A Sinister Game (20 page)

With that, the captain slid his sword back into
the
scabbard at his back and
, using a dark leader ability to,
slowly faded
from sight.

“We’ll see,” Victor replied.

The now transparent Blood
laughed, the sound eerie and hollow.
“You don’t even know where she is
right
now, Black.”

Victor tensed. Another realization hit him in the chest. “And you do
.
”

“
I do.” More soft laughter. “She’s fast, b
ut so am I. I will have caught up with her long before you
figure out
where to start.”

Victor said nothing to this last statement. He
felt Black melt away completely, transporting to some other location, and the
forest clearing fell into a quiet
broken only
by the distant sound of waves
crashing up
on
the
shore.

  * * * *

Where the hell am I
?

The night was so quiet. And the darkness was so deep.

Victoria had been forced to stop running long ago. Weariness and fear had both sapped enough strength from her legs that she could no longer effectively avoid vines and rocks to keep from tripping.

She slowed to a walk toward the outer forest line and crept quietly through the last few yards of twisted vines. She pushed aside the branches of low-lying tree to finally step onto what appeared to be some kind of road. It was made of packed dirt, flat and smoothed out, and the heels of her boots left barely a muffled thud as she walked.

With trees on both sides of the trail blocking out moonlight, it was hard to see more than a few meters ahead. Victoria held her hand palm up and concentrated. A small yellow-orange flame rose to life in the center of her palm. It was no larger than the flame of a candle, but its brightness lit the road for ten feet in both directions.

Next, she
used her free hand to
pop open her crystal compass
.
It magically sliced apart to open like a book, revealing the image of a girl on one side and the compass on the other.
The single arrow of the compass was pointing
north
.

Victoria took a few minutes to figure out that she’d come from the Southwest and that the road
she as on
led directly
north
.

A
fifth letter
on
the
compass
shimmered into view. It appeared
directly at the center of the compass face. It was the letter “U
.
”

F
or “Up.”

As she always did when this happened,
Victoria glanced up into th
e night sky.

The stars were incredibly
bright outside
the Field.
A thick band of them
seemed to run through th
e center of the sky, a
broad
spray of twinkling white.
They were beautiful. But that was all.

So she looked back down at the compass, shook her head in
the same mystified manner
she always did after studying it, and extinguished the flame in her right hand. Then she
closed her locket
and took a deep breath.

“North it is
.” There was really nothing to do but
follow the road
.

She walked for what felt like a mile, perhaps more, when she noticed lights up ahead. She stopped and focused on them. They seemed to be coming from windows, but… they were faint and small and few.

Still, Victoria had nothing else to move toward, so she approached the lights, finding herself entering a small…
city
of some sort. The windows belonged to houses that reminded her of Room 73 at the TGB. In the darkness, details were vague, but the homes appeared to be constructed of wood. Most were two-story, with small roughly hewn windows that bore opaque glass panes and cross beams. Each home sported a chimney composed of brick or some similar substance, and though it was not a particularly chilly night, smoke rose from all of them.

Victoria couldn’t see to the end of the village, so she couldn’t tell how big it was. However, it was clearly very small. There were perhaps fifty houses at most, and a few larger buildings. One of those larger buildings stood just ahead on the left, and as she neared it, she saw that there were animals tethered to a log outside.

They were horses. She had never seen them used domestically before. On the Field, there were a few wild horses that roamed from quadrant to quadrant. But these animals were larger than those. They were brawnier, and they had leather seats strapped to their backs and harnesses around their muzzles.

Victoria stood at the center of all of this and turned a slow circle. This was
not at all what she had expected
of the world outside the Field
. Where were the buildings
with their hundreds of lights like the towers the gamers lived in? Where were the busy
walk
ways and
whirring
transporter cubes and
beeping
business consoles? Where were the
people
?

No one answered her unspoken questions, of course. The silent, barely-lit night continued uninterrupted.

Perplexed but int
rigued, Victoria approached one of the two horses tied to the log.
It was the bigger of the two, with a coat as pitch as Victor Black’s hair. She could see its muscles outlined
beneath the sleek black coat. I
ts mane was long and shiny. It was
beautiful
animal; Victoria very much wanted to touch it.

As
she steadily drew closer to it and the building behind it, she could finally make out
sounds coming from inside.
People talking – plates and forks and knives scraping and pinging. Victoria turned to face the building, considering it. She was cold and tired and definitely hungry. 

