She should. Do something? Maybe?

Her memory is fuzzy. There was a fog? She was flying, she had wings... then the ground and. Oh.

She died, didn't she.

That means Her gifts should be gone, and Her telepathic bond too. She reaches for them anyway, on instinct.

Well. The magic is still there. She tries to Detect Magic but the source of her magic, usually something she can feel quite clearly inside her somehow feels incredibly distant. She feels way too tired to try to reach it. Maybe she'll take a nap.

Yeah, a nap seems good. There is time. It's going to be fine, She will Raise her. And then punish her for her failure.

She... should... check... that... it's... safe...

She... tries... casting Detect Evil.

Nope, the magic is still too distant. Can she contact Her?

No, her bond is also unreachable in the same way that her magic is. Well, no use, she just has to wait for the Raise. It's going to be fine. She can trust Her Lady.

The Boatman doesn't interrupt her. She can wait as long as she likes. There's no hurry.

Well, not for her, at least.

The Boatman applies himself to the oar, and with a series of firm sweeps, the boat makes a slight turn, angling left.

A sharp black rock, jutting up slightly from the surface of the river, is briefly visible on the right.

This doesn't look like the Boneyard, and it sure isn't any of the upper planes. She's going to get Raised, so she shouldn't be in an afterlife yet anyway. Actually, according to what she studied she shouldn't really remember much at all? She's on a river, but the River of Souls is a metaphorical rather than literal river, so, what gives? And she shouldn't have any of her magic, and while she doesn't... there's still something there, which is weird.

She'll try to... sit? Sitting sounds fine.

Sitting up takes somewhat more effort than might be expected, but it's doable.

This puts her in a somewhat better position to see across the river.

Perhaps she ought to look somewhere else, instead.

Ok but surely it can't hurt to just look, right? She's simply trying to get oriented... 

Yes, it can.

It hurts like her worst memories, seen with a clarity uncommon in life.

It hurts like every wound from a broken, shattered body, each making itself suddenly known when that pain had been absent moments ago.

It hurts almost enough that she doesn't see anything at all.

She catches a glimpse of something she wasn't expecting.

But it hurts too much to keep looking.

Or even to remain sitting upright.

Or even to keep her eyes open.

What. How. Not even Her branding hurt this much.

She tries to heal herself on instinct, and feels a stab of - missing, longing, hole.

She's going to lay down for a while. Think about happy thoughts. The top of the clouds, the air on her face...

...lips, pressed against her own.

A kiss! She loves them, although...

... why are Her lips cold?

Valka startles awake, heart racing. Who is this? She tries reaching for her magic, but it's still not quite there. She shoves the other off. Well, tries to, but her arms are still tired and weak... 

The face is unfamiliar; bearded, scarred, missing an eye.

It's no kiss of passion. Instead, he's inhaling, as if trying to draw breath from her lungs.

She's tired and weak, and he looks like he ought to be quite a bit stronger than her.

Still... there's a chance she might succeed anyway.

He's not as heavy as he ought to have been, and he clearly wasn't expecting resistance. The sudden shove sends him off-balance.

There's a moment of panicked flailing, a muttered curse, and a soft splash. He's gone.

She's not going to fall back asleep, not with her heartbeat faster than a rabbit's and the prickling of the man's beard still on her lips. Ew.

Her Lady's lips are much softer and so good to kiss, especially when...

No daydreaming! She needs to be alert. She painstakingly gets herself sitting again, but this time she keeps her eyes firmly on the boat. She has learned her lesson. Painfully (and not even the fun kind of pain).

The noise didn't go unnoticed. There's a sigh from the Boatman, a hollow rasping thing.

He takes up the oar and paddles more vigorously, bringing the boat around.

Not long after, he carefully leans over the side, reaching into the still water with a skeletal hand.

A very dead-looking body gets hauled out of the waters, and is unceremoniously plopped down towards the back of the boat.

With that, the Boatman returns to his post, pulling at the oar to turn the boat back onto its usual course. As he does so, he speaks; a harsh, creaking voice.

"I generally prefer that my passengers not make extra work for me. Or, at least, that they not do so here. Mind, I've no specific complaint in this instance. It's not the first time that one's tried something of that sort, and the comeuppance is richly deserved."

"I'm glad you feel I didn't do anything wrong, sir. May I have your name, if you please?"

He turns to look at you, grinning. (he's always grinning)

"Alas, you may not. In this place, I am less my self and more my role. I am known simply as 'The Boatman'. I ferry the dead across the river."

"So I am dead. Bugger, She's going to be so mad. She's probably going to Raise me, if she finds my body, I don't know if that changes my destination?"

He tilts his head slightly at the unusual terminology, but elects to answer the question directly.

"That depends. The rules suggest that my boat ought to only have one destination, but there are loopholes."

He gestures to an old and battered-looking chess board, set up across the nearest seat to the Boatman's station.

"Perhaps the oldest and best-known loophole is that anyone who defeats me in a game is permitted to return to life. Do you play?"

"I've only learned to game with dice, sir Boatman. I know Mia and Perudo."

"A game of chance is as valid as a game of skill, for my purposes."

So saying, the Boatman gently brushes all the chess pieces off to one side of the board, before flipping it over.

The opposite side of the board is divided into six spaces, each marked with two different symbols. There's a bat, a cat, a hat, a rat, a tentacle, a lens, a bee, an eye, a knife, and a tower. And... two less identifiable symbols.

The symbols are laid out such that each space contains two symbols, in opposite corners; bat with tower, cat with knife, hat with bee, rat with tentacle, lens with eye, and the two indecipherable symbols with each other.

The Boatman proceeds to produce a trio of twelve-sided shapes, gently handing them to you, while pushing the white chess pieces in your direction.

