The Cards Your People Play

I: A Game

It was one of those summer dusks you dreamed of in the winter. Perfectly cool and still and golden, the sun just hovering over the horizon, the lamps already lit in anticipation of the coming dark. A perfect evening to play some cards.

Pyotr hurriedly wiped his wrinkled hands against his shirt as he scrambled up the riverbank, a pewter cup stuffed under his arm. The plates and cups and silverware were finally all washed, stacked neatly in baskets, and wrapped in cloth. He dragged the baskets across the turf—one in each hand—walking rapidly backwards toward the open back door of the kitchen. Yorgos sat on a short stool chewing coca leaves, propping open the unwieldy door with his unwieldy figure. In his haste Pyotr almost tripped over the threshold, causing Yorgos to let out a muted chuckle. “Don’t smash the dishes”, he said with a good-natured wink. With one last heave, the thin servant dragged the baskets into their allotted place, and plopped down on the other stool set across the doorway with a great sigh.

“The river is too low. Have to bend down to wash. Hurts the back.”

“Aye.” Yorgos leaned forward and passed him a sprig of coca. “I will pray for rain.” Pyotr did not even try to conceal the look of anticipation on his face as he absentmindedly accepted the leaves. He was waiting for Yorgos to reach into his pocket. The cook followed his gaze and grinned. “I have never met a man so enamored with cards.”

“I know not the meaning of that word. I do love cards. Alena does not like me to play.”

“Ah yes… doing without tends to only sharpen one’s passion. We will get you home before she notices.” Yorgos theatrically turned to dig in his pocket and produced a perfect, crisp deck of 64 cards.

“Shall we play Four Thrones again?”

“Actually,” said Yorgos, maintaining his conspiratorial affect, “I thought we might play a different one that is popular around here. You should know the games we play if you want to find partners.” Pyotr assented. It was a wise thing. “It is called Waterfront and it is quite simple.” The cook explained the rules, Pyotr nodding along. It was somewhat like a game they played back in his home country. Each player had to build tricks for each suit, but could blow up another player’s trick with the right cards.

“I have the Fool of Canes,” Yorgos announced. “Think very carefully about what you play this turn.” Pyotr’s eyes widened as he gazed at his vulnerable trick. It was nearly complete, and his only one remaining. But the threat was clear. With a sigh he played his card onto the cook’s trick. Yorgos played the Fool anyway, wiping his board.

“The bloody hell!” Pyotr exclaimed. “I helped you!”

Yorgos threw up his head and laughed merrily, almost tipping back on his stool. “Cards aren’t about making friends! You should have threatened me back.”

“But look!” He splayed out his hand of cards face up. “I haven’t a threat to give.”

“Then you should have lied and said you did, my friend.” Yorgos warmly rested his hand on the man’s shoulder. “A threat is best answered with a threat. Meeting a threat with a kindness only shows you are harmless.” Pyotr’s exaggerated dismay vanished and he smiled and laughed along with the cook. It was impossible to not be merry in his presence.

A fellow was standing afar off, near the riverbank. Watching them. Yorgos bent down to snatch another sprig of coca from his pile next to the stool and caught a glance of the stranger. His smile vanished in an instant, replaced by a somber heaviness. He heaved himself off the stool. “Stay here,” he ordered Pyotr, and shuffled over to the stranger. Pyotr craned his neck to see his face, but he was hooded and the light was failing. The two exchanged hushed words and muted gestures. Yorgos’s voice grew louder like he was aggravated, but still Pyotr could not discern the sentences. Finally the cook turned and shuffled back to the doorway, and the hooded stranger vanished out of sight.

“What is it?” Pyotr asked when he once again beheld Yorgos’s sad eyes. “What is wrong?”

“Nothing is wrong, my friend,” Yorgos said. “An opportunity has come our way and we must seize it.”

Pyotr shifted uncomfortably on his stool. The old man’s words didn’t match his expression. It was eerie. “What are you saying?”

“That fellow I just spoke with wants you to meet someone later tonight, once the moon emerges—that is, comes out—from behind the hill. Meet someone down by the pier.” Even his intonation was strange, like he was reciting something poorly memorized.

“Why must I do this?” Pyotr asked.

“For me, my friend. You must do it for me.”

II: A Threat

Pyotr pulled his threadbare coat tighter around his shoulders. The summer cool had given way to the chill of night, and the wind was stronger down by the water. There the moon was, waxing to a near fullness, looking as if it were perched atop the massive hill that dominated the northern skyline, like it was ready to roll down and crush him. But nobody had come. Was this some pointless prank? The only sound was the master’s boat bumping idly against the pier as it was disturbed by the lazy current of the river. Out of boredom he walked to the edge of the pier and squinted at the boat in the moonlight.

“Well met.”