The black stallion
beside her suddenly whinnied, drawing her attention. She glanced over at it. It watched her carefully, still and tall and dark as night.

“Easy big guy,
”
s
he whispered
.
“
Trust me,
I’m not going to hurt you.”

The horse seemed
to consider her words – which was a strange thing for a horse to seem to do. Victoria’s gaze narrowed.
“Are you someone’s mount?”
s
he asked
softly
, wondering if that’s what the leather seat was for
. “I’m surprised anyone could tame a beast like you.”

The stallion
whinnied again, this time softer.

“So, what do you think, big guy? Should I go in? Is it safe in there?”

The horse cocked its head curiously. Victoria had the distinct impression that he was listening, trying to figure out what she was saying.

She smiled and turned toward it again. “May I?” she asked, raising her hand toward its muzzle. The horse allowed her to close the distance between them, and Victoria carefully lowered her fingers to its fur.
She wasn’t sure this was the correct way to approach a horse, but it had always worked with the wolves she’d occasionally come across on the Field.

“I’ve never been this close to a horse before,” she whispered, grinning broadly. The animal was warm and soft, and when it whinnied again
but remained still as she slid her hand over his mane, she
giggled
despite herself. “
This is wonderful
.”

“
The experience is pleasant for him too
,” came a voice from behind her.

Victoria
spun around, her arms and hands flooding with instinctive heat
.

A man stood on the top step of the wooden stairs that led into the
large building
. He was leaning against a wooden support beam, his arms crossed over his chest.

Victoria blinked. So much about this man took her by surprise
;
she wasn’t certain where to begin assessing him. For one, he was as large for a human as the stallion was for a horse. No one on the Field looked like this. It was as if someone had plopped muscles on top of muscles and then molded them perfectly to his tall form. He
also
had a good foot and a half
of height
on her.

His white-blonde hair was so long that he had gathered it at the back of his neck with what looked like a leather strap. She couldn’t see where the locks ended, as he was facing her at the moment. There was a bit of a goatee-like beard on h
is chin, also very blonde. H
is ey
es were a deep, dark brown that
reminded her of chocolate.

He had a strong square chin and
bone st
ructure so male
it was
intimidating. There was absolutely not
hing small about this man. T
he strange clothing
he wore did nothing to hide these
assets
, either
. A light tan lea
ther vest was draped over his shoulders and chest
. His massive legs were encased in
darker
, stronger looking leather, much like that which constructed her downtime uniform jacket.
There were designs on the sides of his leather
boots that
were
matched by tattoos that ran the breadth of his immense biceps.

The man appraised her
with his deep brown eyes, just as she did him
. H
e stayed where he was,
as if he knew what she was capable of,
and that might have been the only reason Victoria hadn’t yet telekinesed him into the wall of the building behind him.

“I’m sorry?”
s
he finally asked, trying her best to keep any kind of quaver from her voice.

He smiled, flashing very white teeth, and gestured to the stallion. “Brom doesn’t normally take well to strangers,” he t
old her in that deep
timbre
of a
voi
ce. “He hasn’t tried to bite
or kick you and he’s actually let you stroke his withers. Trust me,” he chuckled like the rumble of thunder, “that’s impressive.
He likes you.
”

“Oh
,
”
s
he said. It was all she could
think
of
saying
.
Both the animal and i
ts master were larger than life – and it had been a long night.

The stranger
pushed
away from
the support beam, coming
slowly
down th
e stairs toward her. Victoria backed up; s
he couldn’t help it. Her power swirled be
neath the surface, ready to tap and
release.

The stranger
stopped after desc
ending the last step and
held up his
massive
hands in
what appeared to be
a
universal
sign of peace. “I mean you no harm,” he
said,
his smile
appearing genuine
. “You’re awfully skittish.” He paused and then cocked his head to one side
;
Victoria could see that his hair fell clear to mid
back as it moved into view.
“
You running from someone
?
”

She blinked.
“
It’s that obvious
?”

“
Fairly
,” he told her
, shrugging
.

She
moved out of the way
as he made his way to his horse and the stallion nudged its ma
ster’s open palm in
loving familiarity. The man glanced at her over his
very broad
shoulder. “
It’s clear you’re
new to these parts, if your clothing means anything.”

Victoria glanced down at herself. That was fair enough.

“Something made you leave your home. You’ve got no bags, seem to have no food or drink on you. Which means you left in a hurry.”

He was hitting the nail on the head so far.
Victoria
absently touched her locket
as if it could soothe her
tired
anxiety.