Games Creatures Play Read online

  Ace Anthologies Edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L. P. Kelner

  MANY BLOODY RETURNS

  WOLFSBANE AND MISTLETOE

  DEATH’S EXCELLENT VACATION

  HOME IMPROVEMENT: UNDEAD EDITION

  AN APPLE FOR THE CREATURE

  GAMES CREATURES PLAY

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) LLC

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

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  A Penguin Random House Company

  This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.

  Collection copyright © 2014 by Charlaine Harris, Inc., Toni L. P. Kelner, and Tekno Books.

  A complete listing of individual copyrights can be found at the end of the eBook.

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  Ace Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group.

  ACE and the “A” design are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) LLC.

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-101-63887-3

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Games creatures play / [edited by] Charlaine Harris, Toni L. P. Kelner. — First edition.

  pages cm

  ISBN 978-0-425-25687-9 (hardback)

  1. Fantasy fiction, American. 2. Short stories, American. I. Harris, Charlaine, editor of compilation. II. Kelner, Toni L. P., editor of compilation.

  PS648.F3G345 2014

  813'.0876608—dc23

  2013043341

  FIRST EDITION: April 2014

  Cover art by Lisa Desimini.

  Cover design by Judith Lagerman.

  The Edgar® name is a registered service mark of the Mystery Writers of America, Inc.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  For everyone who enjoys playing a competitive game, whether that player is competing against himself/herself, as in solitaire, or against another team, as in baseball, or against a world record, as in sailing. . . . We could go on and on. Hey, if you play, this book’s for you.

  CONTENTS

  Ace Anthologies Edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L. P. Kelner

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Introduction BY CHARLAINE HARRIS AND TONI L. P. KELNER

  IN THE BLUE HEREAFTER BY CHARLAINE HARRIS

  HIDE AND SEEK BY WILLIAM KENT KRUEGER

  STEPPING INTO THE DEAD ZONE BY JAN BURKE

  DEAD ON THE BONES BY JOE R. LANSDALE

  THE DEVIL WENT DOWN TO BOSTON BY CAITLIN KITTREDGE

  ON THE PLAYING FIELDS OF BLOOD BY BRENDAN DUBOIS

  THE GOD’S GAMES BY DANA CAMERON

  THE CASE OF THE HAUNTED SAFEWAY BY SCOTT SIGLER

  PRISE DE FER BY ELLEN KUSHNER

  DREAMER BY BRANDON SANDERSON

  FALSE KNIGHT ON THE ROAD BY MERCEDES LACKEY

  JAMMED BY SEANAN MCGUIRE

  HIDE AND SHRIEK BY ADAM-TROY CASTRO

  ICE BY LAURA LIPPMAN

  BELL, BOOK, AND CANDLEPIN BY TONI L. P. KELNER

  Copyrights

  INTRODUCTION

  Games. They bring out the best in us, the worst in us, the thing-we-never-expected in us. From couch potato games on Wii to computer games like World of Warcraft, from church leagues to the major leagues in baseball, from professional bowling to amateur wrestling, from the pankration event at the ancient Olympics to doing a 360 in a skateboard park, human beings just naturally like to test their limits, both mental and physical.

  It’s not much of a stretch to imagine that supernaturals like to do the same . . . or that otherworldly elements can enter the field of play.

  In our latest anthology, you’ll find stories that feature ghostly players, bloodthirsty interruptions, and competitions with deadly outcomes. We warn you: this may put you off gaming for a while.

  But we don’t think that will last long.

  CHARLAINE HARRIS

  TONI L. P. KELNER

  IN THE BLUE HEREAFTER

  CHARLAINE HARRIS

  Charlaine Harris is the New York Times bestselling writer of the Sookie Stackhouse novels, among many others. A lifelong resident of the South, she lives on a cliff with her husband. She has three children, two grandchildren, four rescue dogs, and a rich inner life. She is seldom bored.

  During the long drive of the day before, Manfred Bernardo had had plenty of time to reflect on the fact that he would stick out like a sore thumb in a small town. In fact, he’d been rather proud of that certainty. He’d argued mentally with Xylda the whole way from Tennessee to Louisiana. Since Xylda had died the previous winter, that was the only way Manfred could talk to her, but Xylda herself was not so limited. She played games with her grandson, in his dreams. Sending him to Bon Temps, Louisiana, seemed to be the opening move in a new one.

  On this sunny, cool afternoon in spring, Manfred scanned the locals around him in the crowded stands, confident in his own street cred. To his chagrin, Manfred observed several people decorated with as much ink as he was, and several more who had facial piercings. Maybe none of them had gone to the same lengths as Manfred, but two or three were in the same ballpark.

  The comparison made Manfred smile, because he was actually in a ballpark for a fast-pitch softball tournament. According to the schedule a buxom brunette softball mom had sold him when he was paying his entrance fee (and she’d been wearing a T-shirt that read Softball Mom!), he was sitting in the stands of Field One to watch the opening game of a two-day tournament.

