Garinor took the snowy path on the right side and passed through the dark portal and into the next room. As the room resolved, Garinor noticed a flurry of activity. Sounds of war filled the air and he realized as he looked around that he had stumbled into a battlefield.
Warriors in brown battled fighters in blue. Axes and swords cut viciously through the air, parried with weapons or shields. As he stared, a few unfortunates were cut down before his eyes. He turned away in horror.
The skirmish was in force all around him. There was no direction he could turn that had fewer combatants and would therefore be safer. They hadn’t noticed him yet, but he understood he wouldn’t go unseen for long. To his left he saw a knight on horseback finish off a foot soldier. Then the knight pursued another fighter in full body armor with a very tall shield. Soldiers with pointed helms seemed especially trained for combat that involved cross-slashes. They struck downward across their bodies and then, with a second sword, cut back in the other direction, constantly moving forward with their arms swinging in circles. Garinor wondered how anyone could break through such a defense, but he saw a brave fighter sneak around and give his own cross-angled jab, felling one of the warriors.
The battle raged on. Some of the pairs engaged in the fight did well at parrying each other’s attacks. Some groups doubled up on a foe and Garinor couldn’t understand how their blows were deflected at all. He walked about, trying to make sense of it all, and as he did so, a powerful voice called out.
Garinor watched as two women with bright golden crowns wrestled violently, trying to tear out the other’s eyes. Their voices screamed over the battlefield, but neither one of them was able to best the other. It was such a strange display and Garinor walked closer, unable to take his eyes off them.
When he drew closer another voice called out, this one aimed at him. “Hold there and do not interfere.”
A man sat nearby at a table upon which were traced sixty-four squares set up in an eight-by-eight grid. On those squares were numerous figures, some of which had been removed and were sitting off to the side. As he looked, Garinor recognized it as a chess board. The pieces were partway through a game and two pawns squared off on the board. Though the pieces themselves were immobile, Garinor suddenly recalled two of the foot soldiers blocking each other’s attacks. He looked further and saw that a knight on horseback had taken a pawn and was now in place to attack a bishop and a rook.
Another bishop had been taken by a pawn, and Garinor thought back to the cross-cutting fighters and the foot soldier who had taken one of them down. He remembered the two queens then, and sure enough he saw them facing each other on the board, both protected by other pieces but still able to capture each other.
The man eyed Garinor suspiciously. “What is it you want, boy? You’re interrupting my game.”
“Which way do I go to escape this labyrinth?”
The man spat and moved one of the knights, taking the rook it was aiming for. Garinor peered out over the field. The mounted soldier struck down the well-armored foe with the large shield. The bishop that was aiming for the knight missed and turned its attention to another attacker.
“See here,” the man said, pointing at the board. “If the blue queen takes the other one, then the brown bishop will checkmate the blue king. But if the blue bishop instead goes after that pawn there, then it will free up the rook behind it and it will be able to come out and lead the blue team to victory. Thing is, I can’t decide which way I should play it today.”
Garinor shrugged, looking at the board skeptically. He had played chess before, but he couldn’t plan out several steps ahead, though perhaps it was different for a man who was playing against himself. “I really don’t know.”
“Let me put it this way, then,” the man muttered. “Over there you will see two doors. The blue one on the right and the brown one on the left. If you ask me, that brown door is the safer way to go, but it’s your call.”