Work Text:
1st April, 1910
The Folk, if Wendell is to be believed, are uncommonly fond of board games. Although Wendell informed me of this the previous night, I have made some attempt to verify it. Rose, when I asked as offhandedly as possible whether he knew of any Faerie board games, answered in the negative, but mused on its viability as a research project.
If any dryadologist did learn the games that the gentry play in their courts, they most likely did not live long enough to write a paper on it. I was perhaps the first to learn that certain Faerie monarchs love Snakes and Ladders.
While working through edits of my encyclopedia, Wendell so carelessly barged into my office, a thin, rectangular box in hand. He shook it, letting its contents make a dull clattering, as though opening my office door was not enough to capture my attention.
“Still at your work, Em?”
I did not dignify that with an answer, as Wendell knew I was diligently putting the finishing touches on my book. I had thought about asking him to read over this latest batch of pages after I was finished, but when I’d gone to his office earlier in the afternoon, he’d been out. He had no classes, and the campus was buzzing with students enjoying the reprieve from the winter weather, as a persistent rain had made the land a verdant green. Even I had wondered if it resembled Wendell’s kingdom. Though I am not inclined to such feelings, I have learned to anticipate Wendell’s bouts of homesickness.
Evidently, he had either recovered from it or was hiding it for his own sake.
“Do you have any interest in what I’ve brought?”
I paused in my annotating. “No matter what I say, I believe you’ll tell me anyway.”
He placed the box atop my desk, obscuring my work and any chance I had of pursing it further that evening. I had had no expectations, but was still surprised to see a well-worn but still colorful box, with “Snakes and Ladders” written with curling snakes and ladders respectively.
“Will you play with me?”
Wendell played cards, had played cards with me in the past even, but I had never seen this game in his possession. I asked him where he’d found it, and he responded, “I’ve had it for years. Dug the old thing up when I was thinking over old memories today. But then, why should you be surprised, Em? You know how we love games.”
Games, of the board game variety, are not found in the tales, but bargains, riddles, and other kinds of play do crop up in several of the tales. Anything where a Faerie can trick a mortal into giving up something precious would be treasured. But those games, if you could call them as such, were spur of the moment, where the Faerie themselves determined the rules so that the mortal could not think their way out of it, unless they were particularly clever. I could not imagine any Folk playing the children’s game in front of me. When I opened the box, I saw that the squares with ladders were labeled after Christian virtues such as Pity, Love, and Self-Denial, while the snakes had Vanity, Unpunctuality, and Depravity. A true Faerie version would likely see those reversed.
Though my work did need to be done, something about Wendell had said pulled at me. His old memories, the teasing of his past life before he had come to Cambridge. In a sentimental, nostalgic mood, Wendell would be more inclined to tell me about that past. Selfish and self-serving as it was, I was eager to ferret out of him whatever I could. For research, of course.
“We can play for something.” He straightened, his eyes suddenly turning deadly serious. “If you win, I will do whatever you ask of me, and if I win…”
Wendell likely would have helped me with the editing if I’d asked, but a Faerie bargain was tempting. Of course, there was the chance that he would win, that perhaps the die themselves were enchanted or that he’d prove so charming the board itself would bend to his whims, but I was not afraid of that. Wendell would probably ask me to step away from my work to do something frivolous, but no great harm would be done.
I acquiesced, and tried to pretend that the grin on Wendell’s face was not its own reward.
We played two games through, and I detected no signs that Wendell had enchanted the board. In fact, I won once, our fate to be decided by the third game. Wendell, for his part, seemed uninvested in the game, instead chattering on about something his students has done in class yesterday, the latest round of faculty gossip he had heard at the pub, and the quality of this year’s daffodils.
As we began our next game, I attempted to broach the subject of the board game as nonchalantly as possible, asking “Where did you come across this game?”
Wendell rolled a perfect six, landing on Kindness. “From the common room in my dorm at Trinity. We used it as a drinking game. For every ladder, you pour your glass. For every snake, you…”
“Drink?”
“It’s as though you played it yourself!”
I raised one brow as I tossed my die. Two. My piece landed on an unlabeled square, Wendell still three rows above me. “That was not the version I played, but my family had our own version. We played after dinner, or on a rainy day. If one landed on a snake, the group set a challenge that one had to do. My brother enjoyed making me run up and down the stairs ten times, or stand on one leg until my next turn.” I nearly shuddered at the remembrance.
Wendell rolled an uneventful four. “We shall have to invite your niece to our next game. Surely she knows the rules to this family game?”
I held the die in my fingers a moment too long before I let them go. “We haven’t played the game since we were children. I would not know whether my brother had introduced it to Ariadne. I…haven’t visited in some time.” I said nothing further as I took my piece forward six steps, emphasizing each hop across a square.
Wendell took up a die, gave them a hearty shake, and released them. Three, which led to Vanity. He slid his piece down with a flourish. “Then she will have to be taught. Can’t allow this family tradition to be forgotten!”
He looked wistful for a moment, and I decided that it was the time to strike. “What you said before, about loving games. Did you have a favorite game? As a child, in your home, I mean?” I rolled an uneventful two.
“Were you hoping to write a paper on Faerie board games? We have no such kind as this in my home, but some variations of chess are played by members at court.” He paused, rolled a five, and landed directly on Covetousness. “There are card games. Have you played five-and-twenty? It’s very popular. Picked it up from some straying mortal who claimed to be from the court of James I. My father enjoyed it immensely. Taught me how to play it personally, on some nights he would summon me to his room to impart all his strategies and tricks. I loved it, having his undivided attention on me. It happened less often when I got older, and won a few games myself. I think the novelty of it wore off, and my stepmother, well, she occupied more of his time.”
I will admit, this was more than I had expected to hear from him. The game paused as I debated how to respond. Game left on the table, I moved closer to him, placed my hand on his, and asked, “Will you teach me how to play it?”
He smiled, wrapping one arm around my shoulders, saying, “Only if you allow me to win from time to time.”
We continued the game from that position, moving each others’ pieces when it was too cumbersomeness to reach across the board. Wendell was losing terribly, but he seemed completely unbothered by that point. I had gotten what I’d wanted, more or less, and allowed the game to go on with no complaints or further questioning. I only complained slightly when I landed on Quarelsomeness and Wendell declared it incredibly fitting. I had my revenge when his piece fell on Idleness.
I shall not describe the details too thoroughly, but the game was interrupted for a few minutes after that, as we became too focused on each other. When Wendell finally tore himself away from my lips, I hardly glanced at the board as I rolled for my turn. It was only when Wendell, practically back at the beginning of the board, rolled a one, and landed on a ladder that certainly wasn’t there before, with a square that read, “Besottedness.”
“I could allow some cheating, Wendell, but when you use a word that doesn’t exist, that is a bit too far.”
He gripped his piece and moved it to the top of the ladder, which just so happened to lead to the final square.
“Now, Em, fair is fair, after all, so don’t be cross. I walked past the seamstress’ window today, and happened upon the most stylish, but practical, gown, and I instantly thought how fetching you’d look in it at the next department dinner, once I’ve made a few of my own tweaks.”
Never make a bargain with one of the Folk, even one that you’ve decided to trust against your better judgement, for you will find yourself betrayed in the cruelest ways.