Once upon a dreadful time

Long did Lisane study the pattern. Finally she took a deep breath and closed her eyes, then circled her left hand widdershins above the wheel of cards, followed by her right hand, circling deasil. She then opened her eyes and said, “This is what I see.” And, to increase her focus, she began speaking aloud the meanings of the cards and their relation to one another, and as she spoke, she touched each card: her right hand for those upright, droit-facing inward-and her left hand for those reversed, oppose, inverse-facing out.

“Here nigh the beginning sits the Tower, reversed. I can but think the card bespeaks of the inevitable breakdown of present circumstance. But flanking are the upright three of swords on one side and the upright four of swords on the other. Taken together they mean separation, isolation, and disaster. Immediately at hand is the three of cups, oppose, signalling a reversal of circumstance, and what was good now causes pain. It is directly followed by the nine of swords, and droit it means despair, anxiety, misery. This is either what has been or signifies what is happening now.

“Here is the two of cups upright, flanked by the Hierophant and the Naif; it indicates harmony between two souls.” Liaze frowned and thought of the previous four-by-four spread. “Does this represent me and someone I’ve yet to meet? Its position in the layout might signify that.”

Finally, Lisane shrugged. “I cannot say, yet these cards flanking, this one droit, the six of cups, signifies friends, while in this ring the three of cups reversed speaks of a test or tests, the double-edged nature of intuition, and since it is oppose, my intuition, or mayhap my first thought, may be wrong.” And on Lisane spoke aloud, touching cards, explaining unto herself, as she moved ’round the layout, coming ever closer to the center. “Here are the four Chevaliers-of cups, wands, pentacles, and of swords-and they all are arrayed against the Magician, and he is at the center of things. Oh my, we have Justice inverse, as is the Wheel of Fortune: together they seem to spell doom.” Lisane paused, her brow furrowing. “This trouble seems centered on the Magician, and the nearby Priestess, who, in this pattern, appears to be but an acolyte of the Mage.

“But in opposition are the four knights. -Oh, and here we see the Hermit, who is flanked by the threes of wands and pentacles. Three Hermits also aiding? Whatever might that mean?

It is a strange configuration. Yet there is something familiar about this spread, and it spells great disaster. Where and when did I last see-?”

Of a sudden, Lisane gasped. “Ah, I remember: it was when Orbane and his armies marched across Faery. Although this arrangement is not the same, there is a great likeness. Can it be that Orbane is somehow involved with whatever jolted me awake?”

Lisane frowned. “But he is imprisoned and cannot get free, and so I think this must be a spurious reading. Perhaps I’d better try again.” She reached toward the layout to take up the cards, but hesitated. “What if it’s not spurious? Perhaps I’d better continue.” Again she began touching each card. “If Orbane somehow again threatens Faery, there seems to be hope, given the Chariot as well as the Star. Yet by their positions, it is such a slim hope.”

On she spoke, reading the wheels-the rings within rings within rings-but at last she reached the center of the circles.

Even so, she was not finished, for four cards were yet to come.

Lisane looked at the remainder of the deck, the cards not yet dealt, and said, “Now for the four primes, first the two which speak of things to be nigh the end.

“Cardinal premier,” said Lisane, and she turned up a card and laid it directly before her, just below the wheel; the card pointed toward the center. Even so, she sucked in air between clenched teeth, saying, “Devil, upright: a terrible omen, for it means ravage, violence, vehemence. It could be a dweller without, someone not permitted within.” Lisane glanced at the Magician in the center of the array. “Can it be Orbane?” Lisane took a deep breath and dealt the second card. “Cardinal deux,” and this time she laid it directly opposite and just above the wheel. “Death, reversed. This can mean death just escaped, partial change, or transformation. Even so, it can also suggest great destruction as well, and coupled with the Devil upright, I deem it signals a disaster none can avoid.” Lisane turned up another card and placed it just outside the left of the wheel. “Cardinal trois, Judgment, droit. Follow guidance to forge ahead. Yet, with the array laid out as it is, the guidance is most obscure. And here it is adjacent to the Naif, which would indicate one must think wisely and make the right choice. Ah, me, I wonder whether the destruction can be avoided if the choice is wrong and the guidance remains unresolved.”

