Page 5 of The Gambler's Prize
I come to my senses and stop struggling before he breaks my arms. His grip loosens enough to be bearable, but he doesn’t let go. People are starting to stare at me, pinned helpless, face flaming. I don’t sense much sympathy. Most of the customers are poor, working in the goldmines for bosses who take the majority of the profits and dole out pitiful salaries. They have no love for people like me who come here to play and dance off home again to the better streets. I knew it, but it really hits home now as I meet their taunting gazes.
“My jacket,” I whisper. “I need it before I go.”
Losing a jacket doesn’t really matter compared to the shit I’m in, but I’m just trying to get back some tiny modicum of control. My life has gone down a sinkhole in a matter of minutes.
“Get his jacket,” Grimes growls at a server.
The man retrieves it from theafitable where I fucked everything up and throws it over my shoulder. Grimes starts to walk me to the door, still holding my arms behind my back like he’s a guard and I’m a criminal. There are loud jeers as I’m led out. And a few murmurs of concern or sympathy, much softer. A woman I bedded a few weeks ago takes a step forward as though she wants to help, but one glare from Grimes sends her scurrying away. The security staff don’t even look at me, but they do hold the door open for Grimes to propel me through. Like I expected, I’m on my own.
We cross the threshold to the street. I catch my breath as though I jumped into a cold pool. During the day, desert sun bakes the streets like an oven, but they turn to ice at night under the empty, cloudless skies. All heat has vanished into the vast vault above. I shiver in my thin shirt, sweat drying on my skin. I’m already pretty sober from the metaphorical cold water the judge poured on my head. I sober up even more now as the casino door shuts behind us and the noise of revelry dies away and it’s just us and the silence of night. Moonlight shines brightly, lighting up the narrow street. Hastily built workers’ houses surround the casino, the wooden boards stained with cheap paint or just left bare. There’s a small grocery store and a tobacconist, but apart from the casino the buildings lie dark and sleeping. The miners start early tomorrow. Cacti twice as tall as men loom from the shadows, scaring the unwary. They grow right in the center of town, everyone and everything working around them. It’s considered bad luck to cut them down: Galbrava superstition. It’s a long way from the pretty architecture and wide, tree-lined boulevards of my home city of Rhennes, where everything has been designed with an eye to beauty. Of course, I never would’ve had to come here if I hadn’t been so stupid. And now I’ve made my stupidest mistake yet.
“You can let me go now,” I say, trying to sound in like I’m in charge of the situation.
Grimes’ chuckle shows very clearly that I’m not. From behind, he brings his mouth close to my ear.
“Are you sure you aren’t going to throw a petulant little punch at me again?” he says.
I’m the best boxer in my weight class at my gym. Unfortunately for me, he’s about three weight classes above me.
“I won’t attack you again,” I say, humiliation curdling.
“And why’s that?”
“Because you’d kill me?” I guess.
“Exactly. You’re a fast learner, Florian.”
He’s hateful. How did he put on such a show to snare me? Am I such a terrible judge of character? Was I that horny? I swear his dark eyes were warm as he looked at me across theafitable. I thought his gaze was pure molten sex, but now I’m realizing it might’ve just been pure, molten hatred. And I was too conceited to see it.
My father is right. I deserve everything I get.
Grimes finally lets me go. My arms sing with pain and my hair is disheveled, the tie almost loose. I rearrange it, looking anywhere but at Grimes. There are no gas streetlights here, of course: this place is years behind Rhennes. But the moon is enough to show my expression, so I try to look as strong and unconcerned as possible. I get my jacket on and hug myself inside it, trying to chase the bitter cold of the night, and the cold that’s seeping into my bones from the realization that I’m in very, very big trouble.
“The contract,” he says. “You still haven’t signed it.”
There’s no escape. The “authorities”, in the form of Judge Draved, have already made that clear. Grimes hands me another pencil from his pocket. I lean the paper against the casino wall and sign. Lord Florian Southland. A grand name for the biggest idiot ever born. Grimes folds the paper and puts it into his pocket. My panic breaks the gates.
“Look, wait,” I say. “Please. This isn’t… it just isn’t going to work. You don’t want me working for you. I’m a terrible worker. I’m lazy, and irresponsible, and annoying... Why don’t you just hire someone else? Someone who actually wants a job?”
“Because I don’t want someone else, Florian,” he says. “I wantyou.”
Chapter 3
Florian
The walk to Grimes’ place is long, and silent. Galbrava is the only city in miles and miles of baked, empty red earth, and right now I feel the isolation deep in my spirit. I’ve never felt so homesick. Back in Rhennes, where civilized people live, Grimes would never get away with this. I have to stop a few times to evacuate my stomach. Too many cocktails mix badly with the terror that swirls inside me. Every time I vomit and Grimeswatches dispassionately, I feel a little weaker. A little shakier. A little more like my life as I know it is over.
His house is a couple of miles outside the city. There are a few outbuildings and a henhouse, and an overgrown yard with a well. There must be an underground spring somewhere. A small patch of parched trees to the back of the house suggests water somewhere around, if hidden. The main house is made of wood and run-down, not much more impressive than the outbuildings. I guess he isn’t wealthy, which explains why he has to trick his way into cheap labor. Though I still have no idea what he even wants me to do.
In terms of disrepair, the inside of the house matches the outside. In the soft glow of Grimes’ oil lamp, I’m greeted with unpainted walls, cramped rooms, and mismatched furniture. Like he just bought up everything from a cheap jumble sale and loaded it into the house in any old order. The scent of a greasy meal hangs in the kitchen and even pervades the hall. Red dust covers most of the surfaces. Desert dust is a determined intruder in Galbrava, creeping thought the tiniest cracks between windowpanes and walls. It takes a better housekeeper than Grimes apparently is to keep it at bay. There are few personal touches. This place doesn’t feel like a home. Has he only just moved here? Maybe he just isn’t domesticated. As if to prove that thought, he doesn’t offer me anything to eat. I couldn’t force down a mouthful anyway. He looks at the clock on the wall of the bare, sad little kitchen.
“It’s late,” he says. “You have work early in the morning. Go to bed.”
“Where?” I say.
For a moment I’m afraid he’s going to direct me to a pile of straw on the floor, but he leads me upstairs to a bedroom. It’s small but not terrible. It has a bed, at least. And a chamber pot. One thing I hate about Galbrava is the lack of plumbing.My house in Rhennes has an ensuite bathroom, though in fairness only a very few houses in Rhennes can boast the same. The chamber pot will have to suffice for pissing and for any more instances of vomiting. Wonderful. Without wishing me goodnight, Grimes takes a large key from his pocket and heads for the door. My throat tightens.
“Wait,” I call.
