The White Towers by Andy Remic

fingers, thin black roots that emerged and began to twist and twine around the iron, burrowing into the solid surface like pikes gnawing through fish flesh and bone.
    Slowly, the elf rat’s eyes closed, and his black bark lips began to mutter, to murmur, to summon and send, for this was Bazaroth aea Quazaquiel, Sorcerer to the Elf Rat King Daranganoth, and the most feared, merciless, powerful magick enchanter ever to walk the Elf Rat lands of Zalazar.
    Zalazar. The Banished Place.
    The quests had spread and were whipping, snapping, writhing. They burrowed through the first pillar with sparks and a mass of writhing, glowing black, then on, to the next pillar, and the next, eating through the heavy iron like some incredibly potent acid. The rest of the elf rats shifted backwards in respect and fear. One did not cross Bazaroth, for the sorcerer was ill tempered and capricious.
    There came several great cracks , and with a sigh like the dying of worlds the arched, ancient brick ceiling sagged. There were crashes as ten, then twenty of the pillars came thundering down into the torrent of sewage, and the elf rats waited a respectful few moments as the thousands of whipping, whirling quests, like a feeding frenzy of thin black eels, snapped and withdrew into Bazaroth’s bleeding, gnarled hands. Then the sorcerer turned. And the sorcerer smiled with crooked teeth; fangs like splintered dead wood.
    “Advance!” he croaked, and pointed, and the elf rats surged forward through the collected shit of the War Capital.
     
    Grenan and Johan were grumbling again as they played blood-knuckle dice in the guard house on the southeast corner watch, down near the tanneries. They were grumbling because, despite the recent snow, the river still stank like a dead dog after three days rotting in the sun.
    “I bet Frenal and Cashmik having got bloody tannery duty again,” complained Grenan, throwing down his runecards as he realised the radiant, open glow on Johan’s face was indicative of an impending win. “Go on. Take your bastard money. Buy a whore. I hope you get syphilis.”
    “Now now, Grenan, nobody likes a sore loser,” grinned Johan, leaning forward and scooping the large pile of coin towards himself with both bear paws.
    “Wait!” snapped Grenan, holding up a hand. Johan froze, grin locked to his face like the snarl on a cadaver.
    “What, Gren? You can see I winned.”
    “No, hold on, let’s see your runecards.”
    “Aww, Gren, you bloody know I winned!”
    “Show!”
    Slowly, the bear that was Johan turned over his runecards and Grenan’s face was a beautiful portrait as he realised Johan held, perhaps, the worst hand dealt since the beginning of Time; certainly, since the beginnings of Fish Wife Rune Poker.
    “Why, you bluffing, bluffing bastard, you cheating son of a cheating son’s bitch! I just cannot believe you did that to me! You cheating, lying, dirty bastard horse shagger! You would have sat there like a bear with its cock in its hand and let me give you my winnings. I don’t believe it! Is there no honesty left in the world? Is there no honour amongst thieves, I ask ye? Oh, you dirty, drooling scumbag.”
    “But Gren, you did it to me last Tuesday!” There was genuine agony in Johan’s voice. “ And the week before that, when we was playing down at Stanmore’s Fish Market. You said that all’s fair in love, war and Fish Wife Rune Poker. That’s what you said. Now you’re getting all aggravated when I did to you what you did to me. Now that’s a double standard, that is.”
    “Listen, my friend. It’s not a double standard because I taught you the bloody game in the first place! Taught you everything I knows! So, if I hadn’t of taught ye, then you wouldn’t be able to win in the first place, would ye? So, if anything, I should be entitled to more winnings and you shouldn’t be allowed to cheat like ye did!”
    Johan’s broad, simple face wrinkled into a frown as he tried to follow Grenan’s