Tymora's luck

OFFSTAGE

Somewhere in the Prime Material Plane on the world known as Toril in Realmspace, the renowned mage Volothamp Geddarm, known simply as Volo to his friends, was sweating profusely. It was alarming how quickly the friendly game of table dice with the barbarian mercenary leader had turned ugly. Not that Volo was losing. If he were losing, he could extricate himself with a smile and an excuse. No. Volo was winning, winning against an ogre-sized man with a hairy back and a deer-skinning knife that could serve a halfling as a short sword.

On his first roll of doubles, Volo allowed himself a chuckle. When his next roll also turned up doubles, the mage merely smiled. By his fifth consecutive roll of doubles, Volo felt the first trickle of sweat dripping down the side of his face. His opponent's scowl had grown so deep that his heavy brow shadowed half his nose and turned his eyes into deep black pits. On Volo's sixth roll of doubles, the barbarian pulled out a whetstone and tugged at the clasps of his knife sheath. On Volo's seventh roll, snake eyes, the barbarian pulled out his knife and began running it across the stone.

Volo was sweating so hard he felt as if he was steaming away and wished that he could. It would be a clever escape, to turn to vapor and drift away, too insubstantial to pursue. The barbarian reached for the dice cup. He, too, looked hot, but not from terror. He rolled a five. Enraged, he flung the ale in his mug to the floor and slammed the dice into the emptied ale mug, obviously convinced Volo was using an enchanted dice cup.

"Perhaps we should leave this for-" Volo began.

"Roll," the barbarian growled. He tested his sharpened knife blade by whittling off a layer of the maple dicing table.

Volo rolled… double sixes. There were tears in his eyes.

The barbarian cursed Volo and Volo's gods as he snatched up the dice and rattled them around in the ale mug. He slammed the mug down and lifted it. A one and a three. Making an ugly declaration about the ancestry of Volo's father, the barbarian pushed the mug back toward Volo.

"I don't understand how-" Volo squeaked.

"Roll, damn your bones!" shouted the barbarian. Volo could swear he saw a fire glowing in the pits of his opponent's eyes.

Volo slid the dice into the mug, gripping the handle as if it might escape. He hesitated for a moment, then flung the mug full force at his opponent as he dodged sideways.

The barbarian raised a hand to fend off the missile and threw the deer knife across the table. The knife buried itself several inches into the door, but Volo had made his exit through the second-story window.

The barbarian stood up and retrieved his knife. That's when he spotted the dice on the floor beside the ale mug. Double sixes.

With a roar, the barbarian ran from the room, determined to chase down and destroy the fiend before it wreaked worse havoc.

Limping on a twisted ankle and shivering in the warm Elturel night, Volo whimpered a chiding prayer to the goddess Tymora. "Lady, what were you thinking, to waste so much good luck on me?"