Foul Play Read online

  ‘Sulk!’ said one of the Kobassis. ‘Yoo’ve been quiet since we last spoke. Haven’t left yer squat, we heard.’

  Sulk was relieved that the ogres didn’t seem to know about his midnight excursion to the crypt. That could have been a difficult one to explain.

  ‘I’ve been studying,’ he lied. ‘I wanted to get on top of the rules and regs. Even in the time since I stopped playing there’s been some rules changes.’

  The ogres looked at each other in an approving manner. ‘Glad to see we made da right choice. But just remember, we don’t give a ratman’s arse about da rules, just as long as da orcs win.’

  ‘Yeah, they really are out of form...’ ventured Sulk.

  The Kobassis both gave him a stare that would have curdled milk. ‘Dat’s the point,’ growled one. ‘Dat’s why dere odds are high and why we’ve bet on ’em. We gonna win big, cos yoo’re gonna make sure dey win big.’

  ‘How about a draw?’ asked Sulk. ‘I know a win would be best, but a draw would mean you get your money back…’

  ‘A draw is da same as a loss,’ rumbled a Kobassi. ‘Get us a win, Sulk. And let’z have no more talk about ifz an’ butz.’

  The rest of the trip passed in silence, and soon Sulk was delivered to the staff entrance at the Oldbowl. As he got out, the nearest Kobassi leaned forwards. His face mere inches from Sulk’s, his breath stank like the River Reik combined with a year-old corpse.

  ‘Don’t let us down, Sulk. My brother isn’t as forgiving as me.’ Sulk managed a sheepish grin before Bald Shrew shut the carriage door. The ex-player, ex-thug and now ref wandered to the stadium entrance muttering a prayer to Nuffle without the slightest idea what to do.

  Sulk stood on the astrogranite, dressed in black and white with a whistle dangling on twine around his neck. The coin had been tossed, the receiving team decided. It was the Dwarfs. Both teams seemed quite mad about that. He was in the middle of twenty-two adrenaline-fuelled and bloodthirsty warriors in spiked armour. On his left, they were short and bearded. To his right were hulking green-skinned beasts. Surrounding them were the raised stands of the ancient Oldbowl, packed to capacity with cheering fans. The supporters of the Dwarf Giants were in the south end of the stadium – easily spotted not just because of their diminutive height, but also for the sea of blue and gold as they proudly wore their team’s colours. The Gouged Eye’s rabid fans were in the opposite end. They were less concerned with wearing the Gouged Eye colours of red and white, because being green was probably enough to identify with their team. There were a fair few inflated Gouged Eye balloons bobbing around those stands to further reinforce the crowd’s support.

  Separating the rival fans in the middle part of the oval on both sides of the Oldbowl were neutral parties. This was the area where the sponsors, corporate blaggers and parties with more financial – rather than tribal – interests spectated. The Kobassi Brothers stood out like sore and irritable thumbs in their seats despite the crowd numbering in their tens of thousands. Sulk saw the ogres and they stared back at him. Time seemed to slow, but it hadn’t really – at all – and both the players and fans were getting impatient.

  ‘By Roze-el’s bearded chuff, blow the whistle you bumbling umgi git!’ shouted Grimwald Grimbreath, the Dwarf Giants’ captain. Startled by the rebuke, Sulk blew into the whistle and the shrill noise carried across the stadium. A great cheer went out from the crowd and the players on the line of scrimmage crashed against each other like a tidal surge against rock-hewn sea defences. Sulk was standing in the centre of this mass and his old player instincts quickly told him to duck as ancient enemies – black orcs and bearded blitzers – crashed into each other at full velocity. Sulk managed to crawl out of the scrum relatively intact. He kept crawling until he reached the side of the field. In theory, he was meant to be keeping an eye on the game for infractions, rule-breakers and fouls, but he’d spent the first half minute glaring down at the blood-caked astrogranite surface as he moved to the side of the field on his hands and knees.

  An arm reached down, offering to pull him up. Sulk took the proffered hand, noticing the zebra-coloured sleeve. So, this was his assistant referee – they had not met before the game, due to Sulk’s dawdling, but there was no time like the present. Sulk let the assistant’s arm drag him up and he looked into the face of its owner for the first time. He was met with a smug grin. It was Hinter’s face.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ hissed Sulk.

