You spend the day crouched in the meagre shade afforded by the walls of the courtyard. At sunset, the courtiers lead you to the second of the five windowless buildings. When they open the door, you can see nothing but blackness inside. A waft of acrid air touches your face as you step inside. You get the impression of a high-ceilinged hall whose dark recesses are filled by rustling and high-pitched squeaks. Something like dust brushes your face. You put up your fingers and run them through your hair, then grimace when you see what is falling from the roof: lice.
‘The bats are our master’s second favourite pets, after ourselves. They are vampire bats, of course,’ says the chief courtier. He peers in and calls up to the rafters: ‘Suppertime, gentlemen!’ Then he leaves and the door is slammed shut, blotting out all light.
(We do not have an
owl, nor do we have the codeword
Zotz.)
Your eyes can make out nothing in the inky darkness that engulfs you. As you squat down on the guano-crusted floor, there comes a flapping of leathery wings and the first of the bats comes swooping down towards you. You throw up your arm, fending it off with a sob of horror.
Although you try to stay alert throughout the night, fatigue finally overcomes you and you sink into a fitful sleep.
Lose 1 Life Point. If you survive, you awaken hours later to discover that the bats have been gorging on your blood. You are covered with tiny sores where they have chewed into your veins. You huddle miserably against the wall to wait for dawn.
You are waiting by the door when the dog-like courtiers come to release you in the morning. The chief is not with them, but later in the day he comes over to where you are sitting at the edge of the plaza and asks: ‘How are you enjoying your stay?’
‘If I were to be candid, I would say your hospitality leaves much to be desired,’ you reply, forcing a note of flippancy into your voice with some effort. ‘But I feel this can be excused on the grounds that you receive few visitors in these parts.’
‘On the contrary,’ he says with a broad smile, ‘we often have people for dinner.’ Stifling a shudder at this veiled threat, you ask what your next ordeal is to be.
He glances at the sun, which is already declining in the sky. ‘You will shortly discover that for yourself. We call it the House of Knives.’
Soon afterwards you are taken to the third building. Here the floor is covered with knives of sharp green obsidian. As the sun sets, the knives come to life, springing up to slice at the air expectantly. The door crunches solidly into place behind you. ‘Now,’ the chief courtier calls through it, ‘I expect you’ll be cut down to size.’
(We do not have a
haunch of venison, nor do we have a
stone.)
The knives drift in a circle around you as you move uneasily across the hall. Suddenly, one of them shoots forward and slices a gash in your arm. Recoiling in pain, you are jabbed by another. They are trying to herd you into a position where they can attack you from all directions, but you manage to duck under one as it flies in. Before they can regroup, you have run over to a corner and put your back to the wall.
The ordeal continues throughout the night. You cannot afford to close your eyes for a moment, as the knives would then tear you to shreds. You dodge many attacks, but several cut you badly and soon your strength is ebbing along with your blood.
Lose 2 Life Points. (Exception: if you have AGILITY, you are better at evading the knife-thrusts and lose only 1 Life Point.)
If you survive until dawn, the knives suddenly fall lifeless to the floor and soon after the courtiers come to let you out.
The following evening you are shown into the House of Cold, where sparkling sheets of ice encase the walls and long icicles form pillars from floor to ceiling. Your breath curls like smoke in the freezing air as you stand shivering and watch the courtiers swing the heavy door shut.
We do have a
lump of charcoal, but we do not have a
stone. We do not have a
firebrand.
You feel yourself getting drowsy as the chill seeps into your bones. If you fall asleep here you will certainly perish, so you force yourself to pace up and down the long hall. Ice crunches underfoot as you walk, and your limbs are soon blue with cold.
Lose 3 Life Points. (Exception: if you have WILDERNESS LORE, lose only 2 Life Points as your natural resilience helps you resist the cold.)
If you survive it can only be raw determination that sustains you. When the courtiers come to open the door, you note with satisfaction that you have only one more ordeal to face. Then you will be taken to meet the one whom you hate more than any in the world, and yet have never seen. The sorcerer Necklace of Skulls.
