Chapter Three
The night's Spectacle consists not of blood games but circus tricks. Syaoran stands at Sakura's side as two acrobats drop down from the ceiling on trapeze swings, making elegant leaps in their skintight suits. There's no net below, just the pristine sand of the arena, but as the house attendants dispense drinks and pipe tobacco to the guests, it becomes clear that no one will die tonight. Syaoran supposes he should be relieved that not every performance here features gruesome death or dismemberment, but he cannot help but notice the mood among the spectators. Though they do not seem precisely disappointed by the acrobats' performance, neither are they particularly engaged. Instead, their hunger for violence lurks beneath a veneer of civility, patiently awaiting the next Spectacle in the hopes that it will bring more bloodshed.
Syaoran watches the acrobats for about five minutes before excusing himself. Sakura has no need of him, with Kurogane and Fai watching over her as she nibbles on chocolate-dipped strawberries, and the card tables won't reopen until the show is over, so there is no reason to stay. Instead, he goes looking for Ryuuo.
Tonight, the lounge overflows with the wealthy and powerful denizens of the Undercity. A few faces look vaguely familiar—people he has seen in other worlds—but most are merely strangers. Any of them could afford to live in the Upper City, save for the fact that their businesses rely on a carefully cultivated system of extortion, exploitation, and other seedy practices which would be frowned upon above the surface. Syaoran steps carefully, peering through a sea of colorful, embroidered gowns and elegant robes trimmed with rich red and luminescent gold, but his search halts abruptly when he senses someone approaching from behind. He turns, fingers tingling with magic as he prepares to summon his sword, but before he can, he recognizes Ryuuo's face.
"Wow, you must have eyes in the back of your head," Ryuuo remarks, crossing the last few paces between them. Syaoran relaxes, letting his magic disperse harmlessly into the air. "Didn't think I'd see you again."
Syaoran frowns, but doesn't remark upon the odd statement as Ryuuo grabs his hand and tows him to a secluded corner of the room. There, Syaoran finds an alternate version of Souma leaning over a low square table. It appears to be some sort of game-board, lit from below in various colors.
"This is Souma," Ryuuo says, though of course Syaoran already knows. "She's my partner. In gambling. Not romantically."
Souma lifts an eyebrow. "He's not going to believe you if you let yourself get flustered like that," she says before clasping Syaoran's wrist. Taking it for this world's version of a handshake, he returns her grip. "And your name?"
"Syaoran."
"You ever played Trick Tile before, Syaoran?"
He shakes his head.
Souma gestures to the game-board, half the tiles lit up in various colors. "Every time you touch one of the squares," she says, reaching forward to tap one of the unlit tiles, "it lights up. The goal is to illuminate everything except the traps."
"Traps?" he repeats.
Ryuuo nods enthusiastically. "If you activate one of the traps, the whole board turns red and you lose the game. But you can avoid them by paying attention to the colors of the activated squares. For instance, when you see a green square, you know that there's only one trap nearby," he says, activating another tile. "Blue means there are two traps, yellow means three, and so on. They have reference sheets if you need one," Ryuuo adds, handing him a scrap of paper from the compartment underneath the game-board. "There's some luck involved—sometimes you just have to guess where a trap will be—but mostly it's a mental exercise."
"Is there a penalty for losing?"
Ryuuo shrugs. "You have to drop a coin in the slot to get the machine going, but it's basically the cheapest game you'll find here. And if you win three rounds in a row, you get your money back anyway, plus a little extra every consecutive victory after that. You'll never get rich off it, but it's something to keep you busy while you're waiting for the tables to open up." He leans forward, tapping another square, then winces as the board buzzes and turns red. "Oops. Sorry, Souma. Didn't mean to ruin your game."
Souma sighs, then leans toward Syaoran, lowering her voice. "He's more clever than he acts, but his impatience can make him a bit frustrating sometimes." Her lips press into a thin line. "If he's pestering you, let me know."
Ryuuo throws Souma a wounded look. "Hey, I'm not that bad." At Souma's flat look, he wilts, turning to Syaoran. "Though I guess I can be a little over-enthusiastic."
"It's fine," Syaoran assures him. "Actually, it's kind of nice."
Ryuuo's eyebrows shoot up. "What, really?"
He nods, and Ryuuo beams as if he's just received an unexpected present. "See, Souma? Not everyone thinks I'm annoying."
Souma rolls her eyes, dropping a coin into the machine. It comes to life with a series of chimes, glowing a soft, uniform gray. "Let's put money on it," she says, plucking an additional two coins from her purse. "We each play a game, and whoever gets the farthest without setting off any traps wins the bet."
"Sure, but let's keep to small stakes," Ryuuo says, retrieving two coins of his own. "I don't want to go broke before I hit the tables."
