World of Warcraft: Vol'jin: Shadows of the Horde by Michael A. Stackpole Read Free Book Online Page A

Zhu credit. And yet each day, as the sun slowly crept over the horizon, the man would head out and up the trail toward the mountain summit above them.
    After Vol’jin had been fed, he sat up in his bed and nodded as the man approached. Tyrathan bore with him a flat, gridded game board and two cylindrical canisters—one red and one black—each with a round hole in the middle of the lid. The man set them on the side table, then retrieved a chair from next to the wall and sat.
    “Are you ready for jihui?”
    Vol’jin nodded. Though each knew the other’s name, they never used them. Both Chen and Taran Zhu had told him the man was Tyrathan Khort. Vol’jin assumed they’d informed the man of his identity. If the man bore him any enmity, he gave no sign. He must know who I be.
    Tyrathan picked up the black cylinder, twisted off the lid, then poured the contents onto the board. Twenty-four cubes rattled and danced on the tan bamboo surface. Each had symbols inscribed in red on a black background, including dots to indicate movement and an arrow to indicate facing. The man nudged them into four groups of six to prove the count, then made to sweep them back into the canister.
    Vol’jin tapped one piece. “This face.”
    The man nodded, then turned and called a monk over inhalting pandaren. They spoke quickly—the man hesitantly, and the monk as if indulging a child. Tyrathan bowed his head and thanked her.
    He turned back to Vol’jin. “The piece is the ship. The face is the fireship.” Tyrathan placed it so the pandaren glyph was sitting the right way for Vol’jin to see it. The man then repeated the word “fireship” in perfect Zandali.
    And his eyes flicked up just fast enough to catch Vol’jin’s reaction.
    “Stranglethorn. Your accent.”
    The man pointed to the playing piece, ignoring his comment. “The fireship is a very important piece to the pandaren. It can destroy anything but is consumed in the destruction. It is removed from play. I am told some players burn the piece. Of the six ships in your navy, only one can become a fireship.”
    “Thank you.”
    Jihui encapsulated much of pandaren philosophy. Each piece had six sides. A player could move as indicated by the uppermost face and attack, or could change the face by one side, then either move or attack. It was also possible to pick the piece up and roll it, randomly selecting a new side, then return it to its facing and play. This was the only way the fireship face could come up for a ship.
    Most interesting, a player could also decide not to move at all, but instead could draw a new piece from the canister by chance. It would be shaken and upended. The first piece to fall out would be put into play. If two fell out, the second would be removed from play, and the opposition would be allowed to draw a new piece without penalty.
    At once jihui was a game that encouraged thoughtfulness yet incorporated impulsiveness. It balanced deliberation with chance, and yet chance could be punished. For a player to lose to a foe who had more pieces on the board was not a great loss. To yield to a superior position, regardless of the pieces in play, was not considered a loss without honor. While the game’s aim was to eliminateall of these opposition pieces, to play to that point was considered ill-mannered and even barbaric. Usually one player found himself out-maneuvered and surrendered, though some relied on chance to shift their fortunes and go on to victory.
    And to play to a standstill, to have forces balanced, this was the greatest victory.
    Tyrathan handed Vol’jin the red canister. Each shook out a half dozen cubes, centering them on the last row of the twelve-by-twelve grid. They oriented them to their lowest value and faced them toward the opposition. Then each shook out one more cube and compared the highest side. Tyrathan’s beat Vol’jin’s, so he would move first. Those cubes returned to the canister, and they began playing.
    Vol’jin nudged a