When it is time for you to be taken to the House of Gloom, the courtiers summon you with surly grunts. It is obvious from their glowering looks that they did not expect you to endure this long. As they prod you through the doorway, the chief courtier is struck by inspiration.
‘You have been cheating in the ordeals,’ he says. ‘Using items to help you. Give me your travelling pack.’ He takes the pack containing your belongings and places it outside the door. ‘It will be returned to you tomorrow. If you survive.’
You glance around at the interior of the House of Gloom. It is a dingy cobweb-strewn chamber with many shadowy recesses. The packed-earth floor rises at intervals in long low mounds. Something about the place stirs the hairs on the nape of your neck. You feel the tingle of awakening dread as you ask: ‘What is the ordeal here?’
The chief courtier places a single short candle on the floor just inside the door. ‘This is the place where our ancestors are buried. See those mounds? Their graves. If you can keep the candle alight until morning, they’ll leave you alone. But if it goes out then their ghosts will be sure to pay you a visit.’
The door grates shut, leaving just the trembling flame of the candle between you and eldritch terror. (We do not have the codeword
Ignis, nor the CUNNING skill.)
The candle looks as though it will last for about an hour. Just as you are thinking this, a draft of cold air suddenly blows it out, plunging you into darkness.
Silence hangs like a waiting presence in the air. The darkness dances in front of your eyes, causing your imagination to paint pictures of horror on the back of your mind. Your flesh creeps with unidentifiable fears.
You hear a noise that sets your heart pounding and every nerve shrieking. It was the sound of something dragging itself across the dry earthen floor. It stops beside you and you feel it reach out to stroke your leg: a thin dry hand with no flesh on it…
And then you scream.
All through the night you are beset by gibbering phantoms that come prancing out of the darkness, running their unseen hands over your skin and whispering horrible things in your ears.
Lose 1 Life Point for this harrowing ordeal.
When dawn arrives you stagger out on shaking legs to retrieve your pack of belongings. No matter what dangers you have to face now, you cannot conceive of anything more unpleasant than another night in the House of Gloom.
(I do kind of dig that we literally had none of the skills or item combinations needed but immortality just carried us through.)
‘I have survived all the ordeals,’ you say to the courtiers, ‘and now I demand to see your master —the sorcerer Necklace of Skulls.’
They watch you with smouldering eyes, but the cocksure sneering looks with which they first greeted you are gone now. By passing the five tests you have earned their respect – perhaps even their fear. As they escort you to the gateway of bones at the rear of the courtyard, the chief courtier studies you with a long sidelong stare before saying, ‘You have got further than any mortal I can remember. But our master will crush you as I might crack a flea between my fingernails.’
With a hollow rattling noise, the great gates swing inwards to reveal an avenue whose walls slope outwards on either side of you. The black pyramid stands at the far end of the avenue, its steep flanks clad in a block of cold shade that defies the harsh sunlight. The courtiers scatter at a signal you do not hear, rushing off with loping gaits that betray their half-canine ancestry. Climbing stone staircases, they take up positions along the top of the sloping walls.
As you take a step forward along the avenue, you notice stone rings set high up on the side walls. It is like the arena in which the sacred ball contest is played, and those stone rings are the goals.
You round angrily on the chief courtier, who is still standing close at your shoulder. ‘What is this?’ you shout. ‘I haven’t come to play games! You told me I was going to meet Necklace of Skulls at last!’
‘I am here,’ echoes a sepulchral voice from the depths of the shrine atop the pyramid. ‘Now let the game begin.’
You squint in the shimmering glare of the sun, but your eyes cannot make out any shape within the black void of the shrine entrance. The soot-coloured pillars give its darkened interior the look of a fleshless mouth. Again Necklace of Skulls’s voice rolls along the avenue, each syllable driving like a grave-cool gust of wind through the blistering desert heat. ‘Your brother came here before you.’
