The Code

One of the fairy people's most popular pastimes is a card game called Bottoms Up. This game is almost the direct opposite of the human game Poker. In Bottoms Up the object is to end up with the least valuable hand possible.

There are four suits: acorns, toads, a weird shape known as splats which is thought to be based on the shape a stinkworm would make if it were stepped on by a troll, and of course bottoms which gives the game its name. Historians tell us that the curved W shapes which represent bottoms are actually supposed to represent ocean waves but gamblers prefer to call them bottoms and now the name has stuck.

If a player realizes that he is in danger of assembling a good hand (which is bad) he must trick his opponents into taking his valuable cards. The most valuable cards are a golden acorn, a king toad, an eight pointed splat and a mega bottom. There is also a hologrammed wild card which can be anything the holding player wishes it to be. If you are tricked into taking a wild card then you must get rid of it in the next two rounds or it freezes at its current value.

When playing Bottoms Up it is very important to hide any behaviour which might betray nervousness or glee. These behaviours are called tells. An elf's tell is to toy with his pointed ears. Sprites sometimes flap their wings, causing a downdraught - which is never a good idea in a card game. Gnomes eat anything they can reach including insects and pieces of furniture, and dwarfs lose control of their internal gases. Once these gases build up past a certain point it becomes almost impossible to hold them in. So if you see a dwarf with a red face it is a good bet that he has a very bad hand. Which is good.