Pyotr jumped, spinning to face back toward the shore. There was a dark figure standing at the foot of the pier, a perfectly smooth shape under a cloak. His voice was bizarre and gravelly, like he was poorly impersonating an accent.

“Well met. What is this about? Yorgos looks like death,” Pyotr stammered. The silhouetted man took a step out onto the pier. Pyotr felt his throat tighten. A threat. The man was blocking the way back to dry land. Still, the river was only waist deep, what was the worst that could happen? Yorgos would not have led him into a trap. He owned nothing of value to steal in any case.

“Never mind that,” the man hissed. “I understand that a great knight will be dining with your master in three days time.”

Pyotr was taken aback. What was this about? “A knight, yes. Padrau, my master’s cousin.”

“And you work in the household?”

“Yes, the kitchen.”

“Do you serve the wine, or only prepare it?”

The question was impossible to parse, too much was left implicit. Couldn’t this man tell from Pyotr’s accent that he was not speaking his mother tongue?

“Pardon? I do not prepare the wine, it is purchased. And I serve my master.”

“Never mind that. Are you cupbearer at the feast?”

“No? I haven’t a doublet.”

“Does the cupbearer’s doublet fit you?”

Pyotr’s brow grew more furrowed with each question. These were very queer things to be asking on a pier in the dark of the night. “I suppose it can. I am small.”

“You will bear Sir Padrau’s cup at the feast. And you will place this in his cup before you give it to him.” The silhouette shifted as an arm emerged from beneath the cloak, holding aloft something too small to see. But Pyotr was not slow. It must be poison.

“No!” he cried. “Why do you say such things? I will not betray my master!”

“You will,” the halting voice croaked. “I do not countenance disobedience.” His other arm emerged from the cloak. The moonlight fell upon his gloved hand, and there was the unmistakable glint of steel. A blade.

“So that is it, then? If I do not obey, you will slit my throat and dump me in this river and find another?”

“No,” the voice croaked. “Your wife’s name is Alena, and your daughter’s is Mirya. You are boarding with Ryome until you can afford to establish your own household or grow enough in stature to move into the master’s hall. You hope to impress with your writing once your grasp of the language improves.”

Pyotr gasped faintly. How did this man know all these things? Even Yorgos did not know about the writing. He felt as if he were trapped in an nightmare where reason broke down.

“So you threaten my family, then.”

“Do what is asked of you and you will never see nor hear of me. But remember this. I know all about you, and you know nothing of me. I speak not with my own voice. I wear not my own face. I am a ghoul. I am vengeance. I shall disappear as a morning dew when I am satisfied.”

III: A Kindness

The stone floor had naught but a bit of straw scattered on it to soak up the urine and blood. Pyotr’s teeth chattered all through the night as that floor sucked every last bit of warmth from his body. But he was thankful to be kept awake. He knew what the morning brought for him and he wished to delay it as long as possible.

The plot had come to its logical conclusion, a conclusion that the poor servant had failed to grasp in the three day haze of anxiety leading up to it. He had been worried sick about letting slip any bit of information lest it made it back to his ghoul. He had agonized over revealing the existence of the plot to the master, the only one who could guarantee the safety of his family. He ultimately chose not to when he considered the plot could actually be something the master desired, done in such a roundabout way by his court to distance him from it.¹ Pyotr had told Yorgos nothing save that he needed to take the place of the cupbearer, an odd request that Yorgos simply accepted with a solemn bow of his head and an uttered prayer. He had stuffed the ill-fitting doublet with towels so it did not sag, and when the time came, furtively slipped the vial of poison into Pardau’s drink. Pardau downed the goblet in seconds, and it was very little time before he began to choke and sputter and fall from his seat. All of this Pyotr had played out in his mind a thousand times.

But he had not considered what would happen next.

That the master would order his men to seize the cupbearer, to search his pockets, that they would find the empty vial. That they would drag him down to the cell kept for torturing highwaymen for the whereabouts of their hideouts. That his master would spit on him and say he regretted ever trusting a dirty Occidental in his hall, that he must have been sent to ingratiate himself by one of his adversaries abroad, and that he would be back on the morrow to break his body and mind to determine who that was. A name Pyotr could not give. Not that it would stop the tormentors from dealing him pain anyway. Then he would hang.

His only remaining goal at this junction was to appeal to his master’s sense of mercy to guarantee the safety of his family. They would surely be driven out—or worse—if he didn’t. Alena was still young, she could remarry and continue to have a life here. It would be cruel to force her and Mirya to uproot and take flight yet again, after so few months.

He summoned his daughter to mind. Her curls, her dimples. He may never see her in the flesh again, except maybe from his vantage on the gallows. But he could see her visage in his mind so vividly, he could almost hear her. She was saying “psst”. Why was she saying that?

