How long had it been since Tay had a win? He couldn’t even remember a time when he hadn’t been trying to scrounge together some scraps for himself just so he could have a decent bite to eat. He’d forgotten the thrill of anticipation, of knowing that his chance to prove himself against Rantho was now at hand.

Except, even though Tay had the strongest revenant on the board, Rantho didn’t seem all that upset. Quite the opposite. He sat back on his bench, continuing to chat with merchants in the crowd every now and again. He pushed a hand through those spiky brunette hairs, and held his cards up to blanket his face in that signature Runicka shadow-glow.

Tay tried to not let it get to him. He tried to keep his smile, and hardly contained himself as his excitement bounced him up and down on the groaning bench beneath him. But, eventually, as Rantho kept eyeing him and then his cards, Tay slowed. His smile faltered. And he wondered if he’d even done enough.

It was then that Rantho asked, “Are you proud of yourself?” Rantho lowered his cards to reveal the most devious smile, like one a man might bear when fattening up rats for his pet snake. “You think you’re clever because you had one good turn? Would you like to know a secret—something that’ll always separate me from you?”

“Is it how to get my hair to stand up as perky as yours?” Tay asked. “Because, if it is, I think I’ll pass to that.”

That got some chuckles from the crowd, but most among them remained quiet. Tay didn’t have any friends here. That fact definitely wasn’t lost on him.

“Funny,” Rantho said. “But not quite. No, you should realize that you’ve spent this whole game trying to find the one good play to win this game. And congratulations, you’ve found your one good play.”

Tay could feel his heart pounding up against the amulet he’d wagered in this duel. He could feel it slowing, like it was waiting for Rantho to get to his point. Was he bluffing, or was the Polamund really that assured against what Tay saw as a chance at victory?

Rantho continued, “But Runicka is a card game, and card games aren’t won in one single play. Every play I’ve made this game has been a good play, because every card in my deck is meant to synergize with each other.”

Rantho selected two cards from his hand, and then placed the remainder face down upon the table. “I can beat you here and now with just these two cards alone. You know why? Because I’m a better duelist than you, thief. Because everything you’ve done, Tay, has led to the moment that we just past. But what are you going to do now? You’re not trying to win—you’ve just been trying to stay in the game. And that’s the difference between us.”

Rantho placed his first card down at the edge of the table, and Tay sucked in his breath. He knew that one all too well.

(20) Living Shadowstone Stable

Shout: double this revenant’s Power until the end of the turn.

Dormant: double this revenant’s Power.

Flying <<< 3

Its art was just as terrible as it always seemed fully-summoned, and Tay couldn’t tell if it was just the way it had been drawn, but its halberd seemed even bigger on the card. Just seeing Rantho slide it across the table gave him shivers.

To which, Rantho smirked, before placing his next card.

(20) Gargoyle Slayer Surging This revenant gains +2 Power for each other Statue or Gargoyle revenant you control. Flurry, Flying << 2

Like all the gargoyles, it had elongated features and terrible wings. Unlike, its kin, it brandished two longswords that it seemed eager to drive into whatever it can, whether that be friend or foe. Its mouth was also open, revealing its fangs, and probably trying to let forth a terrible bellow.

Looking at a fusion on the table was different than looking at one with revenants actually merging together, and it took Tay a long moment to realize what this Slayer Shadowstone fusion really meant for his survival. Rantho hadn’t been lying about being able to beat him with only these two cards. Combined, with all of their effects and Power together, this abomination had 16 Power and the Flurry aura, meaning it could attack him twice—and directly since it was also Flying.

Tay only had 17 Life left, and a Warped Dracomancer that, while it was—or had been—powerful, wasn’t nearly as strong as Rantho’s gargoyle. Nor could it fly and block the fusion even if Tay had so desired.

He was done. All he had in his hands were two cards that he wouldn’t get any use out of until his next turn, which would never come, and the rainbow card. When his eyes passed over it, Tay noticed that its depth had lessened. And now there was a shadow emerging from the spiral of many different colors.

On top of that, all around the card, parts of it were darkening. If he squinted, he could make out the beginnings of appearing text, though he could not yet read any of it.

I’m not ready…

The words rang in Tay’s head and he didn’t even need to look to know they’d come from the card. Its colors pulsed when it had whispered to him.

“Since you don’t have anything to block with, I’m just going to swing at you with my Slayer,” Rantho said. “And that’s going to be game. I wish I could say that it had been a close game. But, Tay, you were really never going to be a challenge for me. Don’t fret though—most aren’t.”

The implication was obvious. Rantho had wiped the floor with Mond, and now he’d done so again here with Tay, much to the rejoicing of the gathered crowd. Which meant, Tay had lost. But he couldn’t lose. Not yet. He still had this card he needed to play.

A glance down revealed that the rainbow card had returned to being just that—a spiral of many colors without even so much as a smudge upon it. Now that the game was over, it was returning back to its unknowable state. But he’d been so close to understanding what it could do though.

