Dice-Lords

Overview

The Dice-Lords are the greatest of the Gamblers of the Shifting Path and the Forking Road: beings that control the outcome of random events. Where a Dice-Lord is, nothing falls by chance.

Appearance

A Dice-Lord is taller and stiller than the other Gamblers, a robed figure in gold and violet whose face is hidden behind a mask that shows a single number, and changes it. Dice turn slowly in the air around it like small moons, showing faces no die of Caeldon has. Its hands are long and gloved, and when it closes one, every die in reach comes up as it chooses. It rarely moves. It speaks seldom, in a level voice, and the rattle of dice follows its words.

Habitat and Range

They sit at the great crossings of the Shifting Path and at the heart of the Forking Road, where the most possibilities meet.

Behaviour and Temperament

A Dice-Lord decides what chance decides. It watches the wagers of the lesser Gamblers and sometimes takes one over. It seems to want nothing but to see the dice fall, and it can be bargained with, at a price, for a fall in a traveller's favour.

Abilities

It controls the outcome of random events near it: a coin, a throw, a choice made blind, the moment a falling stone strikes.

Uses and Dangers

A traveller who wins a Dice-Lord's favour can stack the deck in their own favour for a time. Their danger is that the deck can be stacked the other way.

Lore and Belief

Many dice-players on Caeldon call on a lord of the throw before a cast, and some carry a die with a face left blank for him; travellers' tales of the Dice-Lords may lie behind it.

Gamblers' songs tell of the sellsword who diced with a Dice-Lord on the Forking Road for his company's lives and won, and of every one of them dying in the next ambush anyway.

Where It Appears

• The Shifting Path
• The Forking Road