“Psst!”

Pyotr flew to his feet, his delirium dissipating like smoke. He wasn’t hallucinating. There Mirya was, crouched next to the opening high above him that let in a little light and air. Dawn had broken, but nobody had risen yet. A single curl dangled through the bars of the window, catching a sunbeam.

“Pa,” she sobbed in their mother tongue. “What have they done to you?”

He must have looked frightful. Pardau’s retinue had fallen upon him and beat him within an inch of his life before his master’s men had taken him down here. His face must be almost unrecognizable.

“Mirya,” he responded in a quivering voice. He felt dreadfully faint, like he was about to collapse. “Mirya, come away from there. Someone will see you.”

“Yorgos sent me.”

“You—you stay away from that bastard! He is the reason I’m down here!”

“No, no, Pa. He rushed to us the moment you were discovered. He took us away and hid us in his cellar before anyone knew. He told us you were forced, and he was forced to have you forced. They threatened his family the same as you.”

Pyotr seized his hair with both of his hands. His head was spinning and pounding. Nothing was right or true in the world. If not Yorgos, then who? Who? Or was it more lies?

“Yorgos sent me to tell you that you mustn’t meet a threat with a kindness. That is what he told me to tell you. You mustn’t meet a threat with a kindness.”

Pyotr sank back to his knees. What sort of words of comfort were these? He already knew he had been foolish to go along with the ghoul’s instructions without seeking some form of leverage in return. He had been foolish to fail to foresee that he was being set up to take the fall for the assassination.

A crackle of insight struck Pyotr, like a blow to the head. It knocked him sideways, sprawling him out on the cell floor. Mirya cried out in shock. But the swirling fog of despair had departed. Something had clicked into place. Yorgos was not chiding him, not even comforting him. He was advising him. It was a game of cards. He must bet on something and he must bluff. Pyotr summoned the bets to his mind. If he were right about all of them, then there was a way out.

“Mirya, can you be seen from the outside?”

“No, Pa. There is a slope blocking anybody’s view unless they are right against the wall.”

“We may yet take the trick. Go and fetch one of your little friends back here, then wait and listen. Be quiet and stay away from sight.”

“I will.”

When she had departed, Pyotr summoned up all of his remaining energy to bellow at the top of his lungs.

“I KNOW WHO KILLED SIR PARDAU!”

IV: A Trick

The door to the dungeon creaked open and a beam of light fell upon Pyotr’s face, rousing him from his stupor. Had he fallen asleep? How long had it been since his pronouncement? Steps pacing toward his cell. Pyotr struggled and propped himself up on one elbow. Sat across from him, separated only by the three iron bars of his cell, was his ghoul.

He could see him much better now, even in the very dim dungeon. He wore an iron mask with two dark holes for his eyes and a narrow slit for him to breathe and speak through. Drawn tightly around it was a black cloak, concealing his form. Pyotr’s first bet was correct. The ghoul was part of the master’s household, if he could hear word of Pyotr’s declaration so soon and come down in costume. He had recalled the ghoul growing angry with his disobedience at the pier, a thought that wouldn’t even occur to a commoner.

“Unfaithful servant!” hissed that strange, mannered voice. “You claim to know me when you don’t.”

“Unfaithful master,” responded Pyotr weakly. “Leaving me to be caught with the poison. You were never planning to leave me as a… how do you say? A loose end. Now I will cry out and Pardau’s men will discover you.”

“You try anything of that sort and your miserable wife will perish even before you do.”

“You don’t know where she is any more.”

The masked man paused for a moment. “No, maybe not… perhaps the cook does.” Pyotr could not conceal his dismay. The masked man let out a choking, halting laugh. “You are too weak to best me.”

“But you came down here still. You are afraid I have guessed your person.”

“I see now you haven’t.”

“But I know who you are. You are…” Pyotr trailed off and slumped over.

“What?” screeched the masked man, leaping forward and grasping the bars. “Spit it out!” Pyotr was face-first on the floor, mumbling something incomprehensible into the stone. “Say it!” Pyotr struggled to his hands and knees and hung his head down like he was about to retch. He discreetly stole a glance at the window. A golden curl, waving in the wind.

With every last ounce of strength that he still possessed he exploded, leaping forward, seizing the iron mask and tearing it off. The moment he beheld the face of his enemy a grin spread across his own.

“You are Sir Vorel, knight attendant to my master!” He collapsed in exhaustion onto his back, letting the mask clatter and roll away.

Vorel howled and hissed and spat like a demon from hell itself. He drew his short blade and stabbed wildly at the air in front of him, but Pyotr had fallen too far back from the bars. After a moment of thrashing the knight calmed down somewhat. He chuckled and shook his head, dropping the false voice.