  ‘Same thing as the Kobassis, reminding you to make the correct decision.’ Before Sulk could answer back, he heard a shout from over his shoulder.

  ‘REF!’

  Sulk turned to see two orcs kicking the absolute snot out of a prone dwarf. The remaining Giants were running towards the incident as fast as their stumpy legs could carry them and screaming at Sulk in the eternal way all players appealed to officials – with jaws wide and arms splayed in ‘Can-you-not-see-this-injustice!?’ fashion.

  ‘No foul, play on!’ he shouted. The Giants’ fans voiced their objections – fully half the stadium exploded in boos and khazalid death threats aimed at Sulk. The Gouged Eye fans cheered in delight. One of the orcs in mid-foul celebrated with a flying elbow into his victim. Sulk turned his head to give Hinter his own smug grin. But his assistant was no longer smiling, now there was anger.

  The game continued, and Sulk was not making himself popular with the Giants’ fans. While not as infamous for it as rival dwarf team, the Warhammerers, the Giants were prone to bringing their experimental and illegal weapons onto the field of play. Some refs deliberately turned a blind eye to this outright cheating; they either feared being skewered on the very weapons they were banning, or had received a hefty purse of dawi gold before the game. Sulk was in neither category. He had already stopped a chainsaw-wielding dwarf from coming on to the field. The fans were not amused. Grimwald Grimbreath pushed past Sulk and nearly knocked him flying.

  ‘You’re in my personal book of grudges, laddie,’ spat Grimbreath as he strolled back into his own half.

  In a way, the dwarfs’ willingness to cheat made Sulk’s job easier, as he didn’t have to manufacture any reasons to penalise them. Of course, he still had to consider letting the dwarfs win to please the Lord Chamberlain, but at the moment he wanted to agitate Hinter more. Before the end of the game, he still had to figure out how he could please the ogres and the Eyes, although, deep down, he knew someone was going to lose – and that was probably him.

  There was a roar from the Giants’ end zone. It wasn’t the outraged roar of the crowd; more mechanical – like a lawn mower that had drank a potion of strength. Sulk looked up to see a deathroller churning up the turf around the stands and heading for the astrogranite. Dwarf deathrollers were the ultimate ‘secret’ weapon, the irony being they were not subtle at all due to their enormous size. Initially developed by the Warhammerers from antiquated sports field rollers, it was a steam-driven contraption with a large, spiked roller at the front which was about four foot in height and seven foot wide. The roller span at a fearsome rate, even when stationary. The machine was ridden by a player-pilot whose job was to mow down enemy players, until only dwarfs were left on the pitch unopposed. It was a fan favourite with good reason. Sulk knew if the machine got on the field then there wouldn’t be any orcs left to win the match.

  He sprinted across to the Giants’ end zone and stood before the deathroller, red card in hand. The Giants’ fans were shouting and screaming at him at the top of their lungs, cursing his ancestors and swearing countless grudges against him. The deathroller continued to slowly advance, its spinning drum whipping up the air currents around the referee. The deathroller inched forward, until the roller came within a beard’s length of him. Sulk held his ground, even as he struggled to hold his bowels in place.

  ‘Hold it!’ shouted Grimwald. The Dwarf captain came to stand by Sulk. ‘You’ve got balls, lad. Big, spiky ones, I’ll give ye that.�
� He turned to the player in the deathroller pilot seat. ‘Spin her around, Thorek, we’ll try again later.’

  Sulk let out a sigh of relief but quickly regained his composure as Hinter came to join him.

  ‘If you’d let that machine on, it would have been game over, fool,’ he said. Sulk moved into Hinter’s personal space, their heads almost touched.

  ‘Don’t push me, Hinter!’

  ‘Or what?’

  ‘I might push back!’ Sulk walked away before Hinter could respond.

  The clock was rushing towards half time. Sulk didn’t know if that was a good or bad thing. The sooner the ordeal was over the better, but then what fate would befall him once he blew the final whistle?