Syaoran hesitates, glancing toward the main room, where Sakura and the others are no doubt waiting for the card tables to reopen. He has a coin purse of his own, of course, for necessities, but it feels wrong to wager it on a game he's never played, no matter how paltry the bet. "I shouldn't."
Ryuuo and Souma exchange a glance. "Why not?" Ryuuo asks.
"We . . . Sakura and I are supposed to be saving money for the tournament. I shouldn't make wagers without consulting her."
"But they're your winnings, too, aren't they?" When Syaoran doesn't respond, Ryuuo sits up, his expression uncharacteristically serious. "Look, Syaoran, you don't have to gamble if you don't want, but you shouldn't feel like you have to negotiate for every spare coin, either. Would it bother you if your princess wanted to play a few solo games with her share?"
"No, but . . ." But it's her luck that's winning these games for us. I might be her gambling partner, but she's the reason we're able to do this. Still, Ryuuo has a point. Even if Syaoran hasn't been instrumental in their success, he's spent hours analyzing their wins and losses, learning the rules of each game and working out strategies to maximize their chances.
And maybe he needs this—not the gambling, but the chance to set those responsibilities aside for a few minutes. Besides, he has plenty of other things to feel guilty about; a handful of coins lost or gained is nothing next to the rest of his failures.
He fishes two coins out of his purse and sets them on the edge of the table. "All right. One round for each of us."
Souma shifts forward, tapping one of the squares. Several adjacent squares also light up, in varying colors, and she sets to work filling out the board. It only takes a few moves for Syaoran to understand the game. Ryuuo said it was more a mental exercise than a true game of chance, and he's right—for the most part, process of elimination is enough to identify which tiles must be traps. It's only when Souma has filled out about three-quarters of the board that she begins to run out of safe options. She hesitates, fingers hovering over a trio of tiles, and pushes the wrong one, causing the rest to glow red.
"Not bad," Ryuuo says, cracking his knuckles as he sidles forward for his own game. He doesn't even fill out half the board before he hits a trick tile. "Ack!"
"You know, if you slowed down, you'd have seen that you still had plenty of safe options left," Souma says.
"Yeah, but what's the point in playing it safe? You've got to take risks if you want to win big."
"Calculated risks, maybe," Souma says, glancing at Syaoran. "Maybe you can teach my partner here the benefits of patience."
He nods absently, tapping a square near the corner to reveal his starting path. Though he's not as practiced as Souma, he makes steady progress, surpassing Ryuuo's score and mentally marking the locations of nearby traps. As poor as his luck has been in other games, the puzzle component here plays to his skill set. He clears eighty percent of the board before setting off a trap, beating Souma's score by four tiles.
Ryuuo whistles. "You sure you've never played Trick Tile before?" he asks, sliding the coins over to Syaoran's corner of the table. "'Cause that was a pretty good run."
Souma inclines her head. "Not bad."
"Want to play another round?" Ryuuo asks, and Syaoran almost says yes before he remembers his traveling companions. Their game has taken up almost fifteen minutes, and the card tables will be opening up again soon.
"Sakura will be expecting me," he says, gathering up his winnings and slipping them into his coin pouch.
"Ah. Tomorrow then?"
He meets Ryuuo's eyes, surprised by the intensity of his gaze, then nods. "Tomorrow."
That night, on their way back to the inn, Fai suggests they visit the market.
"This was just an excuse to buy sweets, wasn't it?" Kurogane says five minutes later when Fai veers toward a cart selling doughnuts.
Syaoran glances at Fai, expecting a quip about Kurogane's disdain for sugar or a reminder that they ought to relax when they can, but the remark doesn't come, and a brittle silence falls over the five of them. It's only when Mokona asks about the powdered doughnuts in the display case that the atmosphere lightens.
"We'll take a dozen," Fai tells the man behind the counter.
"What kind?"
"Just give us an assortment."
The man grunts and begins sorting doughnuts into a white cardboard box. Syaoran almost reminds Fai that sugar alone can't sustain them, but then he sees Sakura smiling, and his heart gives a peculiar squeeze. He reminds himself that she's not his Sakura, that the Sakura he fell in love with is trapped in some abyss of time, beyond his reach, and the reminder drives a knife into the fissures in his heart, prying them open again.
He doesn't know how long he can hold onto that pain, but he knows he can't do it indefinitely. Something has to give, and soon.
The next day, he doesn't wait for the Spectacle to begin; as soon as the dealer at their table calls for intermission, Syaoran makes his way to the lounge where Ryuuo habitually spends his breaks.
He barely makes it past the doorway before the shouting starts.
"Get back here, you little cheat!" A loud crash echoes from the fringes of the room, eliciting a chorus of startled cries, and before he can evaluate the danger, Syaoran starts running toward the source of the noise.
"Whoa, whoa! I never cheated anyone!" another voice yells. Ryuuo.
"Hold still, you filthy gutter-snipe. No one wins eight hands in a row."