“It does not matter in any case. I am to lead your torture. Nobody will believe you. Saying the name of your tormentor is a trick we are all familiar with.”

Pyotr also dropped the act. He was indeed exhausted, but he not such that he could not finish a sentence. The incoherence had been bait to draw Vorel closer to the bars as he strained to hear. “I guessed as much. So I made sure there were witnesses. Right Mirya?”

“Right,” came a faint voice from above, like an angel.

“Right. And lest you think as my daughter she won’t be believed, she has brought another to witness it too.”

Vorel’s face fell. He wasn’t contorted by anger any more. He was fearful. “I see I have been bested after all,” he murmured. “But it mustn’t end here. I can make this all go away. Yorgos can take the fall for the both of us. They will take me at my word.”

“I find that agreeable. But we shall skip the torture.”

“Of course,” said Vorel. “I shall have you released and we will speak with our master immediately about Yorgos.” He stood and walked back to the dungeon’s door.

As soon as the door creaked shut, Pyotr rushed to the wall beneath the window. “Now girls, you must fly as fast as your feet can take you! To the back door of the kitchen—Yorgos will be there. Tell him all that you have seen and beg him to take you to the master, now!” The girls stood and ran.

It was his final bet: that Yorgos was not lying. It could have been that Yorgos was protecting his family simply to keep them within reach so Vorel could continue to threaten them and keep Pyotr quiet. It could be that he was in Vorel’s service willingly, not under duress.

But Pyotr recalled how Yorgos had taken him in when his family first stumbled into the village in the muddy spring rains, Alena clutching their dead infant son. His kind smile, his steady temper, his evenhanded command of the kitchen. Pyotr trusted him. So it was a footrace now, whether the girls could make it to the kitchen and from there to the master before Pyotr and Vorel did.

Fortunately, Pyotr could slow them down. When Vorel returned with the jailer to release him, Pyotr begged for some water and a crust of bread, which they obliged him. He sat there in the filthy straw, slowly chewing the bread while Vorel impatiently tapped his foot. Finally, feeling he had bought enough time, he struggled to his feet. “Let us sort this all out, then,” he said, and limped to the door with the jailer supporting him, barely keeping him from collapsing again. They ponderously climbed the stone steps out of the dungeon to the ground floor of the hall.

The moment they emerged from the second door at the top of the stairs Vorel was struck across the face with the butt of a partisan and forced to his knees. The jailer cried out and nearly let go of Pyotr, which would have sent him tumbling down the flight of stairs—perhaps unto his death—but he blessedly remembered to hold on. They awkwardly shuffled out of the doorway over Vorel’s prostrate body, encircled by half a dozen of the master’s men, as well as the master himself, Yorgos, and the girls.

“So,” the master said. “I have received some very strange news from the most strange of heralds. My cook and the village girls tell me of a knight in my court who makes black deals in the black of night wearing a devil’s voice and a devil’s face.”

“Not I, master!” Vorel exclaimed, struggling to his feet. “Can’t you see? This is a conspiracy between the cook and cupbearer to shift the blame! You would trust the word of these lowborn over mine? They cannot produce a single piece of proof, only well rehearsed stories!”

The master pursed his lips. “Hmm, I suppose I must consider the possibility. The cupbearer bore the vial. There is no evidence implicating my knight, mere testimony.”

Pyotr cleared his throat and all eyes shifted to him. He lowered his eyes. “Forgive me, master. It was truly I who bore the poison. But I acted under threat. Jailer, who entered the dungeon after I proclaimed I knew the killer?”

The jailer looked surprised to be directly addressed. “Er— it was only Vorel, who was to see to your interrogation.”

“And was he wearing anything out of the ordinary?”

“Nothing but a cloak.”

“And was I wearing or bearing anything of note when you cast me into the cell? You did search me?”

“I searched ye. You wore and bore nothing but the cupbearer’s doublet and the poison vial.”

“Then where did I get this?” He produced the iron mask, which he had shoved into his doublet while Vorel was away fetching the jailer. A gasp escaped his audience. “Here is your devil’s face, master.” He held out the mask for the master to grasp and turn over.

The master let out a strained sigh. “Well, that settles it. If all you tell me is true, I do not hold you two responsible for my cousin’s death. You were swept up in a conspiracy beyond your power to stop. This knight of mine might have sought to be placed steward over my late cousin’s holdings. Now all he will look over is the crowd at his execution.” He disdainfully tossed the mask to one of his attendants and strode away.

Vorel broke down into blubbering hysterics as he was stripped of his belongings by his stonefaced compatriots. Pyotr stumbled forward and embraced first his daughter, then Yorgos, his daughter still clinging to his leg. Tears leaked from his eyes as his buried his face in the man’s bosom. “Bless you, my friend. Bless you for teaching me the cards your people play.”