Tay lowered his hand, and felt the weight of everything come down on him all at once. He’d have to tell Mond that he’d tried to stand up for him and lost. He’d have to face Cari and tell her that she’d have to live out on the streets again. He’d have to give up the only thing in this world that actually meant something to him.

Tay curled up one of his hands into a fist, but his shoulders relaxed the next moment. What else could he do? He’d come here to Stormwall looking to make more out of his life, and, as usual, he’d bit off more than he’d could chew. This was it. This was the moment he’d finally done himself in.

Back at the orphanage outside Pyrewood, it’d been Madam Principine who’d always said he’d needed to control his hunger. There were people who were born hungry in this world, and if they didn’t learn to keep themselves starved, then they’d end up eating their own stomaches.

That’s how Tay felt now—like he’d eaten his own stomach, and now had to force it back out again. Still, he moved his hands through the motions of gathering up his deck of cards—Rantho’s deck of cards—adding two cards from where he’d set his hand on his lap. When he handed the deck back to Rantho, he held onto the cards for a long moment, then raised his eyes to meet Rantho’s hard stare.

“Enjoy these, while they last, Rantho,” Tay said.

Rantho chuckled, and then yanked the cards out from his fingers. “I will, but I think you’re forgetting that you’ve wagered far more than these cards.”

Tay stood up from the table, and managed to immediately back into what felt like a metal wall. Upon turning around, Rantho’s guard took up his entire vision. The man was a monster of a barrier, and he was practically growling out from within his full helmet.

Tay chuckled and held out his hands, saying, “Can’t we talk about this?”

The guard held Tay’s shoulder as he reached into Tay’s collar and plucked out his mother’s amulet. He didn’t even have the patience to remove it from Tay’s head, instead choosing to pull and then snap the chain itself. Tay felt it cut into his skin right before the metal broke.

Tay stumbled forward, and the guard pushed him right out of the way to the side of the enclosure. A couple street rats who’d come up with them from Whalemaw Square snickered at him as Tay tried finding his footing again. His chest felt noticeably colder, as if someone’s hand had been there all day and had just now been pulled away.

Ranthomandir then stood over him, the Polamund’s emerald robes flowing down like a king’s garb and his hair standing up straight like a king’s crown. In his hands, Tay’s amulet glowed green, violet, and red, letting out a mixture of ultimately white light. It sank into Rantho’s coal black eyes as they looked down at him, drowned in their malice and excessive pride.

“You know, I really can’t believe you’d resort to stealing my cards when you had a Talisman like this. Makes me really wonder who you managed to steal this from to begin with.”

Tay rose to his feet and squared himself. “I didn’t steal it. It’s mine.”

Rantho rolled his eyes and looked back to both of his guards, as if trying to get their opinion on what he thought was an obvious lie. Then, Rantho turned his head back and said, through a grin, “Oh yeah? Well now it’s mine. And before I get out of this reeking sewer, I’ll leave a message with you to give to that faker Mondromo—you have a week to leave the city, both of you. And if I, or any other Polamund, see either of you here again, you’ll lose far more than jewelry.”

And before Rantho left their little enclosure within the Jar, he amongst the gathering crowd and said loudly, “But, just in case that fool actually was the Mondromo Yizzit I grew up hearing so much about, tell him, Ramseth Polamund sends his regards.”

Rantho, his guards, and the entire crowd left chuckling to that, and Tay could hear their laughter and boisterousness all the way in their ascent back up topside. Which left him with the regular humdrum that the Jar had to offer. Which, in all honesty, Tay had realized had been as loud as it was.

He could barely think to himself, and the implications of what’d happened here in this small part of the Jar, as the rest of it screamed itself to life around him. There were wine sellers in the enclosure above him, apparently, because he’d heard one of their bottles break against the wood—and tasted the wine dripping down. They were trying to move as much as possible before it soured even more than it had in the journey to Stormwall.

A group of armored women strolled by outside, all taller than Tay. They were talking about which of the Jar’s many taverns they wanted to sit down at and grab a tankard to catch up on their latest exploits in Aenkora. A banker and a merchant were laughing with each other about recent trade legislations passed in the neighboring country of Shorlaga.

And Tay didn’t care about any of it. He just lumbered over to the half-rotted and groaning bench under the table and sat himself down, just looking at the holes in the ground where he could see all the way to the Jar’s bottom and the shadows that collected there.

He cursed. Why had he stolen that chest? He always did small scores. Why hadn’t that been enough for him this time?

Because he’d come to the city to get something more, of course. And he’d found something more too—people who actually cared about him. People who were willing to put his safety in front of their own. He’d found people who’d been like a family to him, and he’d let them down. How was he supposed to tell them what had happened?

“Are you going to use this space, Qzza?”

Tay raised his head and turned to find a small, squat woman leaning on the table next to him, a small cart full of various objects that were all but stuffed underneath some hastily knotted blankets.

