"Want to play a game?"
Dust asked, his voice already slurred, as the new bottle was placed on the coffee table.
The other two were clearly staring at him, half-asleep.
Red savored a sip of the purple liquid, his voice trailing off the end of his words:
"It depends on what you're suggesting..."
Dust hesitated, having spoken without thinking. He scanned the room again. Here, the sofas weren't green but red, as were the velvet curtains tied together with black ribbons. The table, however, was just like in his own apartments, lacquered with curved legs.
The decor was different, but the layout, as they had observed when they searched the castle, remained the same. No doubt another one of his unspoken but constant rules...
Then he placed his own glass on the coffee table, where it clumsily bumped against the wine bottle.
Cherubine hiccups, and the man she's leaning on snickers.
The boy grabs the drawer hidden in the same spot as in "his" living room.
And pulls it out.
Unsurprisingly, a sort of leather pouch appears before his eyes, and inside are the wooden tiles that mimic the look of playing cards.
He places the set between them.
The woman's blue eyes focus on them, and she lets out an exaggerated "Ooooh" before another hiccup:
"How...how do you play?"
Dust hesitates, clearing his throat as a little acid rises from his stomach.
"I...I don't really know..."
The two pairs of blue eyes stare at him without really seeing him.
After a second or two of confusion, Red slowly leans forward, moving the girl who was huddled against him.
He's tall enough that his shadow spans the width of the coffee table.
His long fingers pick up the deck of cards.
The wooden boards are spread out before them, and without further ado, the man declares he has a game.
The boy raises his eyebrows as the girl encourages him with a "great!" and a playful hiccup.
"It's called," he says, "The Coup d'État."
The man's gaze is vacant as he looks at the cards.
The king engraved on one of them is reflected in his alcohol-blurred pupils.
A few seconds of silence pass, during which Red doesn't blink.
Then he continues:
"It's played by two people with a referee."
He turns over the cards one by one and carefully arranges them into two columns.
Cherubine clings to him, her nails lightly scratching her new lover's chin with a teasing air. She presses him seductively:
"Explain better, darling..."
Red pauses, the nickname catching him off guard, but Dust notices that he seems to like it. He smiles, one of his canines flashing briefly.
The boy feels truly out of place. He drinks again, his throat so dry.
"So impatient... Look," (the other two turn their attention back to the columns of cards) "Each player has a column, let's say it's their castle..."
Red lowers his voice slightly, as if a little hesitant:
"...During the first round, the players have the same cards as their opponents on each floor."
His finger traces the columns back up so his two companions understand clearly. Dust's brown eyes followed the gesture, and indeed: 14 cards for each "castle."
The first level had three cards, numbered I, II, and III. The second still had three cards, from IV to VI. The third had two cards, VII and VIII. The fourth had two cards, IX and X.
The fifth had one card, which appeared to be the Jack. The sixth had the Queen and King.
The seventh had the final card, the Joker, with its bronze mask and grotesque smile.
In the two columns, Red had only placed two emblems.
The first "castle" bore the emblem of the red lion on a white background; the castle on the right had the emblem of the blue lily on a gold background.
The remaining 28 cards were placed to the side, clearly useless for three players.
The red-haired man cleared his throat, speaking more slowly in a futile attempt to be understood:
"The rules are quite different from the usual ones... On the first turn, you can move three cards up and down, or one card three times. Or one card twice and another once."
Their vacant stares were enough to convince him to demonstrate.
The king joined the jack and then moved down to complete the pair of X and IX.
"There," said Red, "that makes two moves." With that, he grabbed the IX and moved it up to the jack's level.
"Here, it's three moves. I have to stop here. One change of level is one move. You can't have more than three cards per level. If a level becomes empty due to a loss or a move choice, then it's uninvadable."
Dust drank some more and held his head. He regretted wanting to play. He doesn't understand anything. At this point, he decides that if he plays, he'll play randomly.
-So he'll have to place his cards to attack the still-occupied level.
The mushroom still seems to be working, because the man is starting to get carried away, forgetting that he was supposed to be
Re: Clear:
-Once the cards have been moved under the referee's supervision, the player turns over their cards.
They turn over their own cards, concealing their faces and revealing their backs, which are completely painted black.
-It's the opponent's turn to move their tiles. Obviously, neither player should look at what the other is doing, so they must turn away from the table until the referee gives the go-ahead. Once their respective "castles" are ready, the first round begins.
This is the "invasion" phase.
Cherubine listens, her red mouth opening wider and wider without her realizing it, her eyes widening with it.
Dust offers her the bottle out of sympathy, and she takes it automatically. The shadows of their arms are projected onto the wooden tiles on the low table.
It seems he won't be the only one playing randomly.
One player chooses the floor they want to challenge. Let's say they choose floor number three. Both players reveal the cards on that floor.
The cards are turned face up again. Since they haven't moved them, they are still the same on each side: VII and VIII.
The player with the highest-ranking floor wins. The Jack is worth 11, the Queen 12, the King 13, and the Joker 14. The Ace is worth 1, but against a Joker, it cancels out the 14. Once a floor is won, the cards on that floor are removed and can no longer be used. The floor is also unattackable. The loser's castle shrinks, but the winner's castle does not. If there is a tie, both players' floors are frozen for one round; they cannot be targeted in the following round. In the second and third rounds, there are only two moves. In the fourth and all subsequent rounds, only one move. The goal, of course, is to destroy the other player's castle.
He catches his breath, swipes Cherubine's wine, and almost finishes it in one gulp. The red wine spills onto his clothes as much as down his throat.
Once finished, he offers the bottle to the woman, who declines, flushed from the wine, but not Dust, who grabs it like a lifeline. He feels a kind of palpitation. His lips close tightly around the neck of the bottle under the other man's blue eyes, who calls out enthusiastically:
"Let's play!"