  All around the small complex, uniformed high school girls were dragging or toting bags of equipment to their assigned fields, and coaches and assistant coaches were converging on the officials’ table. There were clipboards aplenty, there were baseball caps of many colors, and the concession stand had opened to a brisk business. The stand was the hub in the wheel, and each quarter of the wheel was a different softball field. Each field, of course, had its own set of bleachers, dugouts, and a rudimentary press box. Huge plastic garbage cans were dotted around the venue.

  The softball complex was incredibly noisy. Everyone was yelling. A strange green vehicle labeled Gator was leaving Field One, driven by two grinning teenage boys, who’d been drawing the chalk lines and raking the pitcher’s mound. (Why was it called a “mound” when it was flat? Manfred didn’t know, but he’d seen the term on the program.) The wheels on the equipment bags rumbled across the concrete, adding another level of noise, and the loudspeaker at Field One was playing a mixture of music that Manfred could only assume had been selected by the girls of the home team; in this case, the Bon Temps Lady Falcons.

  This was the most unlikely place in America for Manfred to be. For the past three nights in a row, he had dreamed of his grandmother, Xylda Bernardo. She had insisted he come here on this day, at this hour, and she
wouldn’t take no for an answer. He didn’t have any idea why she’d wanted him to be here. They’d played games like this as soon as Manfred had become old enough to recognize his own talent and to appreciate Xylda’s. Before that, she hadn’t been too interested in her only grandson, but when Xylda had discovered Manfred was a psychic, too, she’d done her best to take him over from his mother. His mother, struggling as a single parent, had followed the path of least resistance, figuring Manfred was safer with his grandmother after school was out than he would be at their house on his own.

  What do you and Gran do all afternoon? his mother asked.

  We play games, he said.

  Like Go Fish? Monopoly?

  Like . . . Guess why I asked you to do that, or Tell me what this vision means. You have three tries.

  After that conversation, his mother had driven over to Xylda’s by herself and returned flushed and furious. He hadn’t been allowed to go to his grandmother’s for two days, during which time he’d looked up some porn on his computer, guessing correctly that his mom would check. He’d also made sure his mom would find “evidence” that he’d had someone in the house before she got home from work. Suddenly, his mom and Xylda reached an accord.

  The purpose of most conventional games was winning or losing. The purpose of Grandmother’s games was to teach Manfred how to make a regular living with a very erratic talent, and how to recognize when he should heed the true compulsions of his gift.

  In her disorganized and colorful life, Xylda had experienced moments of true clarity and brilliance as a psychic. She had found lost things and lost people. She had talked to the dead. But those moments had been interspersed with long stretches of making her living by sheer quackery, made credible by her quick and accurate analysis of her clients’ desires and needs. After years of this, Xylda’s gift degraded. She still had the occasional genuine vision, but it had become almost impossible to distinguish such an event from the flood of canned chatter and vague predictions that made up the bulk of her repertoire.

  Manfred’s psychic gift was larger, deeper, and truer, but Xylda had taught him how to resort to a certain amount of chicanery to pay his bills. Luckily for Manfred, he had no moral qualms about this expedience.

  As Manfred watched the girls warming up out on the field, he realized he was not much older than some of them, yet he felt a decade older in life experience. He tried not to be angry at his grandmother as he calculated how much he’d spent to get to northern Louisiana, both in loss of earning time and in travel expenses. The total wasn’t insignificant, especially since he was still paying off Xylda’s credit cards. But she had to challenge him in his dreams. “Go down there to see what you can find out,” she’d said. “There’s a reason you’re going. Next time you see me, you tell me what that reason was.” In his dream, he’d said, “What’s the prize if I’m right?” Xylda had smiled enigmatically, one of her favorite expressions, and she’d said, “You’ll know it when you find it.” He grimaced at the memory.

  “You all right?” asked the woman sitting next to him. The stands had been steadily filling up. He’d vaguely known there was someone next to him because she smelled good. Now Manfred turned to look at her. She was very pretty; of course, he noticed that first. Blond hair, caught back in a ponytail, at least five years older than him, maybe more, which didn’t faze Manfred at all. She had remarkable blue eyes and some bodacious boobs, too. But then Manfred spotted a little diamond ring on Blondie’s left hand, which (Manfred was fairly sure) meant she was engaged or even married. Too bad. He would have enjoyed flirting with her . . . until he met her eyes the second time.

  Those blue eyes were incredibly knowing.

  Suddenly, Manfred felt uneasy. There was something weird and different about this woman, and he couldn’t relax until he knew what it was.

  “I’m fine,” he said, forcing a smile. “Just thinking about a dream I had.”

  “You a fan of softball?” she said, her expression one of gentle inquiry.

  Again, he had that uneasy feeling. Though her face and posture were inviting, even benign, Manfred had a strong conviction that she knew what his reply would be . . . if he spoke the truth.

  Strong feelings are what psychics are all about.

  “I’ve never watched a whole softball game, or a baseball game, for that matter,” he said. “I was never into sports at school.”

  “Hung out with the Goth kids?” she said.

  He nodded.

  “I never fit in too well, either,” she said, though she didn’t seem particularly upset by the recollection. “But I was able to play softball, thank God. I was pretty good.”

