Chapter 108 - Games To Play

"The fern flower? It really exists?" I guess I shouldn't have been that surprised. After all, a lot of witches searched for it today. But not all of them, either.

"Yes, maiden. One of them blooms around this place every year. I think this is just why your kin celebrates here, of all places. But it has a mind of its own, and it runs from wrong hands. I can feel, though, that while yours are matted by greed, your heart is pure, kind and strong." The bereginya smiled. "I think the fern flower will let you pick it up. That is, if you win against me, of course!"

That sounded like a rare opportunity, and businesspeople didn't succeed by missing those. I smiled. "Alright, let's play—"

"Wondrous!" the bereginya stood up to her hips, clapping her hands in joy. "What should we play at?.. Riddles, hide-and-seek, tag, oh, so many options!"

"Wait, if you aren't decided, can I pick a game?" I interrupted the woman.

She paused in her show of enthusiasm and looked down at me. "Well, why not? What do you have in mind?"

Like a great man Sun Tzu said, "Victors win the war and then go fight it, losers go to war and then fight for victory"… Or something with that meaning. I pulled the phone out of my pocket.

"It's a game called 'Doodle Jump'. We will go a run each, and who makes a bigger score, wins." I looked at the bereginya's confused face, light and visible even in the bleak light of the full moon, and grinned. "Don't worry, I will explain to you how to play. But you will need your hands dry for this, and I'd be calmer if you got out of the water, too, if you can."

"Alright," the bereginya nodded and stood up fully. I scrambled to my feet as well and the barefooted bereginya joined me on the dry land and lifted her hands. "My hands are dry now."

And they were, indeed, just like her hair. It's like as soon as she stepped out of the water, the bereginya's state changed from 'wet' into 'dry'. I just hoped that the phone screen would react to her fingers. Otherwise, that would be awkward… Oh right, 'Doodle Jump' was controlled by inclining the phone left and right. Well, that was a tremendous relief.

The bereginya listened intently while I explained to her how to play and how to control the Doodle Dude by turning the phone. She appeared to be fascinated by the moving pictures, which gave me a smug feeling of a white coloniser showing all these Incas and Indians the joys of firewater and boomsticks. Bad, bad feeling.

I called it my guilty pleasure and forced myself to not show it in my smile.

"Alright, how about I go first so you can see what I'm doing?" I offered. The bereginya accepted with a nod, still looking at the phone screen like enchanted.

I took a deep breath. The Doodle Jump app lied on my phone for a while now, but I didn't play it in weeks. I hoped my motor skills were still alright and began a new ascend.

Four minutes later, the Doodle Dude jumped into a monster and I passed the phone to the bereginya. She cradled it awkwardly, but gently, and I watched her turn the phone left and right like a drunk driver turns the steering wheel.

It took her less than a minute to fall into an uncontrollable spiral to the bottom of the screen.

"Ah, I lost so fast!" The bereginya pouted again, but passed me the phone with reluctance written in every smallest bit of her body. "Alright, let me show you where the fern flower is as I promised. It's not far."

I took the phone and checked the time. Still an hour left until the sunrise. Then I looked up at the pitiful-looking bereginya and passed the phone back. "You can play for a little longer. I just want to be back to the camp before sunrise."

"Really?" The bereginya's eyes shone with innocent joy of a child. "Thank you so much! It can get so boring to stay around, especially now that my sisters have moved away from the place…"

"They did?"

The bereginya hummed in agreement, but most of her attention was on the Doodle Dude now. Good thing that the screen did register her fingers after all, or I'd have to help her start each run. "The water here became dirtier, and the humans forgot us. Many of my sisters became bitter and turned into mermaids, and the ones who left travelled into wilder places. They like magic-kins, ones who still live like in the days of old and remember them. Beast-people, witch-people…"

"Vampires?" I suggested.

"Death-people? Oh no, not them!" The bereginya shook her head and the momentary distraction put the Doodle Dude at the bottom of the screen. She pouted and started a new run. "Death-people. They don't follow the old ways. They don't sow and don't reap. They don't eat, either, and no one can eat them without dying. Even mosquitoes and leeches have their place in the flow of life, but death-people are just… Out of it."

I pinched my lips together. Here went my hope that at least someone out there didn't hate vampires.

After this, I watched the bereginya playing Doodle Jump in silence until she finally stopped with a heavy sigh. "Come, maiden," she said, giving the phone. "Let me bring you to the fern flower. And… after the sunrise, can you give me your machine to play for a little longer?"

"After the sunrise? Sure." I shrugged. "Thought I will have to leave eventually, and I might be busy around there…"

The bereginya hummed. "That's alright. It wouldn't be too good for me to spend too much time with human machines. I might even become a human myself. It was fun to play this 'Doodle Jump', but I like my river, too. Even if nothing is like it was before, its still my home. Come, maiden. The fern flower will disappear with sunrise, too, if you don't pick it."