  ‘Illegal procedure!’ a shout called out from the sidelines. Without turning his head, Sulk knew where the shout had come from. As the ranking match official, technically, Sulk was the only ref allowed on the field during play. Assistant refs were confined to the sidelines but could call out fouls and other rules breakages. Most never did, rightly letting the head ref take the heat from resentful players and fans for halting play. But Hinter had his own agenda. Sulk looked askance from the field, and the CabalVision camras followed his gaze.

  ‘Gouged Eye player four doesn’t have his boot laces tied up. That’s a clear breach of NAF code 122, paragraph C. According to the laws of the game, play must reset with Dwarf Giants in possession.’ Hinter’s face didn’t look as confident as the words he spoke. Even he knew that he was not just poking a hornets’ nest but drop kicking it down the ravine. And yet, his interpretation of the rules was foolproof. Unlike the head referee, he must have been swotting up on his NAF regs before the game. Sulk had no choice but to concur. Grimbreath sidled up to Sulk.

  ‘Well now, lad, isn’t he a despicable, sanctimonious oik? Glad he’s a Giants’ supporter!’ He gave a gruff laugh and patted Sulk on the back before ordering his players into formation.

  The Gouged Eye fans were not happy. Some of the mascot balloons were thrown onto the pitch, where one burst over a goblin, covering him in gloop. Sulk dared a glance at the Kobassis. Their faces were stone – not just hard to read, but impossible. However, their eyes – yes, their eyes – gave away their true feelings, and it was pure, unadulterated anger.

  The game restarted with half-time only moments away. Despite all that had gone on, neither side had managed a touchdown yet. While the Gouged Eye were genuinely out of form, the Giants’ were simply being self-destructive, too hung up on getting their illegal weapons on the pitch. If they had just played the ball, thought Sulk, they’d probably be two up by now. It was a thought he certainly wasn’t going to voice to the dwarfs. Although, he worried that Hinter might say something. And as if on cue…

  ‘Foul play!’ shouted Hinter from the sidelines. ‘The troll is picking his nose, a clear breach of NAF player protocol–’

  ‘Shut yer zoggin mouth!’ shouted the Gouged Eye captain. The orc came storming up to Sulk. He was big and angry, with a row of broken fangs jutting from his bottom lip. Sulk was thankful it wasn’t Varag Ghoul-Chewer. Part of the reason the Eye were not on form was their absent captain, who was still recovering from injury from when a witch elf had kicked him in the groin last season.

  ‘Yoo betta get dat assistant git to shut it wiv his weird rulez, or I’m holdin’ yoo’ – with that, the orc poked Sulk hard in the chest with a knotted, clawed finger – ‘responsible.’

  Sulk was now sure that every player and member of the crowd was out to get him… Play resumed, the dwarfs were mere yards from the end zone, Sulk had the whistle in his mouth ready to blow as soon as the half was up. He would call it early if he could, but due to Hinter’s constant interference, scrutiny of the match officials was now off the charts. Then Grimbreath was handed the ball.

  ‘Out the way!’ he roared as he charged past. Sulk blew the whistle, trying to stop the game before the dwarf captain crossed into the orcs’ end zone. But it was too late – an undeniable touchdown was scored.

  ‘Half-time!’ shouted Hinter from the sidelines. His smug grin had returned.

  The teams retreated to their dugouts to be shouted at by their coaches. Sulk was in no doubt that both he and Hinter would be the topic of much of that discourse. He dared a look into the crowd and saw the Kobassis glaring back. Their anger had given way to malice and hatred. If the score line remained the same, he was a dead man.

  His assistant ref approached him from behind and looked at the Kobassis. They returned his glare with the same hatred they had shown Sulk.

  ‘It would be best for everyone if the score stays the same from now on, or even if the Giants can increase their lead.’ He gave the ogres a friendly wave as he spoke. It wasn’t returned. He then faced Sulk. ‘Do you know what I’ve got here?’ He tapped his breast pocket. A small, black book was sat in it. The books were normally carried by match officials used for recording cautioned player numbers... and bribes. Sulk was non-plussed. ‘It’s evidence. All the information we have that you are my informant. Think the ogres are mad at you now? Wait till I show them this,’ he tapped his pocket again, ‘unless of course, you stop being so stubborn and let the Giants win.’