  “So you come to reminisce?” He would have sworn she wasn’t the kind of person who’d live in the past.

  “I come to watch the home games when my work schedule at the bar permits.” That wasn’t a direct answer, but as if in recompense Blondie smiled. The effect was so dazzling it made part of Manfred’s body jump in a pleasant way. “Also, I help out the coach from time to time if the assistant’s out . . . she’s pregnant. Today she’s fine, but the Softball Moms asked me to help with the tournament.”

  Was this why his grandmother had urged him to come to Bon Temps, to meet this woman? For some kind of love connection? Whoever she was, she was not an ordinary human. Manfred was absolutely sure of that, and his conviction didn’t have anything to do with her sunny good looks. In fact, he was sure that she was not for him, that she had already formed a bond elsewhere. But he was curious. This woman had to be significant. Xylda, a little clue here? Send me something from the blue hereafter?

  That was how Xylda had described her location, when he’d dared to ask.

  “Did you have a special reason to come today?” he asked. Maybe if he dug a little, he’d find gold. Then he could go back to his life and livelihood.

  “Special reason? Like, is a niece of mine on the team? Nope,” she said, trying not to sound like that was a dumb question. “When the Moms called, I volunteered to help set up the concession stand, which I came in two hours ago to do. And I’m going to work a shift or two later. You have a special reason to be here, yourself?”

  “Yes,” he said, making up his mind. “My grandmother Xylda sent me here, on a kind of treasure hunt.”

  She looked at him thoughtfully, her head cocked a little to one side. “And she’s passed on, Miss Xylda?”

  He nodded.

  She considered that for a moment. “I haven’t had much experience dealing with the human dead,” she said.

  That was a strange way to put it. “You don’t believe that’s possible.” Manfred was resigned to disbelief and scorn, both of which had come his way since he was a little guy and his talent had manifested.

  “Course I believe it’s possible,” she said, surprised. “That’s just not where my talents lie. And if you had a tough upbringing, mine was tough too, buddy.”

  Feeling ridiculously gratified, Manfred grinned at her. She gave him a decided nod, as if she’d confirmed something in her own mind. She turned to look at the field, unhooking her dark glasses from her T-shirt and slipping them on. A few fluffy clouds scudded across the blue, blue sky. Despite the radiance of the sunlight, the wind made him shiver in his black shirt. Some of the teams had opted to wear their baseball pants and the long socks with their team jerseys, while some had chosen their shorts instead. The ones who’d chosen the pants were far more comfortable.

  The Lady Falcons and their opponents, the Lady Mudbugs, had both chosen long pants. The two teams had finished warming up. Each team now huddled before its dugout in a tight cluster. The girls were holding hands. Their heads were bowed.

  “What are they doing?” Manfred asked.

  The blonde whipped off her dark glasses and looked at him as if he’d asked her why gravity held them to the earth. “They’re praying,” she said, in a gently pitying tone. After a moment,
all the Falcons flung their heads up in unison, gave a yell (“Win!”), and retreated into their dugout. The Mudbugs repeated the process.

  “Good afternoon,” the announcer said, her voice distorted by the crackling sound system. “Welcome to the tenth annual Louisiana Slam Softball Tournament! The first game will be our own Lady Falcons versus the Lady Mudbugs from Toussaint.” There was a lot of cheering.

  Manfred leaned forward and looked to his left so he could see into the little hut that passed for a press booth. Sitting behind the microphone was a woman who was surely a former beauty queen. She was perhaps in her late thirties, with honey-colored hair and a smile like an orthodontist’s dream. She wore a Softball Mom! T-shirt, and she looked as excited as the players. There were a few sheets of paper on the wooden plank in front of her, and she referred to one before leaning to the microphone. “Coaching for the Lady Mudbugs, Head Coach Tom Hardesty, Assistant Coach Deke Fleming.” There was polite applause. “Here’s the starting lineup for the Lady Mudbugs,” the announcer said. “Heather Parfit, pitcher!” Heather, a thin girl with a formidable mouth guard protecting her braces, dashed out of the visiting team’s dugout. She took her place on the third base-to-home line.

  Eventually, the Mudbug and Falcon players had been celebrated and the seniors recognized.

  The girls were all colors and all builds, but Manfred saw they had one thing in common. Their faces were intent, excited, and ready.

  “And that’s our starting lineup for today!” concluded the announcer. “Let’s hear it for the home team and their coaches, Bethany Zanelli and her assistant, Martha Clevely.” There was a lot more cheering as the Lady Falcon starters dashed to their places on the field. The announcer continued, “At this time the flag will be presented by the Bon Temps High School JROTC. All rise for the national anthem.”

  Everyone rose, and kids in uniforms marched out with the Louisiana flag and the U.S. flag. Hands went to chests, hats were removed, and for a moment all Manfred could hear was the snap of the flags in the breeze and the distant shrieks of two children playing tag (“You’re it!”). After a little crackling from the loudspeaker, a country-and-western star’s recording of “The Star Spangled Banner” floated through the air and up into the vast blue sky. People all over the softball park froze in their tracks. Many of them in the stands sang along. The blonde next to Manfred did not. He wondered why.