Syaoran can see the other man now. His pudgy face and shrill voice are vaguely familiar, but it still takes him a few seconds to recognize him: he's an alternate version of the spoiled nobleman's son from Koryo. Syaoran pushes through the knot of people, apologizing reflexively, and steps into the bubble of empty space between Ryuuo and his opponent. "Enough." His own voice startles him, forceful and unyielding in a way he hasn't been since he fought his clone in Tokyo.
The thickset man squints at him. "Who the hell are you?"
Ryuuo steps forward, grabbing Syaoran's hand and standing beside him. "He's my friend. And I never cheated you, Ryon. I don't need to."
"Hey!" the bartender yells, stalking toward them with a wooden club. The ring of onlookers goes quiet. "No fights in the lounge. Take it outside or settle it in the arena."
"This kid cheated me!" Ryon cries, jabbing a finger in Ryuuo's direction. The accusation hangs heavy in the air, and all the rumors about The Red Band's policies toward cheaters whisper through Syaoran's mind. He knows nothing outside of those rumors, but even a false accusation could end with Ryuuo's throat slit in the courtyard.
No, Syaoran thinks, something inside him solidifying. I won't allow it.
The bartender's eyes sweep from the crown of Ryuuo's head to his feet, then flicker to Ryon. "He cheated you? In what game?"
Syaoran calculates the approximate distance to the exit. He thinks they can make it before anyone seizes them, so long as Ryuuo doesn't fight him. He'll need to keep them hidden, and Kurogane or Fai will have to take his place as Sakura's gambling partner until the tournament ends, but they have to get out of here first.
"What game, Ryon? Or are you too stupid to remember?"
Ryon's jaw flexes, a flush creeping into his cheeks. "Crowns."
"Pft. There aren't any card tables in this lounge."
"We weren't sitting at a card table."
"Then it's not the house's problem," the bartender says.
"But he still cheated!"
"Look, if you got fooled in an unsanctioned game, that's your own fault. Remember that next time you start shouting accusations."
The bartender turns away, shoulders stiff. One of the men in the crowd wolf-whistles. "Woo, Kendappa!"
"Fuck off," she says without looking back.
The crowd mutters, disappointed by the lack of bloodshed, before abandoning the area. "You'll get what's coming," Ryon sneers, his beady eyes focusing on Ryuuo. "My father's a councilman. He'll drown you like the sewer rat you are."
Ryuuo says nothing, and after a moment, Ryon stalks off, the back of his neck red and mottled. Syaoran counts ten heartbeats before turning to Ryuuo. "Are you all right?"
The other boy shivers, his icy fingers clamped tight around Syaoran's palm. "I think I need to sit down."
Syaoran nods, guiding him to a plush chair next to an overturned table. Playing cards litter the floor around them, and Syaoran spends several seconds wondering who they belong to before realizing that this must be where Ryuuo was playing before the fight. That explains the crash I heard, Syaoran thinks, imagining Ryon knocking over the table in his fury. Gently, Syaoran frees his hand from Ryuuo's and starts gathering up the cards before anyone steps on them.
"Thanks," Ryuuo says numbly when Syaoran passes the deck back to him. It takes him three tries to get the cards into their container, and when he tries to slip the box into one of his jacket's inner pockets, it tumbles from his fingers, hitting the floor with a thud that makes him flinch.
"Where's Souma?" Syaoran asks. Perhaps she'll know how to soothe Ryuuo's nerves.
"Watching the Spectacle."
Syaoran winces, memories of desperate cries and blood on the sand flickering in his mind's eye. It hasn't occurred to him until this moment, but he didn't see Souma that first night, either, and now he knows why. This world is cruel, more so than most he's visited, but he hadn't thought Souma would be one to enjoy that casual brutality.
"It's not—she's not as bad as the rest of them," Ryuuo says.
Syaoran nods, unsettled, then decides it's probably better for Ryuuo to believe that, at least for now. "The man you were playing cards with—who is he?"
"Ryon Fieren, son of Councilman Fieren, from the Upper City." Ryuuo grimaces, drawing his knees up against his chest. "Ryon likes to flaunt his family's money, but he's just a bully. I figured I'd play a few rounds with him, maybe shake off some of that attitude. But I didn't cheat him, I swear. He's just a shoddy Crowns player."
"I believe you," he says. He's not surprised that the entitled bully from Koryo is just as spoiled in this world. A person's experiences might change between dimensions, but the core of their personality seems largely stable, so far as he's seen.
Ryuuo watches him for a moment, eyebrows furrowed, then leans forward and clasps Syaoran's hand between his own. "Thank you," he says earnestly. "You're one of the only people who's ever stood up for me. It . . . it means a lot."
"I . . ." Syaoran hesitates, then rests his open hand atop Ryuuo's. "You're welcome."
