City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett Page A

pleasure, and he talked to his opponents constantly, merrily gibing them as though at a coffeehouse.
    The boy looked up, and saw Shara watching. He grinned, and winked.
    Disconcerted, Shara returned to her game.
    Finally, after two hours of play, and after laying waste to half the students at Fadhuri, Shara found herself sitting down opposite the Continental. They were the only two players left; the rest of the school and faculty stood around them, watching.
    Shara stared mistrustfully at the Continental boy, who sat with a cocksure grin, stretched his back, popped his knuckles, and said, “I’m quite looking forward to my first actual game, aren’t you?” He started laying out his Batlan pieces.
    “I don’t know what you mean,” said Shara as she did the same.
    “Mm. Maybe,” he said. “Tell me. Have you ever heard of Tovos Va?”
    Something inside of Shara squeaked. She hesitated very slightly before laying out the next piece.
    “It’s very popular where I’m from,” said the boy brightly. “Why, back in Bulikov, we had a yearly tournament. Now, which ones did I win? There were three tournaments I won in a row. I just can’t quite remember which ones. …”
    Shara finished laying out her pieces. “I suggest, sir,” she said, “that you play, rather than talk.”
    He looked at her arrangements and laughed. “So nice to see my suspicions were right! That looks a little like Mischeni’s Feint,” he said. “Or it would be, if this was Tovos Va. Good thing this is Batlan, eh?” He finished laying out his own pieces.
    Shara glanced at them. “And that, ” she said, “is Strovsky’s Curl.”
    He grinned triumphantly.
    “Or you would like me to think it is,” said Shara, “though I suspect in three plays it will be a Vanguard Block, and after that, a basic flank.”
    The boy blinked as if he’d been slapped. His grin vanished.
    “But good thing this is Batlan, eh?” said Shara savagely. She leaned in. “You look so much prettier,” she said, “with your face wiped clean of smugness.”
    The students around them ooooooh ed.
    The boy stared at her. He laughed once, in disbelief. Then: “Roll the dice.”
    “Gladly,” said Shara.
    She dropped the ivories, and the game began.
    It was to be a four-hour slugfest: a game of endless beginnings, of defensive positions, of recombinations and rearrangements. It was, one teacher said, the most conservative game of Batlan he had ever seen played: but, of course, they were not really playing Batlan at all, but a different game altogether, a mix of Batlan and Tovos Va they were inventing as they fought.
    He talked to her constantly, a ceaseless burble of chatter. For three hours Shara resisted, ignoring his gibes, but finally the Continental boy asked, “Tell me—is your life so devoid of entertainment that you have enough time to study obscure, foreign games?” He made a play that appeared aggressive, but that Shara knew was a feint. “Have you no friends? No family?”
    “You assume your game is difficult to learn,” said Shara, nettled. “To me, your game and your culture are childish frippery.” She ignored his feint and pressed toward a front in a manner that would look suicidal to anyone who didn’t know what was going on.
    He laughed. “It talks! The little battle-ax talks!”
    “I am sure that to someone of your position, anyone who doesn’t tolerate each of your whims with blind submission must seem positively inconceivable.”
    “Perhaps so. Perhaps I’ve traveled solely to find backtalk some where. But I wonder—what could have beaten you so badly that it’s formed and honed such a sharp edge, my little battle-ax?” He swooped back around, redoubled his defenses. (Some student nearby grumbled, “When are they actually going to start playing ?”)
    “You are mistaken, sir,” said Shara. “You are merely sensitive. In fact, I would expect that to sit upon an uncushioned chair would surely score your princely