Author Games: Ace of Spades

Task Four: Females

Florence French

According to The Art of War, one should always know their enemy.

Florence French had never really had any enemies – rivals, yes, but she didn't think she could bring herself to use hatred to discuss even the most heated of animosity between her and another person. She certainly had no enemies in the Milena Sable; how could she, when each one of them had been trapped in the casino without their consent, now forced to gamble on each others' lives? No, she could not bring herself to hate any of them. While they were all foes, the best she could hope for was not to know them, lest she pity them and grow to care about those who would soon be dead.

"Twelve of us left," said Aoife. "Surely, this damned evening must be coming to an end."

Florence didn't know how to answer her; she had, of the late, noticed a mean streak in the Irish woman she still could not understand, but felt as though this could not possibly be her true nature. Surely, even the fiercest of the people in the Milena Sable were not truly mean-spirited; they were simply playing the hand that had been dealt out to them. She wished each one of them the best, though a selfish part of her – this, as she hated to admit it, seemed to be the biggest piece of her mind as of late – hoped that they failed. She had never wanted any of this, but the things she would do for money had backed her into a corner. She was as addicted to finery as the ginger man was to his liquor; the only difference between them was that she was still in denial.

Suddenly, she missed the feeling of Paul's arms around her. That, she realized, had not been rock bottom: this was.

The fourth of the aces appeared before them in what Florence could have sworn was a puff of smoke. At this point, nothing could surprise her; she simply wondered just how much of a budget these people had been given for mass murder. There was something about this new woman and her wild appearance, composed of the most vivid of colours in her hair and eyes, that made Florence feel somewhat off about calling them a she, and yet their body certainly seemed to encourage her to believe them a female. They were gorgeous in the most striking and captivating of ways.

The lights of the casino went dark. Florence blinked and looked around her, making out several outlines that seemed to be reacting in the same way as her. The atmosphere in the room reminded her of fear, but the remaining gamblers were doing an excellent job of hiding their fear. Only Aoife, however, seemed to truly be calm. Florence guessed that she'd seen far more worrying things in her life than a little darkness.

"You'll have to excuse me for dimming the lights," said the fourth of aces, who must have been the famed Emerson Monroe; the other three had already passed, and their taste for the dramatic was well-known throughout gambling circles. "It just seems so much more sombre, doesn't it? And you'll see that a darker mood is much more fitting for our next activity."

Their voice was a purr in the silence of darkness, not unlike a cat hunting its prey, and Florence could not help but feel as though her days were number. "Florence French," they called, "it is your turn to spin the wheel."

They did not explain the game, but they did not need to either; if anyone in the Milena Seble did not know how to play roulette, they did not deserve to be standing there. Florence walked up to the wheel and bet on numbers she could not remember moments later. It was not them that mattered, after all, but the price she would have to pay. If she had learnt one thing at the Milena Seble, it was that, nine times out of ten, to lose would mean to die. How will they do it this time? she wondered. Poison? A gun? Will they run up to me and stab me in the throat? The possibilities were endless, and she was sure that there were a plethora of ways to kill a person which she could not even begin to fathom.