The woman seemed, for the lack of a better word, off. Her eyes were bit too far apart to see natural, and were separated by a too-flat nose, which was so pink that it contrasted against the rest of her rough tan skin. She had a brown and braided locks falling around the sides of her head, and a pristine black tunic that nearly covered the copious amounts of hair running along her arms.

But Tay’s eyes were more drawn to what was underneath the blankets. The woman had her cart stacked up to twice Tay’s height, and toward the top, not even her blankets could cover the clockwork she had stored in there. Tay could make out the rickety shape of figurines and dolls formed from wooden pieces of small gears.

Tay returned his attention to the woman, who’d cocked her head to the side. “Excuse me?” Tay asked.

“This space.” The woman gestured to the wooden enclosure, and then asked, “Are you using it? I rolled out of bed a little late this morning, Qzza, and I really need a spot to set up shop. This will do. Are you using it?”

“Oh,” Tay said. “Not anymore. I’ll leave you to it.”

Tay traipsed across the floor of the enclosure, skirting around a whole in the floor that would have taken him back into Duskborough a little quicker than he would’ve liked. Before slipping by the woman’s cart though, she cleared her throat and spoke up.

“You look as if the world’s leaning on your shoulders for support.”

Tay felt his face flush, and glanced away. As the woman pulled one of the blankets from her cart and began unloading the clockwork figurines, Tay noticed black and white patterns running along their bodies.

“I just—” Tay shook his head and bit back his lip. “I needed a win today is all. My life’s just…” He sighed. “My life’s just hit an all new low. I didn’t think that was even possible.”

The woman removed a couple boards from her cart that she unfolded and turned into standing tables. On top of these, she set her blankets. From there she took a couple painstaking minutes to perfectly arrange her clockwork by height and complexity. She’d managed to turn Tay’s place of loss into her own little shop, complete with another blanket hanging at the entrance as a makeshift door.

To Tay, she then said, “Lows are only a bad thing if you let them be. There’re two sides to every coin. The lowest point can also be the beginning to your highest climb. “

The woman wound up a hunched figurine on one of the tables, and when she placed it back down again, it began to move its arms out in front of it. It had a tail that flicked from side to side with them, and white markings glowed with each tick of its gears.

“No offense, put I don’t think you’re in any place to be lecturing me about climbing,” Tay said. “I mean, we’re both in Duskborough, after all.”

“True, but to get here, you’ve had to descend,” the woman said. “For me, and where my people come from, I’ve had to climb to get even here. Duskborough might be your low point, but it’s the highest I’ve ever been.”

Tay furrowed his brow. “Your people?”

The woman put her hands on her hips, and Tay noticed just how hairy her knuckles were. “You mean you honestly think I’m a Qzza, like yourself?”

Despite everything that had happened, Tay bring himself to smile. “I mean, you do look a bit odd.”

“Then I have no idea why you think you’re the one who needs to be insulted! I’m a Brux, not one of you Above-grounders. I was born in the deep places of the world. And just so you know, the deep places aren’t so bad, once you get used to them.”

“Believe me,” Tay said, “I’d stay here if I could. But it doesn’t look like that’s in my deck of cards.”

He almost laughed at the turn of phrase. Almost.

Practically pushing him aside, a man in a gold-trimmed coat and wearing a pair of dented iron-framed spectacles entered into the enclosure and began inspecting the figurines in earnest. In his leather sandals, he hopped from one to the next, before finally picking one up. In one of its hands, it held a curved bow. With each tick of its gears, its other arm drew the bow and then slackened it, repeatedly.

The man smiled at it, and then turned to the woman to ask, “How much for this archer?”

Smoother than a loan shark, the woman swept an arm around the man’s waist—because she was only about half of his height—and then pulled him into a corner of the shop. They must’ve only discussed business for half of a minute before the man was exiting the shop with the archer and the woman was bouncing a heavy sack of coins in her palm.

“I swear, the only thing you Above-grounders love more than air is this precious game of Runicka that’s taken off. I’ve lived a long time, but I’ve never seen people so enamored to purchase my clockwork than the clockwork I make for it.”

Everything clicked into place, and Tay reinspected every figurine in the shop. Most of them had the black markings of Chaos revenants, or the white markings of Order ones. This woman made Runicka figurines. And that man had been a Runicka enthusiast.

Tay started, “You’re not from here?”

The woman chuckled and stashed the sack of coins in a compartment on her cart. “You can call me Qallaz, dear. And no, I’m from Bruxhome, deep under what you call the Barrier Mountains in the west. Been in Stormwall for nearly half a century now though, and I’ve seen it through many changes.”

“And you make your living off of selling these?” Tay gestured to the Runicka figurines, all white and black and full of wound-up life.

“Of course!” Qallaz brightened, pulling out another figurine to replace the one she’d just sold. “Say what you will about the violence of the game, especially at the higher levels, but there’s a lot of money to be made when it comes to Runicka—a lot of money. You just need to know where to find it.”