Red rage seethes in your heart. ‘That’s right, you – ’
The sorcerer’s words continue, unperturbed by your outburst. ‘He played the ritual ball contest and he lost. His life was forfeit. Now you will play for the same stakes. Behold your antagonists.’
Two long rivulets of shadow flow out of the shrine and down the pyramid steps, looking like spreading pools of black blood against the ebon stone. Reaching the bottom, they rise up in obscenely palpitating columns which gradually take solid form. Human form. Confronting you now are your opponents in the ball contest: two creatures of living shadow fashioned by the sorcerer’s magic.
(We have our
brother's skull.)
If you have them, you can now use
a gold diadem,
the Chalice of Life or
SPELLS and a wand.
You set the skull gently on the dusty ground and take a few paces back, raising your wand.
Necklace of Skulls sees what you are planning and speaks in protest from the inner recesses of his shrine: ‘You cannot resurrect him. You do not have that power.’
‘Raw determination is the basis of all magic,’ you counter. ‘My love for my brother will bring him back.’
This is the hardest spell you will ever cast. For almost an hour you continue the chant. The wolfish courtiers do not intervene, fearing your power. For his part, Necklace of Skulls is happy to indulge you. He wants to see you fail. You are determined to disappoint him.
Searingly bright light envelops the skull like a phosphoric bubble from which long green sparks go crawling out along the ground. The wand grows hot in your hand as it channels more magical force than it was ever intended to contain. At last you know you can do no more. Hoarsely uttering the last syllables of the spell, you slump to your knees.
There is a gasp from the watching courtiers, a howl of spite from the sorcerer. You look up. An hour of staring into the heart of the spell-glare has left a flickering after-image across your vision, but you are sure you can see something stirring. It looks like a man. He rises to his feet and steps towards you. You rub your eyes, then a familiar voice brings tears of joy to them. ‘Evening Star,’ he says. Your brother is alive once more!
You must forfeit the SPELLS skill as you have used up all your sorcery in working this miracle. Get the codeword
Venus, but delete the codeword
Angel if you had it.
The ball contest is played in every city of the civilized world. It is much more than just a game. Its exponents travel far and wide, earning fame for themselves and glory for their home cities. The priests say that the origins of the contest lie rooted in ancient tradition, and it is said that the playing of each game is like the unfolding of a mighty spell. Portents for the future are read in the outcome. Losers are often sacrificed to the gods.
The contest involves two players on each side. The aim is to bounce a large rubber ball off the sloping side walls of the arena using only your wrists, elbows and knees. At the same time you have to avoid the opposing players, who are allowed to ram into you with stunning force. You have seen men carried off with broken necks after a vicious tackle.
The side walls are marked into zones. You score points for hitting these with the ball, and the winning team is the first to score seven points. Alternatively, you can win an immediate victory by getting the ball to go through one of the stone rings set high up in the middle of each wall. This is a very difficult feat, rarely achieved by even the best players.
(We do not have the codeword
Poktapok.)
The chief courtier comes forwards and puts the ball into your hands. ‘So we get to launch the first round?’ you say. ‘Very sporting.’
‘We are nothing if not magnanimous,’ he replies with a vaunting leer. ‘Later, when you have lost, we will be equally generous in dividing your carcass.’
You watch him dart back to the sidelines. At the other end of the arena, the two shadow men stand ready.
‘Begin,’ commands Necklace of Skulls.
You throw the ball against the side wall and run forward to intercept it on the rebound. The nearer of the shadow men charges towards you. Will you
tackle him head-on, weave around him towards the rear shadow man, or
try to score a point immediately?
Adventure Sheet:
Name: Evening Star
Skills: CHARMS, FOLKLORE, SPELLS and SWORDPLAY
Life Points: 10/10 (immortal)
Possessions:
1) Magic Amulet
2) Magic Wand
3) Sword
4)
5) Charcoal
6) Rope
7) Parcel of Salt
8) Jade Bead
Money: 5 cacao
Codewords: Sakbe, Venus