"The game is Devils' Dice. The white pieces are your starting stake. Place as many pieces you like on whichever spaces you like, then roll the dice. For each matching symbol, you keep your stake and win an extra piece. Any pieces you put on a space that doesn't match any of your rolls are lost. If you put a piece in the middle of the space, both symbols on that space count, but you can also put them in either corner to double your winnings if it matches that symbol, but earn nothing if it matches the opposite. If you roll a winning symbol on more than one of the dice, you win more than once."

Uh. Valka tries to think it through. She's nowhere as smart as her Lady, but she's been taught to try and think and not give the first answer that comes to her mind.

So if she places all the pieces on a single symbol she's probably going to lose them. There's twelve symbols and three dice, so more likely than not that the symbol doesn't appear.

What if she places all pieces in the middle of the space, divided equally? Let's say... three pieces in each space. Then she rolls three dice, and gets back... three she staked, plus three more, for each dice. So that's... eighteen pieces, same number as she started with. Uh, it's a fair game, she didn't expect it to be.

"What happens if I win more white pieces than we have available? And what happens if - conversely - I lose all of them?"

"If you win all of the black pieces from me, I'll take you to your preferred side of the river. Conversely, if you lose all of your white pieces, it won't be possible for you to return to life."

Her Lady will rescue her. For sure. There is nothing that can stop Her from Raising her, right? As long as her soul is intact she can be...

Oh.

So that's what the wager really is.

"I understand, sir."

So she'll need to cheat. Alone, without her magic and with just her clothes on her.

This is fine.

"To be clear, very few of my passengers are willing to wager the last of their connection to mortality. Most who play such games with me hold something in reserve, and stop short of making that final wager. Those who do risk everything are mostly the ones who are old enough to become indifferent as to the prospect, and who feel themselves more than ready to discover what it is that comes next. If you have someone waiting for you in life, or some prospect of medical attention bringing you back without my intervention, then there is no need to risk everything. You could simply wait a while to see what happens. But if you are impatient to return, I am bound to accept your wager."

"So I could start the game and then if it's going poorly... bow out with some of my pieces and wait to be Raised? Or is it the case that starting it means necessarily ending it too?"

"You have that option, yes."

"Well, in that case I'd like to try my hand at it."

Now the question is: how can she cheat without getting caught. She could try distracting him but that would be conspicuous - the opposite of what she wants.

She could probably... try rolling the dice in a way that gets her the same result every time?

First round: two pieces for every square, both in the middle.

She rolls the dice, paying a lot of attention to how she's doing it and discreetly positioning the dice in a position in her hand she'll be able to recreate.

She rolls a hat, a tower, and a rat.

The Boatman grins (he's always grinning), and scoops up the six white pieces on the cat-knife, lens-eye, and mysterious symbol spaces, and hands her six black pawns.

Losing the white pieces hurts, a little.

Ow?

She'll put... one black piece on each of the hat, tower and rat squares, still keeping them in the middle.

She tries to try to replicate her previous roll as close as possible.

She rolls a bat, a cat, and a rat.

The Boatman scoops up the piece on the hat space, but gives it and one more back.

Well, that's better.

Two black pieces on bat/tower, two on rat/tentacle (tentacles are fun!), two on cat/knife (knives are also fun, but she prefers tentacles).

This time, she rolls a tower, a tentacle, and one of the weird symbols.

The Boatman scoops up the pieces on cat/knife, and gives them to her, along with the last black pawn and a black knight.

She hears movement behind her.

She turns suddenly, letting the pieces fall to the bottom of the boat to have her hands free to cast or swing.

It's a woman, this time.

She keeps a polite distance, and says something incomprehensible.

"Hallit?"

She shakes her head, and tries a much different language, equally incomprehensible.

"Yeah, no, sorry."

"Sir Boatman, would you be so kind as to communicate to this fair lady that I regrettably can not understand her?"

She picks up the fallen pieces, this doesn't look like a situation where she'll need to fight.

The Boatman nods, turns to the other woman, and says, "No, she doesn't understand either English or Hudum."

He pauses to catch another incomprehensible reply, and asks, "Oh? It's that urgent? Very well..."

"She's looking for someone to convey a message back to the living world, in exchange for some of her breath. Her urgency is such that she will consider even a messenger who doesn't share a language."

"I... can do that, sure. I do have a gift with my tongue, even if I don't speak her languages."

The Boatman patiently relays the details, occasionally turning an eye back to the river.

She wants a message delivered to the "Gracious Widow". Apparently, anyone in the area of London's docks ought to be able to point her in the appropriate direction with just that title (barring the dock officials, who are best avoided). She asks the Boatman not to translate the message itself (apparently there's some value in a messenger who doesn't understand the message). All she asks is for Valka to memorise a few short phrases, and promise to make her best effort to deliver the message as soon as possible after returning to life.

"I'd love to but... I've never heard of London before, and while I can promise I would do my best to get the message delivered, I can't promise that on behalf of my Lady, and She may have more urgent plans."

She's disappointed, but understanding. Perhaps someone else will take her offer.

"I could try and memorize it anyway, and if I succeed in delivering it ask the Gracious Widow to compensate me? But you'd have no guarantee I can do that, so I wouldn't ask you to pay me."

An odd bargain, but one she's willing to accept.

The next few minutes involve repetition of an incomprehensible series of syllables, and the correction of Valka's pronunciation until it is deemed acceptable.

To the foreign lady: "I will try my best." Then to the boatman: "How much longer 'til we reach our destination, sir?"

"Alas, there is no meaningful answer to that question."

"But surely we're advancing towards it?"

"We are, yes."

Another long sweep of the oar adjusts their course a little.

"And you have gone down this river before?"

"More than once, yes."

The Boatman grins ironically at this last. (he's always grinning)