I attend no language lesson that morning. Instead, I lie between my new clean sheets listening to the rain drum on the windows until laughter and talk in the next room alert me to the fact that Mariusz has returned — and with him, his friends. I try to decipher their language without much success, but I recognise frequent numbers and realize they must be gambling. Perhaps dice.

They probably won't let me play with them.

The thought angers me enough to rouse me out of bed, despite the dull ache in my lower belly. I slip into a dressing gown and open the door. The four of them sit around the dining table, playing not dice but cards with a German deck.

Mariusz looks over his shoulder at me. "Are you feeling better?"

"A little." If they are playing cards, they will not want a fifth. "Thank you for the tea."

"Of course." He looks back at his hand and scowls. "Milejši?"

I try and fail to decipher the meaning.

Barany, to Mariusz's left, shakes his head. "Ne. Sedm."

No. Seven. I feel a little thrill at understanding even that simple phrase.

Mariusz replies with a single word I can neither translate nor parse. Across the table from him, Celina presses her index finger to her cheek and taps once. Mariusz's scowl deepens. It is some kind of partner game then. They will not have room for a fifth. And it is complex, judging by the brief negotiations that go on between the players before Barany even puts down his first card.

I watch the hand, which Barany and Valery win. Celina marks up the scores on a slate.

"Your mother told me this morning that you are riding the steeplechase," I say as Barany begins to shuffle.

"I am."

"It can be dangerous, can't it?"

"I'm a good rider."

"I saw you fall off your horse this morning."

"I'm good at falling too. I always land on my rump."

Celina and Valery laugh which makes Barany pause in shuffling the cards. He smiles along at the joke he does not understand and offers the cards to Celina to cut. Then he deals.

I wait as the negotiations and silent signals recommence. This time, Celina nominates queens before the play begins, and again I feel a thrill at my new understanding when she plays the Queen of Acorns and wins the first trick. However, once again, Valery and Barany win the hand, three-to-two.

"You play cards as well as you jump hedges," I say to Mariusz.

"We all have strings of bad luck."

"And what happens if your bad luck visits during the steeplechase?"

"I am getting it all out tonight, don't you see?" He looks at his hand, then grins. "Kings," he says in Selician.

He has three kings, which I think must mean he will win the hand. Valery chooses an unpronouncable word as trumps, which turns out to be hearts, and Mariusz smiles and lays his hand open on the table.

"Not all of it," I say, judging by Valery's snarl of disappointment that Mariusz has won the hand.

"Some good must go with the bad." He takes up the cards and begins to shuffle. "I have always competed in the steeplechase. Every year since I was fifteen, except for last year."

An imperfect silence follows that statement, broken only by the shuffling of the cards. The other three watch Mariusz. Valery and Celina look wary, but Barany looks almost guilty.

"What happened last year?" I can't help myself asking.

"Why do you have to know everything?" Celina shoots back. "Deal, Maszek."

Maszek. The nickname bothers me, though I have heard others refer to Mariusz as such. Mariusz offers the cards to Barany to cut and begins to deal.

"It was when Adam was dying," Mariusz says. "He died a few days after the race, actually. So I did not compete last year. This year, I will compete again. Next year, I will compete again too. I like the steeplechase. It is fun." A stubborn note rises in his voice. "My mother hates it, of course. That is why she spoke to you about it. She thinks you will convince me not to ride."

"Can I? It is dangerous."

"You cannot." Mariusz meets Barany's eyes. "Milejši?

This time, Barany agrees, and he and Mariusz discard their hands facedown in the middle of the table and Mariusz deals five more cards for each of them. They decide upon nine with acorns for trumps and Barany begins the trick with nine of hearts.

When play comes around to Mariusz again, he takes the trick with the nine of acorns.

"I have never hurt myself in the steeplechase," he says. "My luck always comes out for the steeplechase."

"I will help your luck," Celina says. "I will give you a favour." She makes a great show of patting her sleeves and skirts. "Ach! I cannot find my handkerchief. No matter, no matter." She bends down, disappearing out of sight below the table. Valery leans over to watch her, one eyebrow raised. A few moments later, she sits up again, a strip of gauzy pale silk in her hand. "You may have my stocking instead!"

She throws it across the table at him. It falls limply onto the discarded cards. Mariusz looks at it for a moment, then laughs under his breath and tucks it into his pocket.

"There, I am now safe."

Celina smiles across the table at me. There is triumph in it. And spite. She hates me, I realize. Not just my reputation, not just my connection to Rothalia, but me, personally.

An echoing feeling ignites in my own heart.

__

2024-08-11: I know some of these chapters are quite short... it's just the way it works out for this story.