Re: The Whitetail Woods
"I think that's the best idea," Widget agreed as he watched the white pawn move across the black and white tiles of his chess board. "Not everypony likes the idea of a test. Turn it into a game, and they're much more likely to stay interested, and try their best." He studied how she had moved. Knowing Twilight, she would go with book moves almost exclusively. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing, but he wouldn't be surprised if she also played defensively rather than aggressively, which as white, was something of a determent. Though he had said he would go easy on her, he had a feeling they weren't as unevenly matched as Twilight feared they were.
He moved forward his alternate pawn two places, placing it within easy capture position of her own, but remained quiet about it, leaving Twilight with something to think on. To leave the pawn where it was would potentially threaten other, more important pieces. This was known as the Elephant Gambit, black sacrificing a pawn to gain the initiative of the game. Risky, but with potential pay off.
As they talked and the game progressed and strategies had to be alternated to prepare for the incoming attacks or potentially dangerous moves, Widget became more and more impressed with Twilight's prowess. He had expected her to be more inflexible in a game like chess than she was proving to be, where there was indeed literally volumes of books about the different moves and strategies, names for every move of every piece at every place on the board and things you were 'supposed' to do in certain situations. But she was proving to be fierce competition, and Widget was glad he had not gone so easy on her as he had first considered.
It seemed like no time at all had passed, though it had been nearly forty-five minutes, the deserts and tea gone (except for a few of the candied flowers left over), when Widget finally smiled, moving his rook in a sweeping right motion to capture Twilight's knight. "Check," he said. It was not over yet, he knew, but it felt good to have at least a little momentary advantage! "For the concert in Canterlot, would you like to make it an overnight trip? It'd be nice to spend the whole day there and come back the next morning. We won't be so tired coming home."