  Sulk walked away, partly because it was already time to get the second half started, and partly to stop himself from throttling Hinter there and then.

  Let the Giants win, mused Sulk. Maybe, just maybe there was a way out of this…

  It was kick-off time once again and the Gouged Eye were receiving. The dwarf kicker hoofed the ball high into the air and into the greenskins’ half. A goblin snatched it before it bounced and orc linemen quickly surrounded him. The greenskin cage started to march upfield. The dwarfs, always better at defending castles than taking them, struggled to grab the goblin as the Gouged Eye moved ever closer to the opposing end zone. Hinter moved along the sidelines, following the ball. Twice he called foul play, but this time the orcs refused to listen. No doubt a direct order from their manager at the half-time talk. Hinter, looking slightly panicked, beseeched Sulk to intervene, but the chief ref pointedly ignored him too. The dwarfs attacked deep in their half. The two team captains were trading heavy blows when a gobbo broke from the cage and made a run for it. He scored, and the Gouged Eye fans erupted in jubilation.

  ‘I’ve had enough of this!’ ranted Grimbreath, as the dwarfs gathered for kick-off once more. ‘Thorek, you’re back on!’ The roar of the deathroller reverberated around the stadium. The dwarf captain looked to Sulk, daring him to stop it. In the crowd, the Kobassis glared at him, and on the sidelines Hinter looked on with a scowl, expecting Sulk to send it off. However, Sulk didn’t, he looked past it, as if the rumbling, smoke-belching machine wasn’t there.

  ‘Play on!’ shouted Sulk in his most ref-like voice. The Gouged Eye fans turned their howls from triumph to outrage. The ogres, who had been stony faced throughout, roared their disapproval. Hinter’s scowl disappeared, and a familiar, irritating smile spread across his face. At last he had got through to Sulk.

  The deathroller trundled up the field, but the greenskins had no answer. As it advanced the Kobassis gestured at Sulk, desperate to attract his attention. Hinter moved down the sidelines, looking self-satisfied. The deathroller made it to the line of scrimmage – the line that bisected the field at the centre – when Sulk called a foul play.

  ‘This dwarf’s beard is too long,’ Sulk shouted, pointing to a runner, whose cheeks burned red with embarrassment as he quickly tucked his beard into the top of his breeches. The game halted, and all players stopped what they were doing. Sulk stood at the centre of the field, with the deathroller stationary but its drum spinning menacingly before him.

  ‘No!’ shouted Hinter. ‘You can’t stop the game now, that’s not even an infraction!’ He strode onto the field in a clear breach of official etiquette. Hinter stormed up to Sulk, ignoring the dwarf and orc players about him, and the rumbling deathroller.

>   ‘What are you up to, Sulk? The game is a draw, full-time is close. You need to let these bearded fools win!’

  ‘No,’ said Sulk, looking calm.

  ‘Then you’ll pay. I have all the evidence, I’ll show it to your bosses and watch them pull you apart.’

  ‘That’s all the evidence? There in your pocket, no copies?’

  ‘It’s all here,’ gloated Hinter. ‘Ready to give to the Kobassis. And once they’re done with you–’

  Sulk gave Hinter a push. It wasn’t hard, but was just enough to tip the assistant off balance. Hinter fell sideways and into the deathroller. There was short scream followed by an unpleasant crunch. The drum of the deathroller turned red.

  ‘Told you I’d push back.’ Sulk noticed the shredded pages of Hinter’s notebook blow in the wind and get trampled into the astrogranite in the ensuing panic. No more evidence to worry about.

  Players from both teams looked surprised at what had just happened. If they had seen the push, none cared to mention it. Sulk quickly took charge of the situation.

  ‘Penalty on the Dwarf Giants, an illegal construction has caused the death of a match official. Send it off. The Gouged Eye take possession!’

  Even the dwarfs struggled to argue against that decision. None picked up on the irony that they were being punished for a murder Sulk had committed. The Gouged Eye were emboldened and surged deep into the Dwarfs’ half with the ball. It was full-time, but with the score still a draw Sulk let the game play on. The Giants’ fans jeered, calling for the final whistle, but Sulk ignored them.