The Adventure of the Christmas Vampires

by Kevin L. O'Brien

double-edged blade into the tabletop with one fluid move too fast for the eye to follow. Though she kept her expression neutral and she sat down to show she accepted his invitation, the startled and astonished look on his face assured her that her implied threat had sunk in.

  She called out to the innkeeper for a fresh goblet of mead and a bowl. One of his daughters brought both in short order, then departed even faster.

  She opened her purse. "I will wager part or all of this." And she poured its contents--two dozen gold crowns from Celephais--into the bowl.

  His grin widened. "Done. We roll to see who goes first." He threw his crooked dice, getting a double six.

  "I concede; make your move."

  He chortled as he tossed the dice, and received another double six.

  The game did not last long, given the circumstances, and the captain won easily. "One hundred and fifty tahlers, please."

  She dug three crowns out of the bowl and gave them to him.

  "Another game?"

  She flashed a half-smile. "Why not? I have time before supper. Same stakes?" That would make the wager 300 tahlers.

  "Of course."

  "Shall we double it?"

  The captain glanced at his mates, and they all chuckled. "By all means," he replied, spreading his arms.

  "What if you loose?"

  "I can make good any bet out of our cargo of rubies."

  "Very well; let us proceed."

  He made to roll to determine which of them started, but she forestalled him with a raised hand before he could even shake the dice. "I concede; please begin."

  The game lasted a little longer that time; she suspected he was toying with her. Nonetheless, he still won, and she handed over twelve crowns.

  "Another game?"

  "Naturally, and double the previous stake."

  "You do not have enough coins; what if you lose?"

  She returned a grin of her own. "Then I offer myself; I shall return with you to your galley and service the entire crew."

  He threw her an amused and malevolent leer. "All of us?"

  She returned a wicked mirthful leer of her own. "Of course."

  The mates laughed boisterously as the captain shouted, "Agreed!"

  She took a moment to drain her goblet as the captain made his first role, and turned in her chair to call for more.

  "Why not try some of ours?" a mate asked.

  She turned back, and saw him holding up their bottle.

  About time, she thought. She had speculated that their primary plan would be to get her drunk on a powerful alcoholic beverage, though she assumed they had contingency plans in case she failed to take their bait. That they offered her the same beverage they had been drinking all afternoon did not surprise her, being as many cultures made powerful moonshines that barely affected them, but could make anyone uninitiated intoxicated very quickly.

  Except her; she could consume enough of any liquor to get ten full-grown men inebriated, and feel little.

  "Ach, yes, thank you." She accepted their bottle, which she saw had indeed been carved from a single ruby. She pulled the stopper and sniffed; it smelled of herbal extracts and tannins. She poured a generous libation and passed it back, then took a deep draught. It tasted sharp, foul, and heady with alcohol, but she expected that, and she sipped at it as she played. Sure enough, she could feel the liquor's effects creep over her body almost immediately, and she pretended to become inebriated. She deliberately made mistakes in judgment as she fumbled her coordination, and she knew she had them fooled when the captain stopped cheating. Two-thirds of the way through the game she pretended to collapse unconscious on the tabletop, spilling her goblet and scattering the pieces on the board. She heard the Leng Men laugh in an evil fashion as they packed up their game and collected her money along with their winnings. Finally she felt them pick her up by her limbs and carry her out of the inn. No one tried to stop them, and she imagined the innkeeper family and the other patrons watching helplessly as she was bourn away.

  From "The Peril Gem"

  Eile Chica looked down past her feet at the pit of lava. It was maybe ten yards beneath them, but she knew they'd get a lot closer real soon. Looking up, she examined her restraints. Her wrists had been well lashed with a thick cord made of fibrous vines, and slipped over a hook that hung from a rope. The rope had been thrown over a cross-pole high above them, from which she and White-Lion dangled. She couldn't twist her body around far enough to see, but she heard the creak of the winch as it was turned, lowering them towards the lava at a tedious pace. She looked out in front of her. The tribe had gathered around the lip of the pit, and they danced, screamed, and gesticulated in a wild orgy of religious ecstasy, as others stood off behind the crowd pounding on hollow log drums.

  "Uhh, Braveheart, I think we're in trouble."

