He looked a wonder, too, in that outfit, with his skin like it was covered with white clay, what a lean, mobile body he had, and what unusually thin long fingers. They caught the tossed coin so deftly that the dime barely had time to flash over the table before it was clenched again in his thin fist.
«I don’t want to play anymore tonight,» Rhianon muttered, not taking her eyes off the red glittering eyes on the other side of the table.
«Winning is good, isn’t it?» The stranger grinned merrily, but not at all kindly. «And will it be so tomorrow?»
«Tomorrow is still to come,» Rhianon thundered down her mug on the table, she had to be swaggering, now that she was a boy, no one should question that.
«Yes, it is extremely difficult to survive in these times, isn’t it?» The stranger winked understandingly and leaned a little closer, the bells on his hat tinkling playfully in time with the movement of his head. It didn’t seem to be ringing really, but laughter. It was the laughter of dozens of little tongues.
Rhianon moved a little farther away so that the skinny hand reaching across the table would not touch her in any way. She didn’t like the intrusive interlocutor, though there was something about him that made her heart beat faster. It was as if she recognized an old acquaintance who shared all her interests with her. Except that this was a man she had never seen before. And was he human? He acted like a buffoon, but his eyes… That voice, those understanding nods. She clenched her hand under the table so no one could see. The lines on her palm began to itch. It had happened before. That momentary flash of recognition occurred to her at the sight of those who knew of her secret predilections.. A fleeting sorcery, quick, secret, inept… She had done it herself and now invariably recognized in the crowd those who had done it as well. And they recognized her, though they had never seen her before. But the doomed, that is, those who roll down the same path to hell and can no longer stop, easily recognize each other, easily dragged along with them. She had no choice, they might have, but they always looked at her derisively, just like this stranger sitting imposingly on the other side of the table. There was something else entirely.
«I’m almost on the run myself,» he whispered confidentially, and his eyes flashed dangerously again, as if he could see into her thoughts.
«I’m not,» Rhiannon finished the glass in front of her with a gulp. She tried to be rude and manly, but her overly-cute appearance must have spoiled the impression. It also made her feel uncomfortable how easily the man had figured out her plans. It was a fact one could only look at her wary demeanor and realize she had someone to run from.
«We’re on the run from ourselves,» the stranger said in a gentle voice, and he brushed aside any disbelief that might have been created by his first indiscreet words. «Sometimes what’s inside creatures is stronger than they are, and they try to escape it, but there’s nowhere to go. The danger is inside you, not outside. There’s no escape.»
«What do you know about it?» She asked haughtily, but nevertheless she glanced cautiously at the already-empty glass. The half-full bottle beside her now disgusted her and almost terrified her. How many times they had tried to convince her that her peculiarity was born in herself, like a curse. This curse needed no fuel to fuel it, but Rhianon was certain that alcohol promoted ignition. She couldn’t feel the heat inside her, and she didn’t see the fire rising out of nowhere, but even now she feared that if she got angry, the fire would flare up right on her fingertips, right on the dice on the wooden table in front of her.
She swallowed hard. Can the damned be seen in their faces? It is said that extraordinary beauty marks only those, like rebellious angels, close to the fall. In any case, at court so often whispered behind her back, unaware that she could hear everything from a mile around her. The royal astrologer hated her in silence until her father’s death, but on the king’s deathbed he was able to say it all.
Extraordinary beauty marks those from whom the fallen angel will come. Then she will be the worst of all, because no one has ever been more beautiful than her. Did the stargazer know of the terrible forbidden books she had collected? Rhianon guessed that he hated her for a very different reason. Just like every other mage she encountered. They all looked at her with envy and jealousy. And why was it? She wasn’t all-powerful and unlikely to ever be. Though she needed it so much, to gain superhuman strength and regain all that had been taken from her. To claim her property, she must first defeat all her enemies. And for that, even becoming a powerful king is not enough. Rhianon sighed. The trickster, ready to perform tricks now at her table, could hardly be of any real help to her. But he, with that same sly smile, kept making suggestions.
«I can make you win every time, every day, every night, at whatever hour you wish, the dice will fall as you wish. But do you want to?»
She looked at him for the first time with mild interest and wonder, the haggard face under the brim of his hat suddenly even began to look cute to her. The feverish, hungry gleam in his eyes was gone. They no longer glowed red. The skin on his cheeks was a little pinker. He seemed to be the kind of creature that feeds on the sympathy of his interlocutor. Like magic smoke, it only became alive and tangible when someone paid attention to it. That’s why he’s so interested in communication. Rhianon smiled at her own thoughts. He obviously took that smile as encouragement and continued to flirt as best he could. His bells were ringing even more merrily now. Their tongues no longer exuded laughter, but song.
«I want so much that I’m scared of my own desires,» she wanted blood, her hand clenched into a fist under the table again.
«And surely you don’t believe you can conquer entire kingdoms with agility?» He made some quick motions with his hands, and the dice on the table tipped over by themselves, revealing high points, and the gold jangled inexplicably.
Rhianon took a closer look at the coins. They were unusually minted. They were unlike anything she had ever seen. There were wings and sun on one side, there was a rose on the other. Somewhere she had seen this before, but not on doubloons. Somewhere else, and she couldn’t remember where.
«At least with dexterity you can get by,» she said smugly, though what she really wanted was something else. She had to take an entire country, overcoming the resistance of all her allies as well as the hired troops, mages, and diviners. Is it possible to accomplish such a thing? Somehow she became more and more convinced of this.
«Show me some more tricks,» she suggested in a commanding tone, wondering how, after all that had happened to her, she had not yet forgotten how to give orders. The capricious princess was sometimes dominant in her, and sometimes she tried to imitate the royal advisors, hypocritical and cunning, capable of prying everything out of their interlocutor and using it to their advantage. «I want to see something more serious than all the tricks you can see in the marketplace, too.»
He frowned, a little puzzled, a little disappointed.
At last she managed to get the better of him in some way. The playful, mocking look vanished from his face as if he’d had a moment’s makeup washed off. His features became elongated and pointed, the luster of his eyes faded.
«Well… here,» he muttered uncertainly, then he turned warily toward the inn.
«Not sure of your abilities?» She teased him.
He shrugged his angular shoulders as if they twitched violently in a comical manner. His expression became even more wary, and even the bells on his hat were somehow silent. He could tell he wasn’t telling the whole truth, or there was something he wasn’t letting on. «It’s not just my territory here…»
As
