tone to sound beseeching and repentant but Schmidt had never been taken in by these acts, and he wasn’t taken in now. Calmly ignoring Lex, he dropped the key on the floor outside the cell, just out of arm’s reach, and then turned away towards the exit.
‘You ungrateful wretch!’ Lex shouted after him. ‘How many times did I save your neck during the last Game?’
Schmidt glanced back over his shoulder, pointed at the key on the floor and said, ‘Now we’re quits.’ Then he disappeared through the door and was gone.
‘Of all the contemptible, lowlife, despicable things to do!’ Lex fumed. ‘I’ll get him for this!’
He got down on to his hands and knees and reached one arm through the bars but the key was out of his reach. ‘The way my luck’s going at the moment I might as well shoot myself and have done with it!’
‘Ah well, another couple of hours hanging out here won’t kill us,’ Jesse said calmly. ‘Try and relax.’
‘What’s the matter with you?’ Lex retracted his arm and then turned to glare at the cowboy. ‘Do you want to stay here in this vile cesspit?’
Jesse gazed about as if half expecting to find himself in different surroundings from the last time he looked. ‘Vile cesspit?’ he said. ‘This? Kid, you should see the prisons they got back west. And even then, prison life ain’t so bad. You’re warm and you got a roof over your head. Besides, there’s good eatin’ in prisons.’
‘There’s “good eatin’” on my ship, too! So come over here and give me a hand, you dolt! Your arms are longer than mine; you might be able to reach the key.’
But, although Jesse tried, the key was out of his reach, too, and, although Lex yelled for the guards until he was hoarse, it seemed that they were not in an accommodating mood − after all, they didn’t want to upset Lady Luck, but nor did they want to enrage Thaddeus and Kala. When Gods start squabbling, it is usually best for humans to stay well out of it.
When Lady Luck finally appeared, over an hour later, the first words out of her mouth were, ‘Oh, that dear man! Lex, however are we going to repay him?’
‘Eh? Who? What the heck are you talking about?’
‘Mr Schmidt, of course! We agreed to defer to an anonymous panel of human judges, you see, to make it fair, but I’m afraid I wasn’t doing a very good job of presenting our case and we were on the verge of losing them when the lawyer swept in and asked to be heard and he spoke so convincingly that the judges decided to give you another chance, Lex! Isn’t it wonderful? I shall certainly be sure to send that dear man a bit of extra good luck. We’re greatly indebted to him.’
This little speech only had the effect of annoying Lex even further, especially since Lady Luck had never had a good word to say about Schmidt when he and Lex had been playing in the Game together. It reminded him just how fickle her Ladyship really was and, considering the look she’d given Jesse when she met him, it made Lex nervous.
‘Brilliant! I’ll send him some roses or something once the Game is over!’ Lex said moodily. ‘Perhaps even a fruit basket, too! Now, if it’s not too much trouble, do you think you could see your way cl
ear to passing me that key so that we can get out of here?’
The Goddess picked up the key and unlocked the door to let them out of the cell.
Lex stalked through the open door first, followed by Jesse.
‘Much obliged, ma’am,’ the cowboy said, tipping his hat to her, causing her to flutter girlishly in a way Lex found extremely irritating.
‘Don’t call her “ma’am”!’ he snapped. ‘She’s a Goddess, not some flouncing, gartered, powdered cancan strumpet in one of your cowboy saloons!’
‘Really, Lex,’ Lady Luck said peevishly, ‘you’re the most miserable company when you’re sulking like this.’
Lex scowled but bit his tongue. The truth was that he felt very much like hitting something. The Goddess of Luck left in a huff, saying that she would meet Lex back on the ship later on, when he was in a better mood, to discuss the penalty round.