  Irritated by the inane comment, she scowled and gave White-Lion a dirty look. "Brilliant deduction, Sherlock," she growled in a sarcastic tone.

  White-Lion jerked her head around, her eyes and mouth opened in large startled O's. "Oh, my! What brought that on?"

  "Whaddya think, ya ditz?"

  "You sound upset."

  "Now, what makes you think that? A bunch of murderous savages want ta immolate us as a sacrifice to their god in punishment for trying ta steal their sacred jewel. Why the hell would I be upset?! Gaaah, sometimes you can be such a space-case!"

  "Well, getting mad at me won't help."

  White-Lion's words triggered an idea for how to escape. She realized it was a long shot, but she didn't see that they had any choice.

  "Geeze, get a clue, will ya? We wouldn't be in this mess if it wasn't for you and yer hair-brained schemes."

  "Hey! You can't blame this on me."

  "Oh, yeah? Whose idea was it ta steal the Eye of the Devourer?"

  "Well, it certainly wasn't my idea to sneak through the village at night."

  "Yer the one who set off the alarm!"

  "Only because you were about to step on that sleeping guard!"

  "Ya didn't have ta yell!"

  "How else was I supposed to get your attention? You were too far away to hear me whisper."

  "You were supposed ta be right behind me."

  "You were moving too fast!"

  "I was tryin' ta get through the village before we were discovered, ya bimbo! Why couldn't you keep up?"

  "I was trying to be stealthy!"

  "Dammit! I thought we agreed ta move fast!"

  "I didn't agree to anything, you decided for both of us!"

  "I thought it was the best thing ta do!"

  "I'm the senior partner, I'm the one who's supposed to make the decisions!"

  "Hah! You couldn't decide what shoes ta wear this morning, you idiot!"

  "I'm the idiot? You're the one who thought we could scare the natives with a simple trick!"

  "How was I ta know they'd seen matches before?!"

  By that time they were within ten feet of the lava. Eile could smell the foul gases and feel the heat rising up from the surface.

  "I knew yer obsession with adventure would get us killed some day, but I never thought we'd go out like this."

  "Son of a--stop blaming me!" White-Lion kicked her legs in frustrated anger.

  She smiled. That's it, she thought, get good and mad. "Who else am I gonna blame? It's no one's fault but yers!"

  "Ooohhh! I can't believe I chose a poopy-skull like you to be my partner!"

  "God, I can't believe I fell for a self-centered butthead such as you. I thought I had better sense!"

  White-Lion screamed in rage as she twisted and bucked her body, but it soon turned into a guttural roar as light exploded from her eyes. It echoed through the jungle, scaring up flocks of birds and flushing animals out of hiding as they fled in terror.

  Yes! Now we're getting somewhere. The only problem was, White-Lion's magical ability was erratic. Eile had no idea what would result. She could only hope it was something productive.

  Read the re
st of the story [https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/338142-the-peril-gem].

  From "Gruff Tolls"

  The three women paused as they topped the crest of the ridge. The other side of the pass ran down-slope to a narrow but deep cleft between the two mountain ranges. The sides of the ravine were sheer vertical rock walls some thirty feet apart, and even from where they stood they could hear the muted roar of the cataract deep inside the fissure.

  Medb hErenn watched as Morgiana crouched and examined the vista with her experienced thief's eye.

  "You were right," she remarked in a casual tone. She was addressing the Zoog Conaed, called Runt, who sat on one of the three pack yaks behind her. He was only about half the size of his race, but his verdigris-tinged bronze fur was darker and the tarnished silver facial stripes were bolder.

  He declined to answer, but the former queen replied, "You should know by now he is very seldom wrong."

  Morgiana gave the massive woman a look that mixed amusement and exasperation on her lovely Arabic face, then turned her attention back to the ravine while Medb followed her gaze. As Conaed had predicted, the gulf was spanned by a footbridge suspended from two pairs of rough-hewn stone spires, one on either side. The planks of the deck appeared to be made from ordinary wood, but the ropes that supported them did not look like hemp or metal wire or any other recognizable material. They almost seemed to resemble cobwebs.

  Mephitis walked up to stand between them. Medb spared the apothecary a sidelong glance and saw her eye the bridge in a dubious manner. "Are you sure this is the only way through?"

  "The Quarry of the Giants should be just a few miles west of here," Medb said. "From there the