Lisane took a deep breath and drew the last card and set it down outside the wheel to the right. “Cardinal quatre, the World upright. Triumph, but whose? The Devil or those who oppose? The Magician or the Knights? Yet with this King of Swords in the pattern, that could mean victory or defeat for the Knights, depending with whom the King is allied.” She studied the layout a bit longer, and then said, “Spurious or no, you are quite a puzzle.”

. .

It was just after dawn when a large bee buzzed down the length of the main street in the village of Ardon, followed by a man ahorse, galloping, with three steeds in tow: one was fitted with a small rack, several modest bags of provisions affixed thereon, and two were completely unladen. Down the main street they thundered, people rushing aside to get out of the way. And in a moment they were gone, leaving a wondering populace behind.

“Do you think this has anything to do with the message the Sprites brought?” asked one.

“Mayhap it was a kingsman on a mission dire,” said another.

“He wasn’t wearing a tabard, like most kingsmen do. Instead, sporting a tricorn, he was, and on a metal helm, no less.” Two beautiful and buxom, dark-haired, blue-eyed sisters who lived at the far edge of the village watched as the horseman galloped away.

“Oh, Romy, I do believe it was a knight errant, for I saw armor ’neath his cloak.”

“You are right, Vivette: armor indeed he wore. I wonder why he did not stop to dally?”

“Mayhap the other knight errants did not tell him of us.” Romy sighed. “Perhaps none told him of the manner of our. . hmm. . entertainment.”

“His loss,” said Vivette, plucking flowers to weave into her very long hair.

Romy, plucking flowers as well, sighed and said, “Ours too.”

. .

Nigh the noontide, Regar and Flic and Fleurette passed through a twilight border to come into a dismal mire, bogland left and right of the road, with cypresses and black willows and dark, gnarled oaks twisting up out from the quag, some trees alive, others quite dead. And from these latter, long strands of lifeless gray moss hung adrip from withered branches, as if the parasite had sucked every last bit of sustenance from the limbs, hence, not only murdering the host, but killing itself as well. ’Round the roots and boles of the trees and past sodden hummocks, scum-laden water receded deep into the dimness beyond, the yellow-green surface faintly undulating, as if some vast creature slowly breathed in the turgid muck below. Ocherous reeds grew in clumps and clusters, and here and there rotting logs covered with pallid toadstools and brownish ooze jutted out at shallow angles from the dark sludge, the swamp slowly ingesting slain trees. Mounded above the fen, the road itself twisted onward, into the shadowy morass ahead.

Within these miserable environs Regar stopped to change mounts, and he paid little heed to the surroundings, as he moved the black to the end of the line and switched the saddle to the bay.

But Flic nervously eyed the bog as from within there came soft ploppings and slitherings. What made these sounds, Flic could not see.

“Why are you uneasy?” asked Fleurette.

“Because this reminds me of the swamp that Lord Borel and I passed through on our way to rescue Lady Michelle. If it is anything like that one, we best be on our way, for there could be an invisible monster living herein.”

“It’s not invisible monsters we should worry about,” said Fleurette, pointing, “but those.”

Gnats and bloodsuckers and biting flies came swarming out from the bog, drawn by the odor of lathered horses.

But just as they reached the road, Regar jerked the cinch tight and leapt into the saddle, and with a “Yah!” away from the oncoming cloud he cantered, the road more or less following the line of the bee.

Slowly the way ascended, and the mire to either side diminished. Walking, trotting, cantering, varying the gaits to preserve the horses, by midafternoon Regar’s small group broke free of the swamp to come into low rolling hills. They paused by a clear-running stream to water the horses and to give them some grain and to feed Buzzer