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“What in the twelve pits is all of this?”
I leaned my elbows on the table and laid my chin on my interlaced fingers. “Those are your bargaining chips.”
“You gotta be kiddin’ me. Who asks for this kinda shit in a game of tiles?”
I shrugged nonchalantly. “I told you this was a high stakes game. If the risk is too high for your tastes, you can go back to town empty-handed.”
“High stakes is one thing. Askin’ for someone’s firstborn is a completely different thing. What happens if I don’t have kids?”
I gave him another bored shrug. “I suppose I lose out, then.” I watched his eyes skim the short list of precious things I was asking him to give over.
“Fine. Won't matter any once I win." He signed the list and crossed his arms. “Now what?”
"Now, the rules of our little game. Fifteen rounds including dealer selection. Start of the round, you pick one of the nine bags I have separated my winning into. If you fairly win the round, that bag gets added to the pot. If you lose, you will pick one thing from that list to add to the pot. If one of us fairly wins nine rounds, the game is over. Either way, whoever fairly wins the most rounds gets the whole pot at the end. This is a winner takes all game."
"Sounds easy enough"
"Sounds that way, doesn't it?" I took my bag of tiles from the backpack at my feet.
"Whoa, buddy. I don't play with other people's tiles. Don't trust you to not have a rigged set." He placed a tile bag on the table. "We use mine or I walk."
I shrugged, pretending I hadn't already planned for this variable. "Suit yourself." I gestured for him to choose a tile first.
He chose a tile at random, taking a secretive look at it with a smirk. "Hope you're ready to lose, kid."
I picked my own tile and returned the smirk. "Pride paves the road to ruin.”
And so we begin.
I knew the outcome of this game, but I liked playing with my food. It always made the victory so much sweeter when the fly tangled itself in my web.
The more rounds I won, the more nervous Corbin became. “What’s wrong, Corbin? Scared you’re going to lose that eternal spirit you just bet?”
He rolled his eyes. “I don’t even believe in spirits or souls or what have you. All magic mumbo-jumbo. Ain’t no matter, though. You’re gonna lose and I’m gonna be a wealthy man.”
I looked over my tiles with a sly grin. “Perhaps.”
Everything about the game changed after I won my sixth round. We both knew if I won a single round more we would have to play through the last three rounds to determine a winner. Corbin didn’t want that. The odds were not in his favor and he was very aware of that fact.
Desperation clouds the mind.
Corbin fell right into my trap the moment he traded several of his tiles for ones hidden in his sleeves so he could win a round I was almost certainly going to take. I didn’t win a single round after that.
I helped Corbin collect his tiles and his winnings as he gloated about his victory. I cared little for what he had to say. None of it mattered to me. They were the ramblings of a fool who had signed away everything for a pile of money he wouldn’t even get to keep.
Corbin loaded the last of the bags onto his horse and grinned at me, shoving Peter’s cursed wallet into his pocket. “No hard feelings, right, kid? I ain’t gonna have trouble about what I did or did not do to Pete?”
“You won, didn’t you?”
He laughed gruffly. “That I did. See you around, Sylvester.” I watched him leave the property with a shake of my head.
“You really spun that one well, Sy.”
My good mood was ruined by Xivole’s voice from behind me. I turned to glare at him as he settled into one of the chairs of Peter’s front porch, allowing my disguise to melt away. “Why are you here, Xivole?”
“Thought I’d watch you conduct business. See firsthand how a professional like yourself works these days. Well played with that ‘fairly winning’ wording. Little obvious, but he didn’t seem like the brightest candle in the box. I was a little confused when I was watching you in the saloon. Didn’t peg you for a handshake kinda gal.”
I rolled my eyes. “Nothing wrong with handshake deals, Xi.” I silently cursed myself for using his nickname especially when it made him put on that stupid grin of his.
“That’s not what you told me when we were partners. I miss those days sometimes.”
“That makes only one of us.”
He put his hand over his heart dramatically. “You wound me, Sy.”
“Don’t tempt me to make that more literal.”
He smiled as he stood. “Don’t you miss this banter? We made a great team.”
I shook my head and made my way back into Peter’s cabin. “I was a very different person back then. I like working alone these days.” I stood on one side of the threshold while he stood on the other. “You should go, Xivole. I have more work to do.”
He pouted at me. “All work and no play makes Sylana a dull Demon.” He laughed as he turned and walked toward the rising sun. “See you around, Sy.”
I closed the door after he disappeared in a cloud of dust. “Not if I’m lucky.” I picked up the signed list Corbin had left behind, examining my winnings. “Cheaters never truly win.”