Entry for the Broker's Game

          She pulls her face out of the sand and coughs water from her lungs.
          Failure ... failure. Everyone's dead ... I'm dead--soon, at least.
          Waves from behind rush over her and carry away the blood from a wound she can't see. With a hoarse, half-drowned voice, and the unpleasant crunch of sand between her teeth, she calls out for her companions.
          Nothing.
          Her arms fail twice to hold up her weight before she notices the boots of someone standing a yard away.
         "Having some trouble?" says a sarcastic masculine voice.
         Without looking up, she croaks her plea: "Please, help my companions..."
         "Not sounding so sweet now, are we, Mellifluous?"
         With great effort, she looks up at an incredibly tall man. His face is featureless--no eyes, no nose--but for his cruel smirk.
         "Your companions are all dead," the mouth says. "And you will soon be dead as well; I'm sure you've noticed the mast of your pathetic raft is sticking out of you."
         A sob escapes the broken girl. "I just wanted to--to save my people ... from the monsters."
         "Yes, on that filthy little island of yours. Unfortunately, you won't be able to help them as you are now."
         Mellifluous lets her face fall back into the sand. The remaining warmth from her body seeps out of her as she continues to bleed out.
         "Do you want to play a game?" the man asks, and he kneels down in front of her. "If you win, I'll grant you one wish. Anything you want."
         "What do I have ... to do?" she manages.
         "Give up your most valued possession, and you'll find out. You'll get it back, of course. If you win. If you don't win ... well, it won't really matter."
         "Take whatever you want. I have nothing left."
         Without hesitation, the man plasters his palm to her forehead, lifting her head from the sand in a manner not at all gentle. She feels her form shift without her control. The black hair becomes its natural silver, her face loses all distinctive features.
         "A changeling without the ability to change. Now you truly have nothing."
         Pain disappears as the fabric of the world shreds apart and reassembles itself in a completely new order. With no means of disguising herself, with her security blanket stripped away, she explores the pink sands of this strange new world.
         She has to win this game--whatever that might mean--and save her people.

         Song: The Seventh Trumpet by August Burns Red

         Quote: "My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth." - Hamlet